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The New Republic has an interesting article tallying up the myriad ways Obama’s administration is clinging to Bush-era policies on terrorism, but it comes to a conclusion that is only correct in a most disheartening way.

Author Jack Goldsmith (a former Bush admin Assistant Attorney General) wants the article to refute Dick Cheney’s claims that Obama’s policies are endangering our country by showing that there is little substantive difference between now and then — and he has a point there (although some have pointed out in response that Cheney’s criticism began prior to Obama’s change in direction).

But there is a bigger problem with Goldsmith’s assessment. The piece is subtitled “Why Barack Obama is waging a more effective war on terror than George W. Bush” and Goldsmith asserts that Obama’s successful repackaging of these same Bush-era policies represents a welcome new era of credibility, but isn’t it really a new era in obfuscation and dishonest politics?

I’ll grant Goldsmith this one point: the Bush admin was certainly woeful on the PR front, consistently failing to accept the need to promote and  defend its policies. Some saw this as arrogance; I saw it as self-inflicted humility. Bush felt he was doing the right thing and didn’t want to participate in the political pissing match, letting the policies speak for themselves and history to be the judge. This was a huge mistake, allowing his political opponents to frame every issue without rebut.

However, why is Obama’s approach seen as so refreshing?

Obviously he deserves credit for taking the responsibility of the presidency seriously and abandoning his contrarian campaign rhetoric to embrace the best tools in fighting terrorism (during the campaign I had written that it seemed improbable to me he would not come around in this way).

Yet, Obama is partially responsible for dark cloud associated with Bush’s anti-terror approach, as he and other Democrats stridently campaigned for 6 years on the moral hazard of the very policies he now embraces! Now that he has reversed course, instead of admitting as much and giving credit where he once laid blame, Obama is pretending his continuation of Bush’s legacy is something new and honorable, despite no substantial change.

Is this the new era of non-ideological politics he has promised us? Is this the change we can believe in? Or is it deeply cynical politics-as-usual? Well, at least he got the policies right.

MORE: The Cheney Fallacy.

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