Alter on Krugman

Krugman has complained about Obama's insistence on having all the players at the table to talk about healthcare, implying that Obama is naive about politics and that this will not accomplish much of anything. I've been a bit reluctant to take sides on the Obama-Krugman spats, as I respect both men. I think Jonathan Alter makes a strong argument supporting Obama's approach to politics:

FDR's third-term success, dominated by World II, was dependent on his unifying the country.

Similarly, Woodrow Wilson's big legislative triumphs over entrenched interests in 1913 (for example, an income tax), Lyndon Johnson's in 1965 (Medicare and the Voting Rights Act) and Bill Clinton's in 1993 (painful tax increases) were achieved with legislative skill, not brute force and a populist message.

Krugman is a populist. He writes that if nominated, Obama would win, "but not as big as a candidate who ran on a more populist platform." This is facile and ahistorical. How many 20th Century American presidents have been elected on a populist platform? That would be zero, Paul.