- Let’s be honest. There’s a clear link with Islam (£) by David Aaronovitch, The Times
- Intellectual property is an innovation killer by Joshua Lachkovic , KernalMag
- Dumb Idea Hall of Fame by Aaron David Miller, Foreign Policy
- Nadine Dorries threatens Cameron's Party Leadership by Nadine Dorries, Daily Mail
- Boris set for party leadership? by Traci Watson, USAToday
- Anti-Israel students deface Star of David at student conference by Jonny Paul, Jerusalem Post
- Jihadist Videos on University Facebook by Rupert Sutton, Huffington Post UK
- Skintland: Heads I Win, Tails You Lose by Alex Massie, Spectator UK
- Green tax on conservatories by James Slack and Tamara Cohen, Daily Mail
- Saudi princess: What I'd change about my country by Staff writers, BBC
A little to the left: Mehdi Hasan wants leftist democrats to challenge Obama. Why so delusional?
Guardianistas dole out strange advice, even to their friends. Hasan's ideologically driven recommendations are full of sound and fury but signify nothing.
Regular writing requires regular inspiration – or in my case, anger. And where better to find such a muse than in a shoddily concocted piece by Mehdi Hasan, senior political editor at the New Statesman and the man who would be king to queen Polly Toynbee’s deserted fiefdom of ‘progressive majoritarians’.
Arguing that President Barack Obama should be challenged from the left, not the right in the forthcoming US Presidential elections is akin to signing a confession which reads, “I know little about American politics, but I believe that lurching left is the most obvious solution to America’s problems.”
If Hasan wanted to save himself the time of writing a thousand words, he could well have just provided that statement with a picture of his future vision for America.
Indeed, I am poking excessive fun, and no I don’t believe that Barack Obama is a raving communist. But we do know that he’s a socialist whose poll ratings decline when he attempts to enact ideologically driven policies upon the American people. Notably, his poll numbers climb when he makes concessions to the right.
Earth to Hasan – not only was your ‘progressive majority’ smashed last week in Britain’s referendum, but the United States has swiftly rebuked such notions and will continue to do so. Sixty-four percent of Americans think the country under Barack Obama is heading in the wrong direction, yesterday’s Rasmussen poll tells us. Pushing harder with a left-liberal agenda is a sure fire way to ensure Democrats rot in the wilderness of opposition for the next eight years.
However Hasan considers it a fait accompli that Obama will return for a second term and I tend to agree. But this isn’t on the back of his leftist reforms. Obama’s popularity is given a shot in the arm whenever he kowtows to the centrists and the right-wingers. Like when he folded on the public option on the healthcare debate, when he extended the Bush tax-cuts and there was that time he had the world’s most wanted terrorist killed, remember?
So on what basis does Hasan think that this leader of cattle (yes, watch this video) should lurch left, taking the US economy and recalcitrant public with him? On sheer ideology of course. Sheer baseless, speculative, far-left ideology.
If we’re (often correctly) using the term ‘extremist’ to describe members of the ‘tea party’ in the United States – may I suggest that Mehdi Hasan’s piece reveals his own inner extremist. That of the regressive left. Those who would reinstate the old Clause IV of the Labour Party constitution and nationalise economies in deadly swathes.
This hot air is wholly appreciated from the centre-right. In the United Kingdom, conservatives are viewed as strong on the economy and the vast number of Hasan’s readers at the New Statesman are scratching their heads at Ed Miliband’s unpopularity. Who would’ve thought that he ordained by the militant unionistas would go down like a lead balloon with the British public?
Obama’s recent poll leaps are clearly a result of pursuing George W. Bush’s policy of hunting down Osama bin Laden – and they won’t last long either. This is a welcome vindication for conservatives and those willing to strike a balance between their own professional beliefs and public opinion. A trait Hasan wishes Obama would throw to the lions.
N.B. For the sake of full disclosure of just how ‘liberal and progressive’ Hasan is by the way, see here. Something in my gut tells me the Democrats would do well to steer well clear of his suggestions.
Also: It appears the Washington Post's Eugene Robinson made the claim about the GOP candidates resembling the 'motley crew' from the 'Star Wars bar scene' a day before Hasan's piece in the Guardian. Plagiarise much?
Raheem Kassam is the Associate Editor of The Commentator. You can follow him on Twitter: @RaheemJKassam
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I still chuckle everytime I remember the day he was made "Senior Political Editor".
His apparent answer to everything is "More Statist Control, More Socialism".
Careful, he despises those who pull him up on his intellectual shortcomings - I expect this forum to be littered with his insults in no time.
The worry is that these new metro-leftists have not read deeply enough nor experienced real political history to realise that all leftist states end in chaos & / or tyranny.
I look forward to Mehdi becoming a small C Conservative as we all do when we get older & wiser & grow up a little.
The killing of the world's most wanted terrorist story would have been a good boost to his numbers, had he not messed it up so badly.
Claims that he personally directed the raid via the Nave Seal's helmet cams fell apart as soon as someone wanted to see any evidence at all that the seals had actually killed Osama.
They had to admit that the helmet cams were switched off the whole time that they were inside the compound. Obama's poll numbers are on the way south again now.
US politics is a very difficult area. But Mr Hassan should recall that Americans always vote for strong leaders and a buoyant economy.
Obama hasn't yet sorted either. Luckily for him the republicans are going through their William Hague period and aren't too much of a threat.
It's 13 years of Labour don't you know - they ruined this country and we have people like Hasan, Toynbee, Maguire and the ilk still around - God help us!
Does he still live with his parents?
Sure sign of a accomplished 'winner' we should all 'intently' be listening to with his 'sage' like advice and opinions......
/obvious sarcasm.
Leave the politics for the adults please Mr Hasan not man-childs still operating mentally with sixth form cognitive reasoning skills.
Sandra in Accounts +1
Medhi is an intellectual desert, a vast saharan plain that is unable to nurture life.
He's rather typical of the extreme left, bumptious and full of his own extreme self-importance, spouting his bigoted lessons from the books of Marx/Lenin/Engels/Trotsky and our dear friend Mao. And like his ilk the world over the man has never had any real experience of life, work, employment and balancing income and expediture.
People like Mehdi are best left to themselves and the small coterie's of like minded self-delusional types that occupy the intellectual mines of the left.
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One large flaw in the piece that you miss, is he says Democrats who faced primary challenges then lost the election, and thus maybe Obama shouldn't face a primary challenge. His reasoning is backward.
A better reasoning might be: Politicians are self-interested. Thus they will challenge weak leaders, since they have a large chance of winning and won't challenge where they have little chance of winning.
Therefore, weak Democrat Presidents, who don't have a clear route to victory at a General Election, will face primary challenges. By contrast, strong ones do not. Thus, since Obama is a strong candidate for re-election (as even Mehdi's noticed), he will not face a primary challenge.