In a February 23 articled titled “Partisanship, by the bye,” The New Yorker compares President Obama to Mahatma Gandhi.
“Fifty years ago,” the New Yorker said, “the civil-rights movement understood that nonviolence can be an effective weapon even if–or especially if–the other side refuses to follow suit. Obama has a similarly tough-minded understanding of the political uses of bipartisanship, which, even if it fails as a tactic for compromise, can succeed as a tonal strategy: once the other side makes itself appear intransigently, destructively partisan, the game is half won. Obama is learning to throw the ball harder. But it’s not Rovian hardball he’s playing. More like Gandhian hardball.”
We’re not even sure what the hell that means, because the article is written in that smarmy, pseudo-intellectual style meant to impress the reader with the writer’s intellect more than the substance of the article itself.
But to tell you the truth, we also think Obama’s a lot like Gandhi. After all, both of their fathers had multiple wives. Both of them were “community organizers.” Both were attorneys. And both look so damn sexy with their shirts off.
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Let me translate this for you. It says, “Obama is so wonderful he’s even better at pretending to be bipartisan than those disgusting Republicans!”
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smarmy, pseudo-intellectual style – you got that right
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Now, make a note of when you first heard the term Rovian hardball. The next time you hear it will be when Katie Couric asks Sarah Palin what her take on the Rovian doctrine is.