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Obama tries to duck liberal label

James Forsyth

Sunday, 24th February 2008

A key part of John McCain’s campaign strategy is to portray Barack Obama as just another liberal Democratic presidential candidate. This line could be effective as Obama is liberal, National Journal ranked him as the most liberal member of the Senator, and the only issue on which Obama has really broken with Democratic orthodoxy is education.

In a campaign speech in Austin yesterday, Obama pushed back against this charge:

"Oh, he's liberal,” he said. “He's liberal. Let me tell you something. There's nothing liberal about wanting to reduce money in politics that is common sense. There's nothing liberal about wanting to make sure [our soldiers] are treated properly when they come home.”

Continuing on his riff: "There's nothing liberal about wanting to make sure that everybody has healthcare, but we are spending more on healthcare in this country than any other advanced country. We got more uninsured. There's nothing liberal about saying that doesn't make sense, and we should so something smarter with our health care system. Don't let them run that okie doke on you!"

Obama’s best chance of shaking off this charge is that he doesn’t talk in the language of contemporary American liberalism. Instead, he sounds like a new frontier liberal—a political agenda that had far broader support than the liberalism of McGovern and Mondale. But if he is to really refute it, he needs to show that he has a post-partisan governing agenda to match his post-partisan campaigning style.