Jeffrey Toobin did a profile of Barney Frank for the New Yorker back in January. Highly recommended. Frank has a number of friends and supporters among Republicans as well, of course, as his own party. As Toobin shows us, Frank's a bright -- very bright -- funny, politically smart man. What most interests me, though, is this comment about Barney Frank from his Financial Services Committee co-chair, Michael Oxley.
Institutionalists can drive committed partisans nuts, and frequently do. What seems obvious now, having read Oxley's comment about Barney Frank, is that Barack Obama, too, is a born institutionalist and that's what's making many of his supporters crazy. Institutionalism may go hand-in-hand with being a constitutional law scholar and to the extent that it does, Obama campaigners should have figured this out sooner. For those who are racking their brains trying to figure out how not to get really angry at their hero when he doesn't oblige those who want what they want now, it might help to realize that this institutionalist is more likely to give us (and our descendents) reinvigorated democratic institutions. Obama isn't the president we fantasized. He's not our beamish boy going snicker-snack after Bush and Cheney. I'm guessing he believes democrats working with their institutions will do the job.
That's us.