Is it acting efficiently by responding forcefully and specifically in an age with constant, nonstop news cycles? Or is it empowering its critics? Also, read this roundup on the administration’s latest clash, with CNBC’s Jim Cramer.
One possibility: perhaps it is taking a calculated risk (based on the election results and polls) that the bulk of Americans want something to be done and that critics who oppose without offering highly specific counter proposals will not look good when viewed against a program (as flawed as some critics feel it should be). This gets back to the point that the current kind of political “debate” by top politicians and top media types in the early 21st century is dominated by the negative and name calling versus detailing with specificity alternative approaches…without that mad, angry, ranting response.
If so it is a calculated risk, indeed, since it’s easy to overstep…and find you’ve squashed yourself. But with his polls still high, the Obama team may feel it’s now or never to use clout that is not likely to remain as time goes on.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.