NP; looks like the Dem Primary is kinda like Iceland Sparring.....

[Robert Mahnke]

To me, the word "centrist" suggests not only a certain set of political views, but also a disposition to self-consciously position oneself according to what others think, to the right of the left and the left of the right.  I hesitate to try to define how far left he is, partly because the two-dimensional model is inadequate (see e.g. this: http://markschmitt.typepad.com/decembrist/2008/03/the-communitari.html), and I think one of Obama's greatest strengths as a candidate and -- I hope -- as a President is that he expands our sense of what is possible.  The single best thing I have read explaining what Obama is up to is this article by Mark Schmitt:

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_theory_of_change_primary

If you're at all interested, I highly recommend it.  Both links are from a guy named Mark Schmitt, whom I think is an unusually perceptive observer of American politics.  Schmitt's thesis in this article about theories of change has been picked up and repeated by others, and I've read that Obama then started incorporating language from it in his speeches (shades of Heisenberg, I suppose).

As his student, it was often difficult to tell where Obama came out on particular issues.  He was teaching a seminar that covered sensitive issues, and he worked hard to make sure that students of all views felt comfortable expressing themselves, which probably meant that he injected his own views less.  He was very good at this.  (I recall asking the dean once why, if they were trying to improve women and minority faculty hiring, they didn't hire him as a full-time professor, rather than an adjunct, and the dean told me that they would have hired him in a second but that he seemed to be pursuing other things.  This was before he ran for office.)  But there was an article in the New York Times a while back (by Jodi Kantor, I think) about his time at Harvard Law School which suggested that he was much the same way then, too.  I think he understands that if you transmit too much from a particular frequency on the political spectrum, it becomes easy for others to block your signal.  


-----Original Message-----
>From: Michael Bailey <michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com>
>Sent: Mar 20, 2008 11:27 AM
>To: Pynchon Liste <pynchon-l at waste.org>
>Subject: Re: NP; looks like the Dem Primary is kinda like Iceland Sparring.....
>
>Robert Mahnke wrote:
>>
>>  FWIW, I took a class from Obama and never would describe him as a centrist,
>
>missed the "never" first time through, caught it this time
>-- how, then, would you describe him?
>
>also, in some ways a prof has quasi-dictatorial powers...
>did you find his exercise of them pleasant, did he earn
>the "consent of the governed"?