Broder Should Stick To Writing Castle Press Releases

David Broder, the “dean” of pundits writes a particularly disgusting column today.

Was Christmas Day 2009 the same kind of wake-up call for Barack Obama that Sept. 11, 2001, had been for George W. Bush?

The near-miss by a passenger plotting to blow up an American airliner as it flew into Detroit seems to have shocked this president as much as the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon did the last.

Both presidents had had plenty of warnings in the form of threats and even incidents. But both were caught off guard: Bush reading to a classroom of youngsters; Obama on a family vacation in Hawaii.

Did I read that right? Did he just compare an attempted attack by an incompetent terrorist wannabe with the 9/11 attacks that killed 3,000 Americans?

The larger question is how this affects the long-term mindset and priorities of the new president. Before Sept. 11, Bush’s agenda consisted largely of a set of tax cuts and an ambitious education program (No Child Left Behind), both of which were on their way to easy passage in a compliant Congress.

Obama, on the other hand, came into Christmas Day with an overloaded set of self-imposed tasks. He was winding down one inherited war in Iraq and expanding another one in Afghanistan. He was renegotiating our relations with other powers in the world and attempting to enlist their help in confronting outlaw regimes in Iran and North Korea. And simultaneously, at home, he was being pressed to rescue a badly wounded economy while lobbying a reluctant but allied Congress to pass controversial, ambitious changes in health care, climate control and financial regulation.

Is Broder hoping that Obama will stop worrying about that silly stuff, like the lives of Americans and get some more belligerence on? You know the funny thing – I think Broder’s column was supposed to be complimentary of Obama.