[img]7|left|||no_popup[/img]All right. Count me in. I’ve been resisting, because there are a few other topics I want to write about, but what the heck. It is, after all, the fad-du-jour. The flavour of the month. All the popular kids are doing in. Dagnabit, even the unpopular ones are doing it. Might as well join in. I refer, of course, to picking on President Obama.
In all fairness, Obama did bring it on himself. You can’t talk about change and then deliver warmed-over Clinton leftovers. However, could some of the hysteria from both Republicans and Democrats (and by extension pop-conservatives and pop-liberals) be the product of not-so-great expectations? Is it possible that we’ve been projecting on own expectations of change on Obama and ignoring what he was really promising?
When it comes to Republicans, there isn’t much to say about their take on Obama. Whether in the form of public commentators like Limbaugh and Beck or among the less theatrical, the trend has been to reject Obama wholesale, without benefit of the doubt. Worse, it’s not just that his policy ideas have been rejected – rightly or wrongly – but that his very motivations have been called into question. From pop-conservative GOP cheerleaders we get, not a critique of someone they disagree with, but a shrill expose of the President as a socialist with fascist intentions. There’s nothing really new in this; it doesn’t matter which Democrat is the piñata of choice. If it’s a Democrat at all, or even faintly liberal, the sticks come out and the whacking begins. This isn’t, I should point out, universally true. Every so often, I’ll check in at the American Conservative for sane discussions from an ideological perspective I don’t typically agree with. But insofar as the mainstream is concerned there hasn’t been an attitude towards Obama along the lines of, “well, he may not be experienced but people voted for him so we should give him the benefit of the doubt and be as helpful, even in our opposition, as possible.” Obama’s a socialist, remember.
This intransigence, which already extends to potential Supreme Court nominees, works against a President who has so far demonstrated a greater willingness to engage opposing viewpoints. After all, Obama has reached out to include Republicans in his administration, as evidenced by his selection of Utah governor Jon Huntsman as US ambassador to China. Former President George W. Bush did, admittedly, nominate two Democrats to the SEC…but that’s hardly as glamours as an ambassadorship. More tellingly, after September 11th the entire political spectrum rallied alongside Bush, as evidenced by an approval rating of 90%. The questionable validity of Bush’s installation into the presidency by the Supreme Court (among other things), the banal promises of compassionate conservatism – all the stuff that liberals disliked about Bush was more or less set aside.
Liberal reactions to the Obama presidency has been far more nuanced and increasingly tinged with disappointment. Jessica Gadsden's recent piece gives eloquent voice to the uncertainty. But it’s not necessarily a reflection on Obama that he’s getting criticized from his Democratic constituents, as Mr. Noonan recently mused. The explanation is rather simple; Obama is a centrist along the Clinton mode, and he never pretended to be anything more. This means, to some extent, the criticism he’s been getting hasn’t been entirely fair, especially since 100 days isn’t enough to definitely solve multiple problems that challenge even the experts.
I am, however, especially disappointed in Obama’s rhetoric in regards to Guantanamo's detainees.
“[President Obama] stopped short of offering a clear answer on the key question of what to do with detainees who won't be tried for war crimes but are likely to be held indefinitely.
He described this group as those ‘who cannot be prosecuted yet who pose a clear danger to the American people.’”
Proof, it seems, that we have learned nothing from Nuremberg and that the Obama administration is not, perhaps, the change we’d hope for. If Justice Jackson backed by the United States could put the Nazis on trial – and surely no one would dispute that the Nazis were among history’s worst – there is no reason to abandon the rule of law that supposedly defines Western democracy. It outrages me, in the sense that justice must be applies to everyone. The idea that there are people who cannot be prosecuted yet pose a danger is nonsense. If these people really are a danger, then it should be proven in a court of law.
The sad yet perversely funny joke of this whole affair is that pop-conservatives are foaming at the mouth over a candidate who isn’t really giving them really liberally liberal things worth foaming at the mouth about, which is exactly why pop-liberals and Democrats are upset. Strike, as they say, while the irony is hot.
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