Thank You November 7, 2012 Much more to say, but for today: 1. THANKS TO SO MANY OF YOU who were among the more than 4 million who helped fund our campaign, and/or among the million or so who volunteered, or the tens of millions who voted our way. I hope you feel as relieved as I do: to my mind, we re-elected a great president (see below, if you didn’t have a chance to read it yesterday). And elected a great new senator from Massachusetts and, from Wisconsin, the first openly gay senator in the nation’s history. 2. THANKS TO THOSE OF YOU WHO DISAGREE but have been willing to listen to my point of view nonetheless. It’s impressive and appreciated. I hope you will be pleasantly surprised as the economy continues to improve and we continue to make progress on our really big problems (see below, if you didn’t have a chance to read it yesterday). From New York Magazine, in part: The Case for Obama: Why He Is a Great President. Yes, Great. By Jonathan Chait . . . Obama’s agenda has generally hewed to the consensus of mainstream economists and policy experts. What makes the agenda radical is that, historically, vast realms of policy had been shaped by special interests for their own benefit. Plans to rationalize those things, to write laws that make sense, molder on think-tank shelves for years, even generations. They are often boring. But then Obama, in a frenetic burst of activity, made many of them happen all at once. Bipartisan panels of economists had long urged Medicare to reform its payment methods to curb perverse incentives by hospitals and doctors to run up costs as high as possible; Obama overcame fierce resistance in Congress in order to craft, as part of Obamacare, a revolution in paying for quality rather than quantity. He eliminated billions of dollars in useless subsidies to banks funneling (at no risk) government loans to college students. By dangling federal public-education grants, Obama unleashed a wave of public-school reform, over the objections of the most recalcitrant elements of the teachers union movement. And he forced Wall Street to accept financial regulations that, while weaker than ideal, were far tougher than anybody considered possible to get through Congress. It is noteworthy that four of the best decisions that Obama made during his presidency ran against the advice of much of his own administration. Numerous Democrats in Congress and the White House urged him to throw in the towel on health-care reform. Many of his own advisers, both economists steeped in free-market models and advisers anxious about a bailout-weary public, argued against his decision to extend credit to, and restructure, the auto industry. On Libya, Obama’s staff presented him with options either to posture ineffectually or do nothing; he alone forced them to draw up an option that would prevent a massacre. And Obama overruled some cautious advisers and decided to kill Osama bin Laden. The latter three decisions are all highly popular now, but all of them carried the risk of inflicting a mortal political wound, like Bill Clinton’s health-care failure and Jimmy Carter’s attempted raid into Iran. (George W. Bush, presented with a similar option, did not strike bin Laden.) In making these calls, Obama displayed judgment and nerve. . . . A year ago, I wrote about the pervasive disillusionment felt by Obama’s supporters. It is a sentiment that has shadowed every Democratic president since Franklin Roosevelt, and even Roosevelt provoked long bouts of agony and disillusionment among his supporters. All were seen by many Democrats at the time as failures, weaklings, or unprincipled deal-makers. It’s true that all of them, including Obama, have made terrible errors. What this tells us, though, is that we need some realistic baseline against which to measure them. Obama can boast a record of accomplishment that bests any president since Roosevelt, and has fewer demerits on his record than any of them, including Roosevelt. . . . If you remain unconvinced, please read the whole thing. And if you get a chance, I again commend The NEW New Deal. You will feel better still. Oh, happy day.