The Corner

The one and only.

Obama to Diane Sawyer


As Jim Geraghty and others have highlighted, the president told Diane Sawyer in a recent interview: “I’d rather be a really good one-term president than a mediocre two-term president.” Talk about your false choices. Charles Krauthammer noted yesterday that Obama left out at least a third alternative — being a mediocre (at best) one-term president. What’s galling about his statement, though, is not the false dichotomy, it is the conceit that it takes to make it. Obama is essentially saying that “I’ll be such a good president that the American people won’t be smart enough to figure it out until after I’m gone. Yes, I’ll lose an election, but I’ll save the world.” So which is it that’s waiting for you, Mr. President? Rushmore or Olympus?