Is he mad enough?

June 17, 2010 - 11:54 AM

Much punditry has been spilled on the question of whether President Obama is teed off enough at BP for The World's Worst Oil Spill. Viz:

- More action, better words - Buffalo News Editorial
   ... Some observers have lamented that Obama has not blown his preternatural cool and gotten angry over the environmental disaster. But we probably wouldn't like it if he did, either.
   For one thing, grown men spitting in anger are seldom inspiring sights. For another, some of that anger would have to be directed, not at BP and its contractors, but at the American people for being so devoted to their unsustainably filthy habit of consuming energy like there was no tomorrow and expecting the government to somehow clean up the mess.
- BP—Blah Performance - Daniel Gross/Slate
   President Obama's Oval Office speech about the Gulf oil spill was almost enough to make you miss President George W. Bush. Maybe not the actual presidency of George W. Bush, but at least the platonic ideal of the presidency of George W. Bush—the MBA president, the chief executive as CEO.
- The Boring Speech Policy - Gail Collins/The New York Times
   I was hoping for a call to arms, a national mission as great as the environmental disaster that inspired it. After the terrorist attack, George W. Bush could have called the country to a grand, important new undertaking in which everyone sacrificed personal or regional advantage for the common good. The fact that he only told us to go shopping was the one unforgivable sin of his administration.
- Floating Above the Chaos - Tina Brown/The Daily Beast
   Obama seized the crisis, all right. But he praised people we've already lost confidence in -- and proved anew that the president doesn't know much about management.
- Democrats should show a little pride and purpose - E.J. Dionne/The Washington Post
   Why does it so often seem that Republicans are full of passionate intensity while Democrats lack all conviction?