Change is coming

Mike Reagan
Published: December 2, 2008

A funny thing happened on his way to the White House: that old, left-wing community organizer Barack Obama has suddenly veered toward the center.

Watching the president-elect announce key appointments to cabinet and sub-cabinet posts makes one think that this is Bill Clinton redux. Mr. Obama has dug deep into the 1990s and resurrected much of the Clinton cast of characters, even to naming Hillary Clinton to be secretary of state.

None of this satisfies the radical left.

Everything Mr. Obama has done in recent weeks since winning the election has been an exercise in pragmatism —gone is all the heated rhetoric about change and reform. Everything is now measured by only one standard — it must above all be practical.

What his disappointed leftist allies don’t grasp is that many of those who voted for him thought he had a conservative message for them. Now with his appointments such as keeping Robert Gates at the Defense Department and naming Paul Volcker as a top economic advisor, he’s delivering on what the voters saw as his conservative promises.

Unlike Bill Clinton, he’s moving to the center before he takes office, and not two years afterwards as Clinton did.

What’s happening is Obama’s discovery that there is a big difference between running for president and being president. He is now up to date, up to speed, and getting all the information President George W. Bush is getting — and he is having to make decisions based on that information.

As a result he and Bush are now on the same wavelength.

It’s amazing what a little dose of reality will do to a man who dreamt dreams before he encountered the inescapable facts of life.

Welcome to Washington, Mr. Obama.

Mike Reagan is the elder son of the late President Ronald Reagan. E-mail .