The rationalizations for Obama’s failures are already beginning, and Tom Friedman employs the laziest of all strategies, tearing down a great man to make a small man look bigger. In his Sunday column in the New York Times, Friedman makes a number of highly dubious points. These days there is a lot of “if-only-Obama-could-lead-like-Reagan” talk by conservatives. I’ll leave it to historians to figure out years from now who was the better president. On the question of the domestic economy, there can be little doubt. Reagan inherited far higher unemployment and high inflation, and within a year or so had the nation back on track for high economic growth, which continued basically through the remainder of his two terms. Obama, in contrast, has managed the slowest recover from a recession ever since economic growth has been measured, has shrunk the workforce, and his economy has seen virtually all gains going to the top one percent, while median family...(Read Full Post)