Not
long ago, a couple of writers in the left magazine, Jacobin, opined that
Barack Obama was the worst President since Warren Harding. Rightist bigots
attack him as the worst of all time.
I think Obama is the best occupant of the office since the
end of the Second World War. We’re unlikely to elect anyone of his quality in
2016.
Like
all presidents post World War II, Obama has presided over the world’s most
(super) powerful empire. Boasting
“American exceptionalism” and flouting superior military and economic might,
the empire systematically generates negative consequences for peace and the
human condition at home and worldwide.
Disappointments
in the ‘State of the Union’, about domestic and foreign affairs, are many and
profound. I’m not about to argue that Obama should be absolved of
responsibility for an interventionist foreign policy, for widespread acts of
war, for commitment to the vast surveillance program and the “security state”,
or for the influence of his Wall Street advisors over economic policy.
How
then can one view Obama favorably? What should one make of the obvious
contradictions in Obama and his presidency? And why does it matter?
The simple
observation by Fidel Castro when Obama was first elected turns out to be spot
on: ‘he’s a good guy, but the system is stronger than he is’. However, the
fuller truth is much more complicated. Certainly the system can’t be overcome
by an individual no matter how high his office. But it’s a deeply stressed
system, unable to control events, far from immune to resistance and change.
There is much to
learn from Obama’s two terms now almost over — about the man and, most
important, about our society.
About Obama,
there is another side to the coin of his limitations and loyalty to the basic
character of an oppressive system. There is no mistaking that he holds dear many
humane and democratic values that are actually in conflict with the essential nature
of the system, values that are connected to the historic struggle to expand
freedom in our country. Nor should one underestimate his achievement in winning
majority support twice as the first African-American president — this despite a
terrible history of racism that remains fiercely alive today.
Like a multitude
of fellow Americans, when I first read “Dreams of My Father”, I was deeply
impressed by Obama’s exceptional intelligence as well as his humanity. I’m
still impressed by those qualities evident in some of his more important
speeches. I can’t dismiss as “rhetoric” his address after the Charleston
massacre or the recent one on the Iran agreement (although his compellingly
logical argument for diplomacy was accompanied by usual misrepresentations of
US policy). It isn’t necessary to watch the GOP presidential debates to see
Obama as exceptional. In qualities of mind and character, few if any among
those in high political office during the last half century are his equal.
Yet, during
Obama’s presidency, the impact of reactionary forces on the political and
economic trajectory of the country grew dangerously. The GOP moved even further
to the extreme right, fought tenaciously to wreck Obama’s presidency and to sabotage
the most elementary social responsibilities of government. With a huge assist
from the Supreme Court majority, interference in elections and politics by
oligarchs like the Koch brothers and Sandy Adelson has grown apace with soaring
economic and social inequality overall. And at the heart of the assault on
Obama has been open, as well as often denied, racist fury at the very idea of a
black president and family in the White House.
Obama’s
accomplishments have been important even if far from the original promise. Noteworthy
is the major expansion of health care against a hurricane of hard-hearted
resistance and greed. He tempered the war lust fostered by neocon hawks, some
of them in his own administration, although he expanded “alternative” tactics
of widespread drone bombings and assassinations in violation of international
law.
Now, in the last
stage of his presidency, the Obama “we hoped for” is more of a presence. Most
important, he is putting up a fight for a more realistic and potentially
peaceful approach to foreign policy, oriented to diplomacy and negotiation
rather than the hubris of US superpower. There is the Iran agreement and a new
attitude toward possible cooperation with Russia in Syria and with regard to
ISIS. These are only a beginning of a turn toward a practical, common sense
approach to international cooperation needed to cope with the problems plaguing
this century. Inevitably, resistance from wealthy selfish interests and the GOP
matches the hysteria mounted against “Obamacare”. Restoring diplomacy and the
influence of the United Nations is also anathema to the Netanyahu government,
which fears that shifting winds will undermine its apartheid colonial rule over
the Palestinians.
Obama is now
more assertive on domestic issues: racism, immigrant rights, the justice and prison systems, the
minimum wage, women’s equality, and more. Looking back, Obama’s presidency
suffered from a stubborn faith that his special powers of persuasion could
bring about bipartisanship, his determination to convince Wall Street of his
essential loyalty to the system, and his desire to calm racist fears that he
might be “an angry black man”. As a result, he put a barrier between his presidency
and the kind of citizen participation and support that might have made it
transformative.
Important
progressive advances during the Obama presidency have come from the
grass-roots. Starting with a determined and militant movement, public opinion
was transformed on gay rights and marriage equality. The institutions of
government had to accept the new reality. The “Black Lives Matter” movement is
also forcing a wider recognition of intolerable injustice and racist brutality.
Tremors are beginning to be felt in challenges to the shameful racism that corrupts
the criminal justice and prison systems.
Looking at the
Obama presidency, now mostly through the rear view mirror, doesn’t tell us
where we go from here. But there are some things to be taken to heart and mind.
Leaders, even
presidents, may be better or worse but they cannot be saviors. What counts most
is achieving a critical mass of public support for causes that sustain progress
and challenge the worst evils of a destructive system. Easier said than done,
but possible as experience makes
clear. The process of popular struggle illuminates every democratic gain in our
history. It defines democracy itself.
Our capitalist
system of inequality and greed can crush people and their hopes. But it is
neither invincible nor immune to change. Nor is the power establishment
monolithic in the control of public policy.
The divisions in
our society, including at the top, are a very important part of the policy
equation. The rise of extreme reaction in most branches of government, fueled by a
clique of ultra-right oligarchs, is an immediate and existential threat to the
nation and to the world. The face of Carly Fiorina may or may not be
“beautiful”, but her prescriptions for the future sound like an American “Mein
Kampf”. And most of her stage mates are just as violent whether it comes to
war-mongering or lying about Planned Parenthood. That crowd has already
“elected” most governors, controls most state legislatures, has a lasting
Supreme Court majority, and at least temporary control of the Senate and the
House. What a dangerous world this is! It would be crazy to ignore how much
worse it could get if the ultra-right is in full control.
The dilemma is
that one can’t rely on Clinton-Schumer Democrats not to succumb to rightwing
pressure and hawk hysterics. The very limited steps by Obama toward a realistic
and less warlike foreign policy might be aborted.
There is no easy
answer, but an answer nevertheless. Despite howls from the GOP and their friend
Netanyahu, despite 30 million AIPAC dollars, there is enough support to sustain
the Iran agreement — and that includes a majority of American Jews who
underwent the fiercest badgering. Hopefully that can be replicated and expanded
in efforts to get the most out of the Democratic primaries.
It has never been
harder to predict the future and maybe it’s pointless after all. I think the
only real answer is in expanding public awareness, in struggles and support for
movements determined to turn the tide on climate change, the search for peace, and
each issue of justice and equality. Above all, the
tide has to be turned, and soon, against those who would plunge America and the
world into a rerun of the horrors of World War II.
Obama fell short
of being the transformative leader he hoped to be. Still he deserves honorable
recognition as one of our most significant presidents. Maybe in the course of
events, a transformative popular movement
can be the source of inspiring leaders that the country surely needs.
