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September 15, 2009

Bob Shrum: After Health Care, The Revolution Won't Be Stopped'

Topics: Political News and commentaries

I read this the same way Kathryn Jean Lopez does, and indeed see it as a threat:

Barack Obama was advised early in his presidency to focus on just one thing at a time and postpone health care for another year. The advice was pressed on him not just from outside observers, but from trusted aides inside the White House. He rejected it--and for that reason, among others, the health reform that's been delayed for a century, and which he will sign into law this fall, will carry his indelible stamp.

Afterwards, though, there will be no period of rest for this president, no time to rein in the scope of his activism. By necessity, he will confront a succession of fateful issues that will not wait. After health reform comes the deluge.

At home, Obama will have to push for a thorough overhaul of financial regulation, overcoming vested interests intent on a return to unfettered business as usual. He carried the case to Wall Street this week, on the anniversary of Lehman Brothers' collapse. Change, he argued, is essential to prevent another speculative boom and bust. He would prefer to shape it cooperatively, and he may have better luck with business than with the Republican Party of "no." But the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is already mounting the barricades; before the battle is over, a confrontational Obama may have to reprise FDR's denunciation of "the forces of greed and privilege."

[...] Add to all this the imperative of far-reaching but difficult reforms to shore up the financial stability of Social Security and Medicare--and it is clear that the coming months, and the years to follow, will not be a quiet time in Congress or the country. And that doesn't even count student loan reform, fiercely opposed by banks and middlemen profiteers; or new Obama nominations to the Supreme Court, which are not only very likely but nearly certain to be fiercely contested; or the expiration of the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy and an end to the ban on gays in the military, each of which will be assailed.

Change? Radical socialism, an apology-based naive foreign policy, and ignoring the recommendations of the military are not the kind of changes Americans voted for.

Posted by Richard at September 15, 2009 8:50 AM

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• Bob Shrum: After Health Care, The Revolution Won't Be Stopped' - Sep 15, 2009