Ouch. [UPDATED]
Obama undoubtedly has major accomplishments ahead of him, but in a real way the Obama presidency is over. His messianic hopey-changiness has been exposed for what it was, and what it could only be: a rich cocktail of pie-eyed idealism, campaign sloganeering, and profound arrogance.
As president, he’s tried to apply the post-partisan gloss of his campaign rhetoric to the hyper-partisan dross of his agenda. And he’s fooling fewer people every day.
Indeed, the one unifying theme of his presidency so far has been Obama’s relentless campaigning for a job he already has. That makes sense, because that’s really all Obama knows how to do. He’s had no significant experience crafting major legislation. He has next to no experience governing at all.
But he’s great at giving speeches, holding town halls, and chitchatting with reporters. So that’s largely what he does as president. The problem is that campaigning is different from governing. The former requires convincing promises about what you will do; the latter requires convincing arguments for what you are doing. He’s good at the former, not so good at the latter. Or as columnist Michael Barone puts it, he’s good at aura, bad at argument.
Of course, there’s more than a little partisan exulting there at seeing the enemy normally wounded. The infatuation is ending, that’s all; it’s just that Obama’s honeymoon verged on a religion. It was like one of those fool-for-love songs where the beloved is almost literally described as “divine.”
It’s not that Obama’s presidency is over; it’s that it hasn’t begun yet! Because he flew so high, Obama is going through a particularly rough reentry into reality (I’m watching Endeavour land flawlessly as I write). He’s going to have to find a style of governing that’s not a style of campaigning, and he hasn’t found it yet. He never had to before.
Oh, and:
Despite the strenuous objections to my comparison from both sides, I can imagine something similar — though different in the details — happening to a President Palin. As Darcy points out, Palin has governed. She is more practical. But I can see her saying or doing something impulsive, reckless, goofy, and arbitrary, and her defenders adamantly refusing to view it as such. We’re getting a taste of what happens when symbolism is paramount and qualification is very, very secondary. This is a problem that transcends identification and ideology.
UPDATE: Read “Why Sarah Palin Fans Feel Betrayed,” the John Hawkins piece Darcy linked in the comments. It confirms my hunch that “she’s like me” is a big part of Palin’s appeal. However, as Ron wrote to me in an e-mail, that’s no inconsiderable strength at the head of a much-needed populist rebellion:
A: The fact that her enemies are repellent doesn’t automatically make her qualified.
R: No, but it certainly makes her refreshing which I suppose may be a qualification. I also agree with worrying about her being “qualified”, but I worry more about “qualification” being diluted enough to mean “elitist rubberstamping.” We have not been critical enough about having a President not only not from any Ivy, but from beyond Harvard and Yale. We haven’t yet constructed a language of approval of non-elitists (we used to have one!) and thus have reduced “qualification” to a code word. Especially after electing the least-qualified candidate I’ve seen in my lifetime!The gravitas of “qualification” has been destroyed by the Bernie Madoffs (former head of NASDAQ!) and the John Edwards of the world.
Identification trumps qualification when elites fail to behave like elites; it [winds up] being perceived as just a con, a hustle that these fraudsters rise as high as they do.
That’s why I think we need a dose of populist energy; not necessarily to blow up Harvard, but to instill more fear in these institutions that they can’t just featherbed their nest and that they actually have to perform for the greater good of all and not just “own.” (class? group? gender? race?)
Ambiance 
michael reynolds said,
July 31, 2009 at 11:07 am
I was trying to see if there was anything in either Goldberg’s piece or your analysis that was true. I was not successful.
Annie, you and your right-wing pals created a fantasy: Obama the Messiah with all his voters as stooges. But it was your fantasy, not ours. It was a right-wing slam job, never the way most of us thought or felt.
Now you’re announcing the end of a fantasy that existed only in your partisan imaginations.
If it makes you feel that you can salvage some bit of correctness from your foolish decision to support McCain and Palin, well, no one wants to deny you a measure of pride. But that doesn’t make any of it true.
You built a straw man, then demolished it.
