If you're hoping for Obama to take unconventional steps, to cross with insiders...

[CreekDog]

It will be at odds with those who he has surrounded himself with.

Although he was quite an unconventional candidate when he ran, and though his campaign was inventive in ways other campaigns could only have dreamed of, his governance seemed so set on both appearing reasonable and projecting stability that he appointed precious few that would give him advice contrary to the financial and foreign policy insiders that surround him now.

It wouldn't bother me to have a Timothy Geithner around as much, if there were a Paul Krugman or Robert Reich to check their advice. There really isn't that person --the closest is Elizabeth Warren and she was added late in the game and I don't know how much she weighs in on "jobs" questions. It also wouldn't bother me as much that a hawkish Hillary Clinton or Robert Gates were offering advice on, say, Libya, if I knew a true dove and an unconventional thinker with respect to projecting military power were also in the room with similar clout.

I understand that you need some insiders to actually run an administration, but you need a fair amount of outsiders to make it known what the administration is running for.

And before some jump on me, I'll vote for Obama, I understand the choices and I don't doubt his sincerity (you can decide for yourself if you do). I just doubt that he's put the right combination of people around him that actually share the values and politics that he ran on. And as for toughness and shrewdness in negotiations, most of that talent has been aimed at shoring up the financial system, but unfortunately the best efforts shore up the top more than the bottom. And from a political perspective, the toughest stances have been towards the left, the ones that actually believe in the policies Obama ran on, than towards the people who think it was just talk (The centrists) and the people that oppose him (The Republicans).

As imaginative as Obama has been in the past, being President separates him from the people he learned to speak to when he first ran, people like us that volunteered when that was more important than money. The problem of the Presidential bubble can be fixed by having the right counsel, the right combination of people around him to hear and stand up for an idea that the insiders don't want to do.

Does Obama know how badly he needs some of these people around him in the midst of a stagnant recovery and in the face of default? Does Obama have the political team that will fight for the most effective ideas or are they afraid of those ideas and prefer more centrist, Third Way style ones? I'm sure his political advisors see the advantages of centrist policies designed to appeal to the widest range of people and offend the fewest, but the downside is the policies that accompany it are less economic stimulus than is needed right when demand is low. I'm sure the political advisors see the advantages of status quo in foreign policy, but the downside there is that this policy is collapsing under its own weight as we watch.

But what do I know. I'm just posting on some message board somewhere. He's got Bernanke, Geithner, Clinton, Gates, Panetta and all their vast knowledge and experience, advising him on the important issues.

And what do I know? All I know is that everything's not working nearly as well as they say it is.

[DrDan]

1. it sure isn't

[quaker bill]

2. I would disagree that he was an unconventional candidate

He was only unconventional in that he was prepared to do what it took to win both the primary and general election. This would make him seem unconventional compared to the usual 22 State Democratic Presidential candidate, but there was no real magic to it. He knew Hillary had the money and the connections to state organizations, so he looked for places where these big blue state advantages did not exist or weren't being used and spent relatively minor amounts of funds to take these races without significant organized opposition. This might seem unconventional but it was actually just smart.

Otherwise, he took the Howard Dean playbook from 2004 and ran it far better. The Dean campaign provided plenty of evidence that this approach would work. Obama had naturally better oratory and picked a much better staff to implement it, but the path had already been trodden. This is less unconventional than it would seem, Dean had armies of young volunteers as well.

He was unconventional in that unlike alot of previous democratic candidates, he actually played to win, not squeak by. His positions on the vast array of things were typical democratic center-left, hardly unconventional.

I think he has governed pretty much as I expected, given the context. In rosier economic times with larger majorities in both houses, I expect he might have done differently, but that has not been the situation.

[Name removed]

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