The Incredible Shrinking Barack Obama
No matter what consequences stem from the controversial debt limit ceiling deal, one thing is clear: we are now watching The Incredible Shrinking Barack Obama.
And here are four other facts. First, Barack Obama will go down in history along with Ronald Reagan as presiding over the New Deal’s and Great Society’s gradual dismantling. Second, Obama’s mystique is evaporating almost as fast as his political clout (which is pretty fast). Third, Obama has enabled and rewarded a new political tactic as America moves into the 21st century: political hostage taking versus traditional American give-and-take political compromise. Fourth, in all deference to Alexis de Tocqueville, the greatest danger to American democracy today is not “tyranny of the majority” but “tyranny of the minority.”
What’s Obama’s problem?
His style is often described as “leading from behind.” It’s akin to the tortoise and the hare story where slow and steady wins the race. Obama usually grabs the middle position and appears the most reasonable. In another era that could be masterful. But Obama is up against America’s talk radio political culture of sound bite cues given to the ideological faithful and virtual political threats given to Congress by powerful talk show hosts, bolstered by a sea of conservative old and new media pundits and conservative groups. In this context, Obama loses the 24/7 narrative war, his image takes a beating and he seemingly fritters away his — and his party’s — clout.
Former Ronald Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan now calls Obama a “loser.” Pundit Walter Shapiro laments the lack of political courage in the debt ceiling fight in Congress — and in the Oval Office. Michael “Wall Street Poet” Silverstein calls Obama “Pleader in Chief.” Others say Obama is “another Jimmy Carter.” Actually, Obama is more like President Woodrow Wilson who was incapacitated by a stroke and powerlessly watched foes destroy his dream of a League of Nations. Obama increasingly seems powerless as he watches foes destroy his vision of his Presidency and America.
But defenders still insist he is a master of the “long game.” Could they be right? Clearly, his 2012 priority is winning independent voters. A new Gallup Poll finds 41 percent identifying themselves as conservatives, 36 percent as moderates, and 21 percent as liberals. If he can get moderate independents, moderate voters and enough liberals he has a strong coalition.
But he faces problems with his liberal base. Some liberals think Obama has been in more caves than Fred Flintstone. They feel he is so untrustworthy that he should have a Twofacebook page.
The White House reportedly believes liberals have no other place to go. And, indeed, another Gallup Poll shows Obama support is holding firm with liberals. A Washington Post/Pew Research Center poll finds moderate and conservative Democrats are three times more likely than liberals to say they think less of Obama.
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13 Responses to “The Incredible Shrinking Barack Obama”
I disagree. I think President Obama is doing a great job considering the circumstances. The Republican party has been taken over by legislative terrorists. How often has a president faced that in history?
Tea Party stole Boston
Perhaps the Left should steal the Alamo
It would be equally nonsensical, and thus only “fair”.
Do you get what you ask for in a democracy?
majorityminority rule.signed,
a Bostonian
Isn’t “leading from behind” also called being a “wind vane”?
At any rate, it’s laughable how the Messiah is now a Judas, or worse.
[chuckle]
I had to note this:
Of course what’s been excessive and wrong has been rejected (a good description of so much behind Ronald Reagan’s election in 1980) and of course as we approach and reach limits to what the welfare state and government can do, things will have to Change.
It’s so obvious! This isn’t 1965 or 1933, we know better about too much expectation of and demand from government, we’ve learned from excesses and failures, we’re wiser now, and those unsustainable features of an obsolete model were known to be unsustainable and will have to Change after the Baby Boomers retire and we’re out of money. How can so many be so stupid? They don’t understand that and if shown that, they reject that!
http://www.twq.com/02spring/hewitt.pdf
And they are so stupid even after New York City bankrupted itself in 1975 from too much government and liberal policy, with those expectations of and demands from government!
Can’t we screen the suffrage pool at least for basic competence?
At least some have been looking forward at how to adapt (and to mitigate, to borrow from “global warming” environmentalist movement-related nomenclature).
http://csis.org/publication/global-aging-preparedness-index
(Read it here, too, if you want.)
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2011/06/pdf/howe.pdf
I’m with Allen on this one. Obama has let me down on a number of issues, but I’ll still take him over any other candidate. Nobody since FDR was left with a big a mess on his hands when he came to office, and the GOP has been completely obstructionist ever since Obama took office. The GOP wrecked this country for 8 years, and they aren’t going to let anyone else fix it until they are back in power.
Sorry, but decades of prosperity doomed FDR’s programs. Whenever the money was good, congress grew those programs beyond what was sustainable. For Social Security alone, the trustees reports (found at ssa.gov) have been warning this country for decades that this needed to be fixed, and everyone responded: …. (meaning: “that will be someone else’s job”). They all sponged off of the excess SS revenues while they were available, or even raised the payroll tax for more.