Does this mean that from this point forward you’ll be able to discuss Obama without reiterating phony GOP talking points leftover from November?
amba12 said,
July 31, 2009 at 11:15 am
Boy, now I know how to make Michael show up fast! He’s patrolling the perimeter!
I think you flatter too many Obama voters by comparing them to yourself, Michael. I’m quite sure that was not the way you thought or felt. But you’re not the average voter from either side. You’re much more of a strategist. In fact, Obama’s “magic” was a big part of what got him enough votes to fulfill the strategists’ aim of regaining the White House for the Democrats. But you can’t deny that he lacks practical experience running anything but a campaign, and that he’s learning on the job how to govern this fractious juggernaut of a nation.
amba12 said,
July 31, 2009 at 11:21 am
Oh, and: straw men? Takes one to know one.
amba12 said,
July 31, 2009 at 11:24 am
“Symbolism” not as in race (that’s your next straw man), as in cosmopolitanism, globalism, scientific worldview, and education level.
reader_iam said,
July 31, 2009 at 11:31 am
So, Michael, President Obama does have the treasure trove of political chits and IOU’s, legislative-process chops and temperament of an LBJ? There’s a lot to disagree with in Goldberg’s piece, but that bit rang with more than a little truth. (And yes, yes, yes, of course we’re in different times; still.)
We’re getting a taste of what happens when symbolism is paramount and qualification is very, very secondary. This is a problem that transcends identification and ideology.
Speaking of ringing with truth–and a lot of it (and note that’s it’s mostly a comment on the the nature of diehard partisan, electoral politics … not so much the candidates themselves)… .
michael reynolds said,
July 31, 2009 at 1:26 pm
Look at Obama’s current approval numbers. Look at his vote in November. Notice anything? They’re the same number.
For your thesis of disaffected, disappointed Obama-worshipers to be true, you’d have to see the voter number dropping. But you don’t see that. (Despite the fact that many of us are frustrated on any number of issues.)
What you see is people who decided to support Obama after the election, now moving back to their initial positions. By definition people who did not vote for Obama cannot be these mythical Obama-worshippers of yours.
Now you may decide to conclude that Obama worshippers are still worshipful. Or you may begin to suspect that this entire construction is nonsense. You might even go a step further and consider the fact that Jonah Goldberg’s an idiot. Which would not be breaking news to anyone outside the ODS world.
As for an LBJ comparison: apples and oranges. Those days are gone. No one has that kind of leverage, in either party, which is why presidents only pass the “free candy” legislation: your tax cuts, your free drugs for old people. Was a GOP president able to make a serious move against abortion? No. Because it wasn’t free candy. Social Security reform? No free candy.
One of the reasons nothing useful gets done is precisely that the Congress is less hierarchical. Too many chiefs and too few Indians. So now the game has gone from being checkers to three dimensional chess. It’s more complicated by orders of magnitude. So nothing gets done.
What Obama is trying to do is not handing out free candy. It’s the hard stuff. It’s expensive, hard-to-understand, easy-to-demonize stuff that he has to try to pass on top of rescuing banking, which was unpopular enough. He’s trying to do al the things no one has had the wherewithal to do over the last 40 years.
Why people who complain about our shortsighted, malfunctioning government should take pleasure in attacking a president who is staking everything on a legislative agenda which does not hand out free candy, which actually tries to solve problems we’ve all been bitching about for our entire adult lives, is a question for a psychiatrist.
amba12 said,
July 31, 2009 at 1:36 pm
He’s trying to do al the things no one has had the wherewithal to do over the last 40 years.
With printed and borrowed money, with what the CBO says has a slim chance of lowering costs and deficits and is likely to increase them. It’s older-style Demthink than Bill Clinton’s.
The days of LBJ are gone; the days of FDR are goner!
amba12 said,
July 31, 2009 at 1:37 pm
In fact, with the major exception of his (as far as we know) stellar family life — which is a joy to behold — Obama makes Bill Clinton look wise, policy- and fiscal-wise!
reader_iam said,
July 31, 2009 at 1:43 pm
“A question for a psychiatrist.”
