Published on TheHill.com on January 26, 2010
Q: How many psychiatrists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None, if it really wants to change.
Any president, at any time, can choose to embody the consensus his nation has reached after it has engaged in a period of extended debate. That process, called triangulation, involves the embrace of the elements advanced by the right and by the left that Americans have found valid, and the rejection of those from which they have turned away.