"Conciliation" or "Persuasion"?

By Ankush

I had high hopes for Larissa MacFarquhar's profile of Barack Obama, but ultimately I don't think it breaks much, if any, ground: What you get is the requisite (if interesting) personal history, the commentary on Obama's mostly reserved demeanor on the campaign trail, and -- the centerpiece of this profile -- much ado about his interest in consensus-building.

But can you really call someone a "conciliator" (as the title of the profile does) if you pay so little attention to the man's actual policy positions? MacFarquhar mentions that Obama publicly advocated removing the troop withdrawal timetable from the Iraq supplemental in the event of a Bush veto, and that he has "one of the most liberal" voting records in the Senate, but that's basically it.

If your thesis, however, is that Obama pursues consensus as an end in itself, you really do need to identify specific issues on which he has compromised or demonstrated his willingness to compromise. You need to try to substantively answer the question of whether the rhetoric is designed to draw people from both parties to some sort of middle ground (which isn't the same thing as the true political "center") or whether it's designed to draw people to his positions. If it's the latter, then a better word than "conciliation" is probably "persuasion."  It will only seem like conciliation if you wish he were further to the left than he actually is.

Absent that sort of inquiry, these pieces are basically filled with airy quotes -- from his book, from people who know him from law school, and from the leisurely interviews with which he appears to be rather generous. TNR's Isaac Chotiner, for instance, writes:

The worrying thing about the piece for Obama fans is that his thirst for consensus and unity ("One America") comes across as less a way to pragmatically achieve good policies than as a misplaced need for consensus as an end in itself.

I agree that's how he "comes across," except that in the absence of much policy detail, you're in no position to evaluate whether that impression -- the one MacFarquhar is passing along to you, not one that you're passively receiving from nowhere -- is accurate or not.

It's time for more reporters to start moving this story forward, rather than playing into the storyline (consciously or not) that Obama lacks substance.  Read his white papers; ask him about how his positions differentiate him from the Republican field and from his Democratic contenders; and then try to figure out whether his positions represent the maximal goals he would like to achieve or whether they're simply what he thinks he can achieve without offending too many people.  It's not that difficult.