LOL. Oh, *I* see. Michael’s bored today and not actually intending or wanting to be taken seriously. No problem.
Double LOL.
reader_iam said,
July 31, 2009 at 1:56 pm
OT:
Annie, that Davidson piece does oddly draw one in, at least initially. I kept reading for a while, but I’m stuck now, because I when I got to the following …
We never know that, I say. “It’s like buying a horse. You have a hunch it’ll be good, you ride it a few times, then you take it home, get to know each other and sometimes it’s magic and sometimes you move on to another horse.”
He considers this.
“What do you want to do?” I ask.
He smiles. “Date all three of you. You’re all busy, and I have time enough to serve all three of you.”
… (especially that groaner-of-an-image I bolded), I just broke into an uncontrollable bout of laughter from which I’ve yet to fully recover. What a howler of a conversation! I know that’s mean of me, on a number of levels, but really … !
Did you read the whole thing? (Not a challenge, a question.) Should I try to break through my inner what-the-hell-ever and attempt to canter on through? Because at present, both my body and my knowing are bridling, making it hard to rein in my galloping sense of humor and stay steadily on course to the finish line.
(Loved the “national penis finder” anecdote, by the way. Can you imagine?!)
/OT
reader_iam said,
July 31, 2009 at 1:58 pm
YIKES! Annie, can you please turn off the italics after the graf ending *all three of you.”* ? Sorry, and thanks!!!!
amba12 said,
July 31, 2009 at 2:12 pm
Done. Is it worth reading all the way through? Mostly only if you’ve ever been there (in bad love city). Or if you could use more good laughs!
michael reynolds said,
July 31, 2009 at 2:50 pm
I see no one’s bothering to support Amba’s original premise. So I take it that’s nicely demolished.
You don’t really need me to address the notion that deficit spending is a Democratic idea, do you?
Donna B. said,
July 31, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Michael, sometimes you exhibit the self-awareness of a paint chip.
amba12 said,
July 31, 2009 at 3:36 pm
More likely it’s that no one is bothering to demolish your objections.
Deficit spending a Democratic idea? Stop making Bill Clinton look good!
wj said,
August 1, 2009 at 11:21 am
OK, Michael, let me offer some support for Annie’s original premise. Obama’s Presidency hasn’t started yet. Which isn’t surprising, because pretty much everybody comes into the job with a very steep learning curve. Being governor of a big state with a strong executive (not, for example, Texas) can help a bit, but not all that much. Everybody comes in, makes some mistakes, and slowly learns how to do the job; or fails to learn in some (fortunately rare) cases.
So at this point, 6 months into the first term, nobody’s Presidency has really gotten off the ground. And Obama’s is no different in that respect than anybody else’s. Or can someone come up with an example, in our lifetimes (because I don’t want to argue about stuff that we didn’t live thru and remember) to the contrary? Some President in the last half century or so who got stuff done in the first 6 months which, seen in the context of their whole Presidency, was truly memorable.
michael reynolds said,
August 1, 2009 at 12:08 pm
WJ:
I believe Reagan got his tax cuts and defense increases in six months. But I couldn’t swear to it.
I think the question should be: Has any president gotten anything done that wasn’t 1) war or 2) free candy?
LBJ got civil rights legislation. I don’t think it was in six months but it certainly wasn’t war of free candy. Nixon got the EPA. George HW Bush got tax increases. And Clinton got tax increases. But we’ve been nibbling around the edges of problems. No one, until Obama, has tried to deal with systemic interrelated problems. No one else has tried to square the circle of economy-environment-health.
Obama has actually been very ambitious in his first six months. He seems to have averted a depression or bank meltdown. That was a crisis situation of epic proportions, and it seems he weathered that crisis.
He recommitted to Afghanistan with a complete change of leadership there and 17,000 more troops. People don’t realize it, I think, but we were in very big trouble there. That was a crisis despite the lack of coverage.
He played the Iran situation perfectly — despite the idiot ranting of John McCain. Not a crisis for us by any stretch, but a nicely played hole.
He at least temporarily kept GM and Chrysler alive. And the success of the much-derided cash-for-clunkers program may give them some extended life.
