It's been a while, so let's see if I can do this without rambling incoherently for two or three pages. Here goes!
On Part the First, P, you're absolutely right; as I recall, you were postulating that President Obama's popularity, in conjunction with his obvious intelligence and (I think) even-handedness would ensure that he would hold the upperhand in the never ending contest between the Executive and Legislative branches. I admit that I hadn't viewed the administration's having the bill wholly crafted by the House in the same light as you P. I can see where you're coming from though, even if my gut tells me that my original interpretation seems more likely. I suspect that's because of the different lenses through which we each view Obama so early in his Presidency, before he's really had a chance to define himself. As an aside, I tend to believe, as you do, that he truly does want Republican support for his measures. My imagined rationale for that urge is however filtered through the same aforementioned lens, so I tend to view that in a more cynical light. Does he want their input, or is he trying to avoid conflict for it's own sake?...Not that that's necessarily a bad thing. After eight years of on-high pronouncements from the White House, I welcome a move in the opposite direction.
Moving on to the second point, the work of Deng Xiaoping should be required study at the undergraduate level for any liberal arts student. I may have issues with some of his political decisions (I hail from a nation that prizes individual liberty and free choice, so I'm naturally going to be condemnatory on issues ranging from Tiananemen to Tibet), but his economic policy directions were foresighted and help lift, in a very real way, hundreds of millions of people out of poverty. But I digress.
President Obama is a pragmatist, he's not a raging lefty and, you're right, he makes me look exciting. He's an incredibly boring 40-something with a beautiful family whose greatest political aspect is that he's got the charisma of Bill Clinton, without the sleaziness...also, it helps that he's never performed an exorcism. I still believe that the existing evidence points to his being too pragmatic. That being said, your defense of his career from the 2004 convention forward during our drink at that restaurant following the Maher/Coulter smackdown was well thought out, and I freely admit that his only real 'sin' since that time has been hubris which, again, is needed in a politician and is after all what's brought us to this (happy) day. I think the greatest threat at this point is that the President begins to believe his supporters' claims that he rose clean and pure from the depths of the political cesspool, held aloft by the seraphim of Hope and Change. He doesn't seem to be falling into that trap though, much to his credit.
On the final point, thanks for your perspective there P. Truly; I appreciate it. On the God front, I've been trying to refine that argument of late, figuring that after nearly a decade, it was getting a bit stale. I readily admit that science, in its pure form, is not a faith. Aristotle, al-Haytham, Bacon, Galileo, and so many others made sure of that over the long and arduous development of the scientific method. However, just as no rational third party observer would equate the religious thought and depth of Thomas Aquinas with that of Joe the Plumber, neither do I think that you can honestly equate the stereotypical faith the majority of the population seems to place in scientific achievements with the steadied rationality of the men and women working to make the discoveries and inventions that add to the collective body of human knowledge.
Two examples to try and better articulate that. The recent stem cell debate has been led in large part by those claiming that the things are likely to be a panacea for all manner of ills, from Alzheimer's to paralysis to retinal degeneration. They're a blank slate onto which people pour their hopes and dreams. Talk to the men and women in the field, and the response is far more measured. They believe in the technology (as do I), but also believe it has firm limits. But that's not what people want to hear. They want to believe that 'scientists' will be able to use this latest alchemical concoction to cure whatever ails or may ail them. You find a similar mentality in the less urgent realm of climate change. Republican or Democrat, both firmly believe that science will magically find a way to solve the issue by devising new economically sound power generation tools; the foolishness over 'clean coal' springs immediately to mind.
Humans crave certainty. Even those who believe in a higher power tend to attribute to modern science abilities it is not likely to possess. In this way, science is treated as a religion, with 'scientists' taking on the role of the High Priests. We ask the priests to solve our problems, and offer up tithings to them as they beseech the Gods. Is this a perfect analogy? No, of course not. Science actually stands a chance of succeeding in solving whatever issue it's attacking, wheras Zeus and Ahura Mazda very rarely bothered to stop the plague or bestow more advanced defensive weaponry on their worshippers. But my contention, poorly worded though it may be at 2:00 in the morning, is that this is how science is treated and viewed by the vast majority of the population. Thoughts?
