It has been an eventful four years since then-Senator Barack Obama’s victory in the November 2008 presidential election. This country ceased major military operations in Iraq, the Republicans resumed control of the House, Obama’s healthcare plan eventually passed through Congress and Osama bin Laden was killed by American special operations units. So what are we to think of his first term? I am going to go out on a limb here and say Obama’s first term as president was an unmitigated disaster for almost everyone outside of a core group of technocrats and corporate leaders. How can I make this claim? Well, I’ll show you.
The first part is campaign promises. I didn’t necessarily expect a whole lot of Obama’s campaign promises to be kept. However, what astounded me was that he achieved a total of one of his major goals: removing the bulk of American troops from Iraq. Even then, it is a qualified victory since Obama massively expanded the war in Afghanistan, increased American presence in Pakistan and was the major leader of the NATO intervention in Libya.
These are not the actions of a man concerned with world peace or respecting the sovereignty of other states. Not many people remember the rhetoric coming from the Obama 2008 campaign about improving relations with the global community and for decreasing American military presence abroad. He has actually done the opposite of those things, but people do not seem to be very interested in that since he ordered the death of an old man who was the figurehead of a shriveling terrorist organization.
He didn’t keep to the other aspects of his platform at all. It’s not even like they were compromised into something worse so they could pass through Congress or be palatable to both sides of the aisle – they just never materialized. Obama promised the most transparent government in American history. His administration has actually expanded executive branch powers to act without oversight.
Obama promised healthcare reform. The Supreme Court, barring a miracle, will declare Obamacare unconstitutional. His social welfare and aid programs were scrapped in favor of propping up predatory lending institutions. Hell, Obama even promised to adopt his daughters a dog from a shelter. His dog is purebred, from the same breeder that provided a dog to the Kennedy family.
What I’m saying is that Obama’s presidency and the fandom surrounding it, when taken from an outsider’s lens, is absolutely absurd. When compared to the sheer lunacy of the Republican candidates and that primary it makes more sense, but that doesn’t make Obama a good president, or justify any of the incredibly questionable (and extralegal) decisions made by him and his administration. Partisan support for Obama’s administration is tantamount to brand loyalty as opposed to actual knowledge of the issues or the world situation. It’s like Xbox 360 versus PlayStation 3 fanboys, or Mac versus Windows. In neither instance does it really matter – the similarities massively outweigh the differences. The relatively minor “wedge” issues that will pop up between Obama and Mitt Romney will be pored over and analyzed in every way by analysts, and then trumped as the real issues people should care about. Obama’s presidency has been a shining example of style over substance, and the rhetoric of “hope” and “change” is largely a red herring so people don’t look at the real systemic issues facing the American political and social system. Even worse is that it doesn’t matter which party takes the White House. If Romney were to win the upcoming election, I doubt it would be any different, which scares the hell out of me.
Tom Bradtke is a senior history major. He can be reached at bradtke@umdbk.com.