And in six months he’s gotten a huge health care bill out of the House and will get one out of the Senate and onto his desk within his first year.
What you’ll notice about all the above is: no free candy. He hasn’t bought anyone’s support with a tax cut. He’s moved simultaneously on health, environment and the economy. He took moves he knew would be deeply unpopular but that he thought were necessary. When’s the last time you saw that in a president?
So I really am at a loss to see how his presidency has not yet begun. I think that theory only makes sense if you pay very little attention, or if you start from a pre-existing belief that Obama is too young and too naive. But almost any set of facts can be twisted to confirm a prejudice. Doesn’t make it right.
amba12 said,
August 1, 2009 at 12:20 pm
Those are good arguments, Michael. Disagreeing with what Obama is doing — or, questioning whether we can afford it and how effective it will be — is different from claiming he’s not doing anything. We have to be careful not to confuse those two things.
This goes back to the “Which do you trust, government or business?” trope. The fear on the Right is that Obama is expanding government to a dangerous point where it will permanently reduce our liberties. The claim on the Left is that only government can handle problems of the systemic size and complexity we now face. You could leave it to the free market but the results would be far more brutal than even the proponents thereof would want to face.
As I said in that post, energy is one area where I think government is justified in putting a thumb on the scale to motivate innovation. It’s one area where the inertia is just too powerful a juggernaut towards disaster. The equation of internal combustion with the U.S Constitution is short-sighted.
The whole issue of how to pay for it — print money? borrow money? raise taxes? lower taxes to stimulate growth? — is so vexéd that even the experts don’t know the answer.
amba12 said,
August 1, 2009 at 12:31 pm
Obama could use your help with those “convincing arguments for what [he is] doing.”
Being anything but hyperpartisan, I am very grateful for the Blue Dogs’ brake on Pelosi et al.
michael reynolds said,
August 1, 2009 at 12:55 pm
I agree that paying for it is the problem. Which is why maybe next time we get close to a balanced budget — as we did at the end of the Clinton era — we could avoid the urge to hand out tax cuts to rich people and instantly balloon the deficit.
In theory we should save deficit spending for real emergencies — like the banks/AIG meltdown. As opposed to buying votes with cash rebates.
What do you think the odds are of that?
Darcy said,
August 1, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Late, but amba, I really liked how this blog post summed up how I feel about Palin and her credentials, and it gets into the “she’s like us” that you mentioned – and in a way that I agree with, without dismissing her stances on issues and her accomplishments: http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/why-palin-fans-feel-betrayed/
I’m tired of talking about Obama, though. All I can say is “God help us”, there.
And the Blue Dogs didn’t stop this in the end. I think we’re headed for government run health care. I just hope no Republicans sign on to this. It would give me some hope.
Thanks for the mention! :)
michael reynolds said,
August 1, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Darcy:
If I’m not mistaken Amba, like about a third of Americans, is already on “government-run healthcare.”
Darcy said,
August 1, 2009 at 1:43 pm
Sorry Michael, I should have been more clear. Complete government takeover of health insurance is what I think we are headed for. National health care.
amba12 said,
August 1, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Gosh, Michael, you’re really hurrying me towards that ice floe, aren’t ya? No, I’m not on Social Security or Medicare yet. I’m on union healthcare — J’s Screen Actors Guild — plus I’m a good case for prevention.
wj said,
August 1, 2009 at 3:15 pm
Michael,
You raise some interesting points. But have you noticed how many of them (including several that you didn’t mention) can be summarized as simply “refrained from screwing things up”? Or, like Afghanistan and Iran, could be classified as “doing what anyone with more than two active brain cells [admittedly in short supply last administration] could see was a step in the right direction.”
As for getting health care moving, I am hoping that the plan that came out of the house (run by some Democrats who do not fit the “more than two brain cells active” category) will get replaced by some of the more sensible plans on offer. It is pretty clear that something will get passed. It remains to be seen whether it will be useful, neutral, or a disaster in waiting. The smart bet, from what we’ve seen from the Congress so far, would be the latter — but one must cling to hope.
michael reynolds said,
August 1, 2009 at 4:02 pm
WJ:
You must be an optimist. Do you really expect presidents to do more than not screw up? Based on what? The presidents of my semi-adult life so far: LBJ, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush Sr., Clinton, Bush Jr. If they’d simply refrained from screwing up we’d be living in a paradise right now, bathing in Champagne and lighting cigars with hundred dollar bills.