All programs have far exceeded their initial estimates. No one fixed them. No Republican. No Democrat. Just like they do today.
If you want keep them intact, fix them before they get out of hand.
Prof,
There are only two programs that need to be fixed:
A) Medicare/Medicaid: and not because they are all that poorly managed, but because the cost of healthcare has been going thru the roof and that any attempt to resolve that problem has led Big Pharma, Insurance Companies & the AMA to go on the war path.
B) Defense, The Military Industrial complex goes into overdrive the instant anyone talks about downsizing it. 3 Wars, 7 Countries being bombed on a regular basis and no shortage of idiots trying to suck us into a couple of more wars, good luck downsizing it. (On the bright side it is our industrial policy, you can any R&D, development & manufacturing you want as long as you cloak it in defense)
If the government finances were in as good of shape as that of the Social Security Administration, we would not have any deficits but massive surpluses across the board.
Prof-
Social Security would be viable today, especially considering the high interest rates of the nineties, had Reagan and his Republicans not robbed the Treasury of the funds set aside. George W. Bush did it again. And for what? DEFENSE that is and was never necessary!
What ever you say regarding this, is made null, and, void by the very fact that every modern nation on this planet has vastly more Social Protections, and, that this fact has nothing to do with that nation’s prosperity, or, lack of. For every Greece I can site a Sweden or Finland, for every Spain, I can site Denmark or Switzerland, for every Ireland I can site Germany or France, for every Portugal I can site an Austria or Netherlands.
You just have no leg to stand on. None at all. Social programs are NOT the cause of our “over spending”. It’s Defense Spending and no growth because of Republican crazy economics under Bush’s and Reagan, and Nixon.
Slamfu: that’s what you still are probably going to get in 2012. Do any of the Republican candidates seem likely to defeat him next year?
Allen: Social Security was about to fail when it was changed in the 1983 revision (obviously a change), and set up for many decades in the future, but not forever, which is what is needed if anybody is to claim that it is “fixed.” (To do it, to pay for all known program future obligations, FICA taxes must be raised to 25 per cent or other kinds of taxes of equivalent amounts raised.)
(Note that it failed because vote-buying politicians raised benefits and expanded eligibility.)
The programs are unsustainable now because of future demographics. Raiding of the trust funds means additional money is having to be found, or raised, now, because of deficits already beginning (a problem that liberals deny or ignore as they always have). It is going to be much worse from the 2020s onward.
All the European nations have much worse problems in their future with their social-spending (entitlement, notably for retirement) and their far greater dependence on such spending, and their much, much worse demographics, are in even worse trouble. That includes cultural or societal trouble; just the very first stabs at reform are met with riots and strikes, and it’s not limited to retirement, but the welfare state and inflated expectations of government in general. Greece has failed already, and it’s not the only one in danger of that. And that is now, not in the much worse future.
If you’re curious what the state of many European nations is for the future, and what can be done here once more(!) is a report about it. Ignorance may be blissful, but it’s not complementary.
(“[G]lobal aging promises to affect everything from business psychology and workforce productivity to the shape of the family and the direction of global capital flows. Perhaps most fatefully, it could throw into question the ability of societies to provide a decent standard of living for the old without imposing a crushing burden on the young.”)
http://csis.org/program/global-aging-preparedness-index
There’s nothing surprising about it (or at least there shouldn’t be). Here’s another work on the subject.
http://www.cer.org.uk/pdf/p475_pension.pdf
“Can’t we screen the suffrage pool at least for basic competence?” – DLS
Better be careful what you wish for.
@Allen
For other countries: all true, all pointless. We have a much bigger lobbery. As you pointed out, the dependent industries (the AMA is really a bigger winner) will use their money to fight the powers that would take it from them. The presidential campaign is the biggest one in the nation, approaching the billion dollar mark, while payouts under a billion don’t even register on the radar.
Plus, our parties are far more entrenched.
@QF
You’ve noted the biggest problems, but not the only ones. I’ve already quoted the trustees report that clearly says demographics is the bigger short term problem, then medical inflation.
If you research any program, you’ll find that there are plenty of people saying what’s gone wrong, but the payouts are considered too small to bother with.
DLS-
Lies of ossification, Lies of omission, Lies of intentional data misinterpretation…
Why do you continue this pathetic display of propaganda? Why don’t you just use real historical information? OH! I get it. It don’t support your Republican Politics!
Pardon me, but I have to edit a copy of The Internationale for an up coming recruitment rally.