Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Obama = Bush?

Clinton has once again compared Obama to George W. Bush. This time it's on Obama's comments that he's not a bureaucracy guy, but a CEO type. Clinton again essentially said to voters, "we saw how well *that* worked" when Bush came into office with his M.B.A. education, but not knowing how to manage.

Such comparisons should be highly questionable on their face, since a successful presidency is the result of interactions of literally millions of variables. In this case, Obama's response was a very good one, saying that Bush was really on top of being on time, but that he didn't know how to listen to diverse viewpoints. It was a deft pivot back to a central theme of his campaign.

An aside: In recent debates, wide shots that included Hillary while others were talking included a lot of clenched jaws and icy stares. Tonight there is a great deal of nodding. Detente, if only temporarily.

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