Blog about sports and politics and whatever else seems interesting from a guy (formerly) in Mexico.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Wrong Mindset
It seems to me that seeking to analyze Obama's recovery plan based on whether it will make the US look more or less like France is worthless for anyone who's not a conservative operative interested in moving the debate to more friendly terrain.
2 comments:
Anonymous
said...
I don't get the guy. For wa while he seemed like a standard issue "serious" pseudo-liberal hawkish type. Then he ran a series of columns about Iran (about 8 straight, up until last week) that were really lucid and would have pissed off even liberal hawks, let alone the conversative kind. Now this odd piece. I think it has more to do with being a conflicted Francophile than anything deeper, but it's certainly weird considering how well aware Cohen is of the role that France plays in US political discourse.
I cant really find an adequate label for him either, which I guess is points in his favor. Although Im generally not crazy about his writing. Whatever the case, it's a bizarre way to look at the recovery plan. I'm all for reading meditations about the differences between the French and American national character, but I dont think that in and of itself is relevant to the stimulus/budget. It's about whether it gets the economy up and humming again, and everything else takes a backseat. Honestly, if the two choices were 2 percent growth for the next 20 years using the "French" model, or a decade-long depression using the "conspicuously not French" model, I dont think too many people would object to the former option. Of course I'm not saying it's an either-or scenario, but I dont really see where us turning into France should be involved in any rational assessment of the recovery plan.
2 comments:
I don't get the guy. For wa while he seemed like a standard issue "serious" pseudo-liberal hawkish type. Then he ran a series of columns about Iran (about 8 straight, up until last week) that were really lucid and would have pissed off even liberal hawks, let alone the conversative kind. Now this odd piece. I think it has more to do with being a conflicted Francophile than anything deeper, but it's certainly weird considering how well aware Cohen is of the role that France plays in US political discourse.
I cant really find an adequate label for him either, which I guess is points in his favor. Although Im generally not crazy about his writing. Whatever the case, it's a bizarre way to look at the recovery plan. I'm all for reading meditations about the differences between the French and American national character, but I dont think that in and of itself is relevant to the stimulus/budget. It's about whether it gets the economy up and humming again, and everything else takes a backseat. Honestly, if the two choices were 2 percent growth for the next 20 years using the "French" model, or a decade-long depression using the "conspicuously not French" model, I dont think too many people would object to the former option. Of course I'm not saying it's an either-or scenario, but I dont really see where us turning into France should be involved in any rational assessment of the recovery plan.
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