Chicago Tribune On Potus Barack "Obama's Decline". Read More About It.
Obama's decline
In his book "The Audacity of Hope," Barack Obama had the insight to explain much of his political appeal. "I serve as a blank screen," he wrote, "on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views." That lack of definition proved a big asset in the presidential campaign, allowing him to attract support from liberals who saw Hillary Rodham Clinton as too hawkish, moderates who saw her as too liberal, and independents who saw John McCain as too conservative and too partisan.
But in his first year in office, the president has had to fill in that screen. And many Americans are disillusioned with the picture that has emerged.
Since April, Obama's approval rating has dropped from 61 percent to 47 percent. Just 39 percent of Americans say they would vote for him again, down from the 52 percent who did so in 2008. Of the presidents since Dwight Eisenhower, only Ronald Reagan had a lower approval rating at this stage of his tenure. Fifty-five percent of Americans think the country is on the wrong track.
What Obama and the Reagan of 1982 have in common is a bad economy. Although economic data indicate the economy stopped shrinking and began growing last summer, unemployment is far higher than it was a year ago. The president's admirers think that as the recovery strengthens, Obama will bounce back, just as Reagan did.
We wouldn't bet too much on it. What Reagan had that Obama doesn't was a mandate for a clear set of policies: cutting taxes, rebuilding the military and freeing the economy from too much government, which eventually yielded good results. Obama, by contrast, has embraced policies more ambitious and sometimes quite different from what he led Americans to expect — and which may not work out so well.
During the campaign, he proposed a stimulus plan costing $60 billion, but once in office, he signed one with a price tag of $787 billion. His health care plan is far more expensive than he estimated during the campaign. He didn't campaign on a promise to take over General Motors and Chrysler. His budgets forecast an endless river of red ink. And he's done little to install the bipartisan approach he once extolled.
The result is a picture of the president as an old-fashioned, big-government Democrat — not the open-minded, non-ideological innovator he once portrayed. Much of the impetus for this direction comes from Democrats in Congress, notably House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who have never been accused of fresh thinking or devotion to bipartisanship. Obama's biggest mistake was to defer so much to them.
Had Obama taken a tougher stance toward his own party — shown a bit more audacity — the stimulus might have been less larded with pork and the health care plan might have focused on incremental, broadly popular changes that could have attracted significant Republican support. Instead, he now finds himself of being lumped with a Congress that has even worse approval ratings than he does — and in danger of losing the health care battle anyway.
In some places, Obama has shown an admirable willingness to do the right thing even when many Democrats disagree. Despite his opposition to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, he recognized the dangers of a rapid withdrawal and has largely stuck by the commitments made by the Bush administration — with results that are very promising but largely overlooked by a citizenry more concerned about pocketbook issues. Faced with a deteriorating security environment in Afghanistan, Obama elected to try a troop surge much like the one that turned Iraq around.
At the same time, by rejecting waterboarding and taking steps to close the Guantanamo prison camp, he has made the welcome point that the United States can and must prosecute the war on terror without abandoning basic principles of civilized conduct. He understands that unchecked government power is a danger to all of us.
Too bad his sense of limits doesn't seem to apply in the realm of government spending and regulation, which have grown and doubtless will keep growing under his policies. In his inaugural address, Obama dismissed those "who question the scale of our ambitions, who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans." A year later, a lot of people who voted for him are asking those very questions.
In his book "The Audacity of Hope," Barack Obama had the insight to explain much of his political appeal. "I serve as a blank screen," he wrote, "on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views." That lack of definition proved a big asset in the presidential campaign, allowing him to attract support from liberals who saw Hillary Rodham Clinton as too hawkish, moderates who saw her as too liberal, and independents who saw John McCain as too conservative and too partisan.
But in his first year in office, the president has had to fill in that screen. And many Americans are disillusioned with the picture that has emerged.
Since April, Obama's approval rating has dropped from 61 percent to 47 percent. Just 39 percent of Americans say they would vote for him again, down from the 52 percent who did so in 2008. Of the presidents since Dwight Eisenhower, only Ronald Reagan had a lower approval rating at this stage of his tenure. Fifty-five percent of Americans think the country is on the wrong track.
What Obama and the Reagan of 1982 have in common is a bad economy. Although economic data indicate the economy stopped shrinking and began growing last summer, unemployment is far higher than it was a year ago. The president's admirers think that as the recovery strengthens, Obama will bounce back, just as Reagan did.
We wouldn't bet too much on it. What Reagan had that Obama doesn't was a mandate for a clear set of policies: cutting taxes, rebuilding the military and freeing the economy from too much government, which eventually yielded good results. Obama, by contrast, has embraced policies more ambitious and sometimes quite different from what he led Americans to expect — and which may not work out so well.
During the campaign, he proposed a stimulus plan costing $60 billion, but once in office, he signed one with a price tag of $787 billion. His health care plan is far more expensive than he estimated during the campaign. He didn't campaign on a promise to take over General Motors and Chrysler. His budgets forecast an endless river of red ink. And he's done little to install the bipartisan approach he once extolled.
The result is a picture of the president as an old-fashioned, big-government Democrat — not the open-minded, non-ideological innovator he once portrayed. Much of the impetus for this direction comes from Democrats in Congress, notably House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who have never been accused of fresh thinking or devotion to bipartisanship. Obama's biggest mistake was to defer so much to them.
Had Obama taken a tougher stance toward his own party — shown a bit more audacity — the stimulus might have been less larded with pork and the health care plan might have focused on incremental, broadly popular changes that could have attracted significant Republican support. Instead, he now finds himself of being lumped with a Congress that has even worse approval ratings than he does — and in danger of losing the health care battle anyway.
In some places, Obama has shown an admirable willingness to do the right thing even when many Democrats disagree. Despite his opposition to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, he recognized the dangers of a rapid withdrawal and has largely stuck by the commitments made by the Bush administration — with results that are very promising but largely overlooked by a citizenry more concerned about pocketbook issues. Faced with a deteriorating security environment in Afghanistan, Obama elected to try a troop surge much like the one that turned Iraq around.
At the same time, by rejecting waterboarding and taking steps to close the Guantanamo prison camp, he has made the welcome point that the United States can and must prosecute the war on terror without abandoning basic principles of civilized conduct. He understands that unchecked government power is a danger to all of us.
Too bad his sense of limits doesn't seem to apply in the realm of government spending and regulation, which have grown and doubtless will keep growing under his policies. In his inaugural address, Obama dismissed those "who question the scale of our ambitions, who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans." A year later, a lot of people who voted for him are asking those very questions.
Labels: News reporting
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