Winning for the right reasons

George Will endorses Obama's ambitions in the Democratic party for all the right reasons.

Iowa's Histrionic Hucksters

Obama's not perfect. His commitments in Iraq are shaky. His commitments to the market are far from reassuring.

And, like me, George Will has to overlook Obama's strong advocacy, as with Bill Bradley, on one of his signature issues: campaign finance regulation.

But I think George's instincts are similar to mine. For all of Obama's weaknesses, he comes by his liabilities as well as his strengths honestly and thoughtfully and rather exploiting or inventing boogeymen that do not, in fact, exist. He also, and most importantly, happens to be thinking bigger and more constructively about how to resolve many of our most serious international policy messes, today, without having to defend our poor handling of such messes in the past.

Every Presidential race, I'm beginning to discover, is one long choice between less than ideal options.

This race is no different. But it would be nice to have candidates who genuinely have faith in the American people and their ability to resolve many of their own problems and keep their eye on issues that only the President can be responsible for and handling them better than in the past.

Obama's not my ideal candidate, in that respect. But he is better, I think, than his Democratic rivals. And George sees that for all the right reasons.

Bill Bradley looks set to endorse Obama, by the way. And any candidate that gets endorsements from Bill Bradley and George Will should be taken seriously if just as a matter of respect for thoughtful reflections of people who care about politics but have some perspective on its role, or lack thereof, in our lives.