Beginnings

The excellent David Kaiser has another Time.com article, looking at Obama and Immigration, with comparisons to Lincoln and F. D. Roosevelt.  It also looks quite directly at Strauss & Howe, going from those two previous presidents to note that they were both Crisis leaders, just as Obama is.  As Lincoln controversially suspended habeas corpus because half the nation had picked up and moved on; or Roosevelt  created an alphabet soup of federal agencies perhaps not completely supported by the letter of the Constitution; so has Obama attempted to remake immigration law without particular input  from  Congress.  In a Crisis, though, you do what you need to do - legalities are simply a different challenge to overcome.

The more surprising note there was an unequivocal assertion that the Fourth Turning started with 9/11. That's a minority view among folks who pay attention to this - 2001 is seen as too early, with Neil Howe preferring the 2008 financial crisis, and some still holding out for Katrina in 2005 as the beginning of the end for Bush and his legacy. Kaiser has come to the conclusion from a number of directions, particularly from the idea that September 11 was the start of George W. Bush's principles being taken seriously and even expanded by his successor Obama.