Single party governing.

The Republicans are starting to push the benefits of a divided government, claiming that liberals will run amok if the Democrats control the House, Senate and the White House. Frontline is running a great two-hour bio on both Obama and McCain (The Choice 2008) that suggests it may be otherwise.

Frontline describes how Obama came to be president of the Harvard Law Review. There was a liberal-conservative split among the students (which was also, to some extent, a black-white split). Some of the conservatives, for instance, went on to become the core staff in the Bush White House. After hours of debate, the head of the conservative students stood up and endorsed Barack Obama, stating that he was the only person who could bridge the gap between the two factions. It seemed that in the past, Obama had taken pains to work with people on both sides of the conflict.

After Obama won, he began selecting staff and much to the anger and dismay of the liberal students, he ended up appointing more conservatives to positions with the magazine. He did so saying that his number one responsibility was to the publication, not to either of the factions.

President of the United States isn't necessarily the same as president of the Law Review but it gives us some interesting insight into how he might handle a Democratic Congress.

(By the way, the entire show is available on You Tube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpEpg12kEnc.)