Barack Obama’s inaugural speech on Monday drew criticism from conservatives over what they perceived as the president’s overly liberal agenda. In an appearance on The Ed Show on Tuesday, Nation editor and publisher Katrina vanden Heuvel lauded the speech, arguing that Obama’s defense of progressive government articulated an agenda that the majority of Americans already support.

“I think that we’ve seen a left-center emerge over these last years but that too often the media doesn’t pay attention to it,” vanden Heuvel said.

The American media must also begin to reflect that joblessness, not deficit and debt, is the major crisis of our time, and that our great struggle is the fight against corporate control of the political system, she added.

—Alec Luhn

Katrina vanden Heuvel last appeared on Current TV’s The War Room to discuss gun control.