OBAMA THE INTELLECTUAL? “Yet if one compares Obama’s positions with Bush’s, it’s the similarity in their intellectual approaches that is striking. Both make decisions on the basis of pragmatic, momentary considerations rather than an intellectually defined standard. Just as Bush employed a seemingly random grab bag set of strategies, going with his ‘gut,’ so Obama is already switching positions on policy after policy. . . . However much Obama seems to sport the trappings of an intellectual—and clearly he does—in practice, his policy consists in shooting from the hip, making short-range decisions without adherence to any firm set of guiding convictions.”