Liebau on Obama

Carol Platt Liebau has an article at Townhall discussing Barack Obama that is both very classy and very perceptive (clean and articulate, in other words). While not downlplaying his leftism, she gives a fair and refreshingly upbeat appraisal. This passage, in particular, stood out:

He listens. Certainly, Barack is a liberal’s liberal, and his leadership of The Harvard Law Review in many ways reflected that fact. But unlike many of his left-wing compatriots, he treated his ideological adversaries with respect on a personal level. Indeed, he always offered the small conservative contingent on the Review a hearing, even though his decision-making consistently showed that he hadn’t ultimately been influenced by their arguments.

This quality is actually typical of Carol, as well, which is what makes her one of the few conservative pundits consistently worth listening to. I have often suspected that most of the negativity in the political world stems from fear and lack of confidence in one's own position. I expect this from the left (since they are, after all, wrong) but I find it grievous that it exists on the right in such profusion. So nice to see someone confident enough in her own principles that she can fearlessly praise her political opponents.