Last year when I doing “Obama as a Reverse Von Clausewitz” riffs in regards to what seemed like a deliberate attack on the American middle class, I thought I was being a tad hyperbolic. But check out this line from a reader of legendary conservative’s conservative Andrew Sullivan, as spotted by Dan Riehl:
Don’t forget the President is still following the script from Doris Kearns-Goodwin’s A Team of Rivals, along with all his other readings on Lincoln. President Lincoln calmly, deliberately, and with a lot of mistakes and few successes for several years led us to victory in the Civil War. Oftentimes he was at odds with his own party, at least the “Radical Republican” wing. Lincoln, and much of the North, even believed he would lose the election for a second term until Sherman took Atlanta. That’s the model Obama is following with regard to the Republican insurgency, slow, steady, smart, and ultimately, successful (we still hope).
Somebody’s taking their moral equivalent of war analogies just a tad too seriously. Not to mention forgetting which party was which during the 19th century. (Robert Byrd could not be reached for comment.)
Actually, the better analogy to Lincoln would probably be that a lot of Obama’s supporters — including many of the more fervent media pundits — probably wouldn’t mind seeing Barack suspend the writ of habeus corpus, if that’s what it takes to get his agenda passed.
You’ve got to really want to see it – just squint (or put on a pair of Walter Duranty-strength glasses), click your heels together and dream a little dream. It works for anything:
Remember Sean Penn in his leaky rowboat with photographer and red plastic cup? : Washington crossing the Delaware.
How about the 9/11 hijackers? : Just like the Minutemen; A broad spectrum of society.
The repeated catastrophic failure of collectivism? : Merely incomplete implementation. We can do it right this time, trust us!
It’s easy, and fun.
Do you really think Obama read Team of Rivals?
Remember, he’s not in it.