Quote

In public, Barack Obama's giving the simple version of his beliefs for the mass public. In private, he can discuss it at a really high level.

Jonathan Chait

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Jonathan Chait
Age: 52
Born: 1972
Born: January 1
Columnist
Commentator
Journalist
the United States of America
Belief
Beliefs
Simple
Obama
Giving
Private
Really
Mass
Level
Levels
Discuss
Public
Version
High
Versions

More quotes by Jonathan Chait

Image
Barack Obama is pretty similar to the person you see in public, at press conferences. He's a little saltier, a little more sarcastic and cutting.
Jonathan Chait
Image
Obamaism is the future of America.
Jonathan Chait
Image
On Obamacare, every day that goes by I have more evidence that I wish I could put in my book, on how difficult it is for the Republicans to eliminate this law. They have no real alternative. They're afraid to take away health care from the 20 million people who now have it.
Jonathan Chait
Image
One of the things we've learned during the Obama era is how important norms are, because we've seen how the Republican Party behaved against Obama. So much of what they did was to smash pre-existing norms, which were nothing more than assumptions of how people would behave, which didn't have any real basis in rules or limits.
Jonathan Chait
Image
President Obama is so much smarter and a better communicator than members of Congress in either party. The contrast, side by side, is almost ridiculous.
Jonathan Chait
Image
That's an important Obama accomplishment: he raised taxes back to Bill Clinton levels, and made a major dent in inequality doing so. That's certain to be reversed, that's going to disappear. The Republicans are going to slash the rich's taxes.
Jonathan Chait
Image
Liberals tend to romanticize the past, past leaders' failures.
Jonathan Chait
Image
Barack Obama knows a lot about a lot of things.
Jonathan Chait
Image
I don't think the Democrats need a silver bullet.
Jonathan Chait
Image
In some ways, Trump is just going to continue the trend: by continuing the norm-smashing behaviour that Republicans used in opposition.
Jonathan Chait
Image
It's absolutely true that people who believed Hillary Clinton would be a decent or even strong nominee need to think why that got that wrong. Laying the entire blame at the feet of Russia and the FBI is not sufficient. The biggest reason things went wrong were her own choices and her own weaknesses.
Jonathan Chait
Image
Barack Obama is extremely smart.
Jonathan Chait
Image
The story of the Republican Party is of a far-right that has moved from the fringes of the party to a complete domination of the party. The moderate, mainstream and pragmatic leaders of the party have been pushed out or died off.
Jonathan Chait
Image
We're not going to be living in a world of abundant coal power in a hundred years.
Jonathan Chait
Image
In the long run, however much damage we come through, Obama's vision is the one that's going to be left standing. It's a question of how much pain and suffering America has to endure in the meantime.
Jonathan Chait
Image
It's possible that Trump will have success by staging jobs theatre, rather than creating jobs. It's the inverse of what Obama did: saving an enormous amount of jobs without having the televised theatre to go along with it.
Jonathan Chait
Image
I never thought Hillary Clinton was a very good politician.
Jonathan Chait
Image
Trump has a lot of authoritarian tendencies that need to be a serious concern.
Jonathan Chait
Image
Trump is what Obama critics think Obama is: Someone who's focused on symbolism rather than substance.
Jonathan Chait
Image
Conservatives are much more comfortable supporting the leader who's in power than liberals.
Jonathan Chait