There is a virtually endless list of "100 Days" reviews of Obama's term. Most of them are not worth posting here (and probably weren't worth writing in the first place) -- but I've included here a couple of interesting reviews, some of Obama, and some of other people. Check'em out.
100 Days: Obama the Politician from the Guardian [of London]
"Much of what we've seen during the first 100 days is a continuation of the engaging and transformational leadership that Obama presented during the campaign. The savvy, strategic and analytical nature that allowed him to blindside his opponents during the campaign is still present."
White House Cheat Sheet: 100 Days Winners and Losers (Chris Cillizza) from the Washington Post
"On President Obama's 100th day in office, it's clear he has won far more than he has lost during his time in the White House."
At 100 Days, Obama Still Stumps GOP from Politico
"President Barack Obama has one indisputable accomplishment as he nears the fabled 100-day mark: Republicans remain baffled about how to combat him."
An Engaged, Yet Elusive, President (Gerald Seib) from the Wall Street Journal
"Just as the times of Barack Obama defy the easy descriptions and old labels, so too does the man himself. Indeed, if the first 100 days of President Obama's term have proved anything, it is that he is a hard man to classify. He has confounded, at one time or another, people at just about every spot across the political spectrum. He likes big and activist government, but he isn't a classic liberal. He is more of a social engineer than a guardian of the old welfare state."
Early Resolve: Obama Stand in Auto Crisis from the New York Times
Very interesting insight into how Obama is managing the auto bailout.
"By the time he sat down in the Oval Office to brief Michigan’s Congressional delegation, President Obama had made up his mind. Days earlier, he had decided to oust the head of General Motors and give it and Chrysler weeks to fix themselves. If they could not, he was prepared to let them go bankrupt, a prospect fraught with economic and political repercussions."
We Didn't Have to Lose Arlen Specter (Sen. Olympia Snow) from the New York Times
"It was as though beginning with Senator Jeffords’s decision, Republicans turned a blind eye to the iceberg under the surface, failing to undertake the re-evaluation of our inclusiveness as a party that could have forestalled many of the losses we have suffered."
GOP is Specter of its Old Self from Politico
"Arlen Specter’s break from Republicans is the latest in a trip-hammer series of reversals that leaves the GOP more beaten and less popular than either major party has been in decades."
GOP Confronts Its Future Viability from the Editorial Board of the Wall Street Journal
Note THE SOURCE on this commentary!
"Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Arlen Specter's decision to become a Democrat underscores his former party's political downward spiral."
Specter Switch Gives Conservatives Second Thoughts About "RINO Hunting' from the Washington Independent
"The Specter switch ... has given Republicans and conservatives a gut-check moment."
Will GOP Sleep Through Wake-Up Call? (Dan Balz) from the Washington Post
"The question now is whether Specter's departure will produce a period of genuine introspection by a party already in disarray or result in a circling of the wagons by those who think the GOP is better off without those whose views fall outside its conservative ideological boundaries."
Obama's 100 Days: The Media's Obamania from the Guardian [of London]
"Our glamorous new president has created something of a dilemma for journalists. On the one hand, they presumably want to provide fair, tough-minded coverage. On the other hand, Obama is awfully good for business. At a moment when the news industry is imploding, that's no small consideration."
McCain's 100 Days: Bitter in Defeat from the Guardian [of London]
"John McCain. He lost an election to a freshman Illinois senator in an electoral college landslide. McCain seems to have emerged from this defeat a changed man."
Michelle's 100 Days: Michelle Takes the Country by Storm from the McClatchy News Service
"She's wowed Europe, planted a White House organic vegetable garden, is breaking in a new family dog and touring federal agencies to buck up morale on behalf of her husband."
Michelle Obama Commencement Creates Scramble for US University from the Guardian [of London]
"The newest school in the UC system is the envy of its sister campuses, and local city officials are in planning frenzy - bracing for an influx of up to 25,000 people."
SERIOUS HISTORY NUGGET!
I don’t know if you saw this, but a statue of Sojourner Truth was unveiled yesterday at the U.S. Capitol. She’s the first African American woman to be honored with a statue in Statuary Hall.
She was born into slavery and then became a crusader for the abolition of slavery and for women’s rights. At the Ohio Women’s Rights Convention in 1851, she listened to most of the speakers and then stood up to speak. People were horrified – a black woman, and former slave daring to speak? I had never heard this, but what she said blows me away:
Well, children, where there is so much racket there must be something out of kilter. I think that 'twixt the Negroes of the South and the women at the North, all talking about rights, the white men will be in a fix pretty soon. But what's all this here talking about?
That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much
as a man - when I could get it - and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne five children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?
Then they talk about this thing in the head; what's this they call it? [member of audience whispers, "intellect"] That's it, honey. What's that got to do with women's rights or Negroes' rights? If my cup won't hold but a pint, and yours holds a quart, wouldn't you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full?
Then that little man in black there, he says women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause Christ wasn't a woman! Where did your Christ come from? Where did Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him.
If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, these women together ought to be able to turn it back, and get it right side up again! And now they is asking to do it. The men better let them.
Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain't got nothing more to say.
--Sojourner Truth
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