State of the Union- A change in perspective

State of the Union : a change in perspective

I found the overall frame of President Obama’s State of the Union speech  most interesting, the U.S. economy needs to grow to catch up with other countries.  “We need to Out-Innovate, Out Educate, and Out-Build  the rest of the world,” or  our own standard of living will continue to decline.

This speech accepts the end of U.S. economic domination of the world economy a perspective made clear in the world wide financial crisis of 2007/2009.  The U.S. based corporations need to invest and the U.S. government needs to invest in crating a new future.

This change in perspective is not great, but it is realistic.

The  promise  of America should be a good job for all,  the opportunity to have  a rewarding career, and the chance for a life that is more than simply the workplace.  The austerity paradigm underlying the tax and budget cut mania is the enemy of human progress.  It does not promote good jobs, rewarding   careers, nor a fulfilling life.

And, this from the N.Y.Times

Responding to The State of the Union

In Writings of Obama, a Philosophy Is Unearthed

Duane Campbell

         The book Reading Obama may well offer some significant insights into the political viewpoints of President Obama.   In addition, it is a prolonged essay concerning how the author sees the political philosophy of pragmatism and a history of how pragmatism has served in the U.S.

         There are several interesting issues.  Can a scholar describe well the political philosophy of an important leader by reading books by the President and reading the transcripts of his speeches?   Is it far too early to be describing the philosophy of Barack Obama after only two years in office?

            I found the book delightful in a number of ways.  I particularly enjoyed Prof. Kloppenberg’s descriptions of the development of pragmatism as a political philosophy.    The book is as much an essay on pragmatism as it is a description of the Obama philosophy.  That is, the author is promoting intellectual pragmatism as a preferred philosophy and using the Obama experience as device to describe concrete implementation issues of pragmatism and the ascendance of pragmatism as a philosophy.

            Certainly Barack Obama, as described by Kloppenberg, is a significant intellectual.  I am uncomfortable with the device of describing a viewpoint held by one or another of Obama’s professors at Harvard and then asserting that Barack Obama learned and adopted this particular position., or the summary of a position taken by a professor in the Harvard Law Review while Obama was editor and assuming that Obama adopted this particular nuanced position.   This seems to me over interpretation.