Saturday, December 26, 2009

Right-O About That

With only a touch of irony, columnist Frank Rich observes in The New York Times that Tiger ought be Time's Man of the Year because he's emblematic of America's ability to mythologize heroes (and leaders) while avoiding even a fleeting skepticism of what's beneath the surface of our personal biases. This observation is less about morality than about habits of mind forged on the left and the right by political spin.

"Though the American left and right don't agree on much, they are both now coalescing around the suspicion that Barack Obama's brilliant presidential campaign was as hollow as Tiger's public image -- a marketing scam designed to camouflage either his covert anti-American radicalism (as the right sees it), or spineless timidity (as the left sees it)."

Describing ObamaCare as genuine reform, he told us "the American people will have the (health care) they deserve ... ." A cynic would say he's right about that.