Barone on Obama's Faulty Liberalism

The "Lyrical Left", Contentions, August 26, 2009. "Michael Barone has an article in today’s Washington Examiner that is—like all he writes—thought-provoking and worthy of a read. Titled 'Obama’s lyrical Left struggles with liberalism,' it argues that Obama is a member of the 'lyrical Left'—basically, a dove. But it wasn’t a dovish foreign policy that made the state big, argues Barone: it was the undovish liberals like Wilson and FDR who fought wars, because wars grow the state. As Barone concludes, 'A big-government president, Obama is learning, needs to be a war president first.' Well, maybe."

When Did Britain and the US Diverge?

Barone on the Anglo-American Divergence, Contentions, July 21, 2009. "Michael Barone has a column today at Real Clear Politics that’s summed up by its title: “Britain and United States Go In Different Directions.” His thesis is cogent, and to an extent correct: the Obama Administration is trying to drag the U.S. to the left (he might well have said that the Administration is trying to Europeanize it), whereas in Britain, the next government looks likely to be Conservative, and to be more interested in shrinking the state (or at least restraining its growth) than expanding it. This divergence is limited only by the fact that it’s not easy to change the direction of politics: whatever the situation, no matter what the crisis, the status quo has inertia on its side. Arguing with Michael Barone about U.S. politics is a losing proposition. But he does miss an important piece of the British context . . . ."