I don’t see how health care, cap and trade, the stimulus, the Detroit bail-out, and banking reform are passive efforts. They seem pretty active to me.
As for Iraq and Afghanistan, he’s following Bush’s SOFA on Iraq and I agree that’s a two-brain-cell minimum policy. But Afghanistan is a much more complicated problem. There are a lot of thoughtful centrist or even right-leaning people who think Afghanistan’s a waste of effort. They may be right. So Obama’s decision is not an easy or obvious one. In fact I’m taking a wait-and-see on that myself, because I don’t know if he’s right.
By the way, in foreign policy generally he’s moved quickly and with some success to get away from Bush’s chest-thumping to a more realistic and subtle approach.
michael reynolds said,
August 1, 2009 at 4:12 pm
Amba:
I’d forgotten you guys were union. I did not think you were old enough for medicare, I’d assumed you’d been driven into bankruptcy by our lovely health care system and were now on disability and medicaid.
I want a government take-over. I’m so far Left on health care I’m French. A people who get health care as good as ours, live just as long, never have to worry about medical bankruptcy and pay less than half what we pay.
Unfortunately Mr. Obama is a bit more centrist than I am on that issue, so we’ll continue to get some version of our overpriced, screwed-up current system.
Ron said,
August 1, 2009 at 6:25 pm
I believe French bankruptcy rates are about the same as ours, (I know they are 7 times the German rate) and the Canadians have a slightly higher rate. Their health care plans have not affected this.
wj said,
August 2, 2009 at 10:25 am
Hey, Michael, you picked the accomplishments, I didn’t.
As for Afghanistan, as of January what we basically had was a bleeding ulcer. There were only two reasonable alternatives that I could see:
– leave, and let the Afghans go to hell in their own fashion,
– put in enough troops to have a chance to actually achieve something, beyond on-going casualty counts.
Given the need to exit Iraq, politics probably precluded leaving Afghanistan at the same time as well. Which only left one viable alternative for the moment. Can the second alternative succeed in accomplishing something there? I sure wouldn’t bet the ranch on it, especially in the long term. Certainly not without a major change in American policy towards drugs at home — which I don’t see Congress doing anything sensible about for a decade or more at least.
But we might get lucky. And if not, once we’ve been out of Iraq for a couple of years it becomes politically possible to exit Afghanistan as well.
michael reynolds said,
August 2, 2009 at 2:00 pm
WJ:
I think that’s right in broad strokes. But there is a third alternative: withdrawing to more defensible lines in Afghanistan.
I think you’re overlooking Obama’s ballsiness in putting McChrystal in charge, though. McChrystal is a neo-con wet dream of a general, very hardcore, with a very dubious record on torture.
Remember when the knock on Obama was that he was secretly a wimp who wouldn’t have the nerve to stand up to terrorists? I’d argue that continued Predator strikes inside Pakistan, 17k additional troops, and McChrystal puts that line of attack to rest.
As a matter of fact, a reasonable observer could, based on what we’ve seen so far, dispense with all the attacks on Obama, with the sole exception of the line that he was basically a tax-and-spend liberal. And I think that one will go away too.
He has been anything but naive. He’s picked no one radical for any position of power. He has genuinely tried to work with Republicans and has not been hyper-partisan. He’s sufficiently secure to continue Bush policies he thought would work. He’s been just what I said he would be: smart, ruthless, manipulative, moderate and pragmatic.
8 months ago Henry Paulson was on his knees begging because he thought the country was teetering on the edge of a cliff. We were all dusting off our Woody Guthrie records and learning hobo signs. Now — after just 6 months — we’re debating whether the recession is already over.
I do not think it is possible to argue with a straight face that we’d be better off today with McCain and Palin.