Looking back on Obama’s first year in office, I think it is pretty clear that his biggest defeat has not been related to policy. His biggest disappointment has been his failure to change the tone in Washington. As Mark Whitaker points out, Obama is by nature a bridge-builder. He isn’t afraid of the other side and sees value-in-itself to working with them. He assembled a Team of Rivals and former opponents in his cabinet. Early on, he reached out by inviting Republicans to attend public workshops at the White House. The response was an embrace of Birtherism and Teabagging, combined with rigidly disciplined obstruction on a totally unprecedented scale. This was an easy way for the Republicans to deal Obama a symbolic defeat that has very concrete consequences. The way Obama is forced to govern as a result of this Republican strategy is almost a breach of one of his core hope-messages. And in a more tangible sense, it has forced him to trim his ambitions to suit the most conservative members of his caucus who, my mere happenstance, each enjoy an effective veto over policy. This truth must supplement Whitaker’s observation on health care:
On health care, Obama’s studious decision to avoid the mistakes of “Hillarycare” and delegate the bill-writing to Congress may yet be vindicated if a reform act passes next year. But he underestimated how giving legislators the keys to the car would drag out the process and allow grandiose senators to hijack the vehicle and demand to be paid off with side deals and media attention.
Had he known in advance that the Republicans would intimidate all of their members into not only opposing any health care reform, but in supporting unprecedented levels of obstruction, he may have taken a different path. This was a failure on Obama’s part that probably reflects a certain lack of imagination. He wasn’t cynical enough. Yet, as Whitaker notes, Obama tends to be a quick learner.
Yet, if this first year has sometimes made President Obama seem caught off-guard and frustrated by the meanness and mayhem of Washington, no one should assume that he won’t learn from the experience.
The other theme running through “Dreams From My Father” is Obama’s capacity for self-examination and self-improvement. He has applied that introspection to becoming a better person, a better writer and speaker, and a better politician. In Hawaii for the holidays, taking the long walks he so misses at the White House, Obama may well be reflecting on what he needs to do to be a more effective president.
Exercising power, he may now see, involves more than giving impressive speeches and seeking common ground. As Ronald Reagan showed, it requires a sense for majesty and mystery. As LBJ demonstrated, it demands a behind-the-scenes talent for flattery and intimidation. As JFK proved, it helps to have an ironic, rather than a self-righteous, view of human motives and vanity. And as that other product of a messy childhood, Bill Clinton, could tell you: It’s not about bringing order to the world around you. It’s about learning to love the madness of governing before you can master it.
Obama will need to become tougher. His challenge will be to do so without losing that bridge-building quality that was so integral to his message of hope.
