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“[Hillary’s] hawkishness relative to Obama’s is mirrored in her circle of advisers. As my colleague Ari Berman has reported in these pages, it’s a circle dominated by people who believed and believe that waging pre-emptive war on Iraq was the right thing to do. Obama’s circle is made up overwhelmingly of people who thought the Iraq War was a mistake.”
- Along those lines, Emily Bazelon’s argument that electing a law prof would be a good idea is pretty convincing. It also raises a broader point: Obama may be “inexperienced” as a politician, but he’s experienced in other areas, such as community organizing and teaching law. Bush came in with a lot of experience in business, and that profoundly affected his administration. Rather than writing off Obama’s pre-political days as inexperience, it’s worth thinking about that time as experience.
