The Left has sprung a leak

The History Channel is on another Hitler bender so last night I rummaged around the DVR. I was rewarded for earlier compulsive recording with a show called "Engineering Disasters". One of the disasters featured was the St. Francis Dam break in 1928. The St. Francis Dam was a dam in northern LA County that was one of the final stops for water from central California. The entire system was created by William Mullholland, (who morphed into Mulwray in the film version - the brilliant Chinatown.) and it, in turn, created Los Angeles. The day before the dam broke killing over 400, Mr. Mullholland visited the dam which was clearly leaking badly. He said there was no problem and went home.
Go with me for a minute:
Today it occurred to me that one could argue that Obama's appointments so far are to the RIGHT of Bill Clinton's in 1992. The evil centrist that the Kos Kidz bashed mercilessly all year actually appointed Robert Reich - a bonefide liberal as part of his economic team. And it is easy to argue that Warren Christopher, Henry Cisnaros and Donna Shalala were to the Left of anyone Obama has picked thus far. In simplest terms: Obama has ignored the Left wing of his own party. Clinton did not. The vaunted "team of rivals" is actually just a list of Center-Right Washington and Wall Street insiders.

So far.

About that dam leak - it did not seem like much to the builder when he viewed it - then, within hours the dam broke. The Latte Liberal Obama Dam will leak but hold until about 3 weeks after he's sworn in. That's my bet.

I remember how roundly the Left trashed Bill Clinton early on. I supported Tom Harkin and Jerry Brown - both liberals - before coming to admire Clinton. The vocal Left was miserable about Clinton's nomination in 1992. So here, in 2008, we have a leaky dam of sorts holding back the cognitive dissonance of the committed Obamaton Latte Liberals. But the leaks are visible.
Criticisms of Obama's foreign policy team are if anything outstripped by indignation over his economic team.

His foreign policy team is populated by hawks and the economic team is Wall Street bred. This is not change. Many here and elsewhere have said for months that Obama will be Bush's real third term. This looks truer than ever. Obama's team will be more competent. Not hard. But the ideological differences are small. Certainly not what the most committed Pods expected. Forget about W's first term for an moment and the differences barely register with the second term. More war. More spending. A large "investment" package would be coming January 21st if McCain, W, or Mickey Mouse was President. Guantanamo would have been closed under McCain as well. (Those drunk on MSNBC continue to believe Obama will be magically ending the wars - denial on a grand scale. )

With the possible exception of Bill Richardson and Samantha Power, John McCain could have easily picked most of the same folks Obama has chosen. Even McCain picking his friend, Hillary Clinton, for something is not a big stretch of imagination. She garners grudging respect on the Right now.

Don't get me wrong, I like many of Obama's picks. General Shinseki at the V.A. is almost inspiring. And I've followed the Clintons long enough to know that Hillary will survive and thrive either by staying and serving ably at the State Department - or leaving if she needs to. Richardson goes from being useless to harmless and back in all his jobs - but he won't do any damage. Samantha Power won't win a battle with Hillary if one comes.

Obama's picks are not inspiring in the least. They are boilerplate. As for policy - expect change. It IS coming. But it won't be big change and is more the result of this historical moment than Obama. He will yank some policies back to the center - as well he should.

The only person the Obama Delusionists can pin their hopes on now - as it has always been - is Obama himself. The personality cult will plug the dam for a while. But a POTUS can only pretend to be the agent of change while administering the Washington status quo for so long.

Even the Latte Liberals are not that stupid.