Anyone pissed off at Obama over Lieberman should read "Roots"

Empowerer

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Tue Nov-18-08 08:29 PM
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Anyone pissed off at Obama over Lieberman should read "Roots"

In Alex Haley's classic, Kunta Kinte's father teaches him that when he has his enemy cornered, he should always allow him an opportunity to escape, for two reasons. First, a trapped enemy will fight you to the death and, causing you much more injury and harm. Second, allowing him to retain some dignity makes it likely that he will remember the grace you showed and return it in some measure in future dealings.

That's exactly what Obama is doing with Lieberman. He had him cornered but rather than beat him down, he allowed him to save face. As a result, Obama will reap future political benefits. And, even if Lieberman never reforms and continues to behave as he has, what's the harm? He already went after Obama with everything he had and fell very, very short. Obama ain't skeered of him.

Obama is showing himself to be a brilliant politician and strategist in ways that are likely to also make him a great leader.

For example, his tacit absolution of Lieberman, while on its face may seem to be puzzling, is, in my view, genius.

Let's weigh the costs and benefits, aside from the "Roots" analogy.

While drumming Lieberman out of his chairmanship and out of the party may have felt good, what impact would it have had? Deterrence? Hardly. If we were facing a wave of Democrats running over to endorse Republican candidates, perhaps. But Lieberman's behavior is not epidemic and it is unlikely that harsh punishment against him would have frightened other Democrats from doing the same down the road. And other than retribution or deterrence, I can't think of any benefit or practical result of beating him up in the way that some people are demanding of Obama - spitting at Lieberman would not bring Obama one step closer to accomplishing any of his policy objectives that he was voted in to achieve.

But the downside of doing such a thing is apparent. As obnoxious as he has been, Lieberman DOES have a strong record of voting with Democrats on the vast majority of issues. Smacking him upside the head and publicly humiliating him would likely have undercut that. Further, it could have led him to switch sides when Obama still needs his vote. And, very important, it would have demonstrated that Obama is not REALLY any different than any other politician - that he is vindictive and retaliatory, even when it doesn't result in any real benefit to him or his objectives

On the other hand, letting Lieberman keep his seat will reap enormous benefits to Obama. First, he has earned big chits from Lieberman, which he will no doubt call in when he sees fit. He is also cementing his reputation as someone who IS really different than other politicians and who is willing to take a different road, even when his own people complain about it.

Change is easy when we're just talking about it. But actually CHANGING the way things are done takes guts. Obama is showing he has the guts to do what he said he was going to do.

Obama may not be skeered of Lieberman, but I'm sure skeered of Obama - he's a baaaad man.