I Stand With President Obama

There’s a peckin’ party going on, and we’ve all joined in.  If you don’t know, the term refers literally to a tendency of chickens to go after a spot of blood on another chicken until they have all pecked that chicken to death.  I’m using the term politically.

There’s a peckin’ party going on, and we’ve all joined in, ironically because of our own best instincts.  See, your average liberal, like me, is so concerned about being fair and open minded, that he or she is generous in heaping the criticisms on his or her own.

Meanwhile, the political right sits back gleefully and watches, occasionally sprinkling President Barack Obama with another drop of blood.

That’s right, we, us, the self-proclaimed good guys, are pecking President Obama to death:

He’s not environmental enough!

He’s not pro-gay enough!

He’s not black enough!

He’s too pro-Wall Street or, wait, is he not pro-Wall Street enough?  I forget!

He didn’t get what I want into the health care bill!

He won’t stop the war in Afghanistan!

He didn’t close Guantanamo yet!

His finance reform doesn’t go far enough!

He takes vacations!

He………………

Jesus Christ!  Enough. 

Every four years, we all drink the idealistic Kool-Aid.  The next president is going to change everything, he’s going to fix our ills, restore our moral compass, strengthen our standing in the world, be the Second Coming.  Etc.  Or she.  Oh, yes, we sip it at first, cautiously, but as the election nears, we gulp it.  Even if it’s being poured by dull statesmen like Al Gore (would you give a massage to this guy?) or John Kerry.

But something special happened this time.  We got what we wanted.  Our ideal candidate, perfectly reshapen by each of us into the image that we, individually, wanted him to have.  He was John Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., Julius Erving, and Ward Cleaver all rolled into one.

But still, two realities, well, three, need to kick in now, if they haven’t already.  First, the man can’t do everything that he said he was going to do in exactly the way that you want him to do it.  That’s not intended to let him off the hook on campaign promises; indeed, there are some he has not fulfilled. Instead, I’d point out that every person who latches onto every campaign promise and thinks that the one he or she considers most important will get top priority is in for a big disappointment.

Second, in this age I’m beginning to call the “Too Much Information, Too Little Sense” Age, for every step a president takes, there are plenty of people who think they know what they are talking about and might who are arguing passionately that he should do the exact opposite.  Sometimes this occurs because of powerful, philosophical differences; sometimes, it’s simply politics. If we only join in on the chatter once in awhile, we will only hear the loudest voices, and the loudest voices at any given time, I guarantee you, are going to be focused on what’s going wrong and who’s to blame for it.

And, finally, I’m certainly not trying to stir up any kind of pity for Obama—he got the job he wanted.  But it’s a damn complicated job, and as far as I can tell, he has the right demeanor and intellect to handle that complexity. 

I stand with President Obama.

I know his approval ratings are down.  I don’t care about that.  While polling may accurately reflect the mood of the people, it cannot capture the complexity of the modern world.  If you’ve heard there’s oil gushing, if you don’t have a job, if your 401k is tanking, hell, if you’ve got to go cut the grass, you’re going to give the man a potentially negative report.  Even if the poll asks you pointed questions in several areas of the president’s performance, I don’t think it can get to the heart the matter.  It’s like asking your family to rate your cooking based on the last meal you cooked—burn last night’s casserole and they want to head to Panera.

I tend to think of a president’s work as more like a game of darts.  You hope to put the darts exactly where you want them to get the highest score first.  But, ultimately, the more darts you can get on the board, the better chance you’ve got of scoring.  I know, I know, the metaphor doesn’t quite work. Obama’s got a lot of darts on the board.  While Pundit A pontificates about how he would have handled the spill differently, the sole issue he will harp on for days if not weeks, Obama is expanding internet speed and access, trying to give guidance to other countries at the G8, pushing through another balanced nominee toward Supreme Court confirmation, promoting health care reform, backing off on Guantanamo, networking for a Financial Reform bill, and, yeah, playing a round or two of golf.

Underlying the current criticism of Obama, I believe, is the growing unease that we ain’t the country we once were.  Obama is trying to adapt us to that reality, so that we can retool our infrastructure—in business, energy, our approach to the environment, our dealings with each other and the world.  But so many voices out there that feel the old America slipping away, rather than do something about it, are looking for someone to blame, believing against all logic that the decline started in the last 18 months.  If, indeed, we are to regain our standing and our clout, it won't be by continuing to do things the way they are being done.  Above all, that's what I think Obama understands.  

Meanwhile, the right-wing are doing their darndest to make Obama into the next Jimmy Carter, and they get a good chuckle everytime we help.  Do you really want to be a part of that?