Barack Obama, Constitutional Conservative?

I’ve been just as frustrated as other progressives with the Obama administration’s lack of … progressivity. And I’ve been befuddled by why it hasn’t happened. Why didn’t he take the lead on redesigning our health-insurance system, for instance, instead taking the politically bruising months-long course of delegating its drafting to Congress?

Here’s a possiblity.

Obama — constitutional law professor that he is — is at his very core a constitutional conservative. He believes that laws should be created by Congress, not the executive branch. And unlike so-called conservatives on the right, he’s ready to live by those convictions, sacrificing both short term policy goals and political considerations on the altar of those beliefs.

I think it’s quite possible that when the biographies are written, when the historians get a chance to go through the presidential papers and interview key members of the administration, that constitutional conservatism will emerge as at least one of Obama’s defining characteristics as president.

But I’m not sure. What do you think?


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One response to “Barack Obama, Constitutional Conservative?”

  1. JazzBumpa Avatar

    I hadn’t thought about it in quite this way, but have no reason to disagree with you.

    IMO, Obama is to the Right of Clinton, and Clinton was to the right of Eisenhower.

    The reason for this Administration’s lack of progressivity is that it is not headed by a progressive. B Hoover Obama is a right-leaning centrist.

    Cheers!
    JzB