Principles Versus Politics
I have no particular written piece, nor even a group of written pieces, to cite for this post.
I have only my personal observations of Obama in his first year as president.
(Personal disclosure, should that be important to you.) I was and am an Obama supporter, and reserve the right as an individual American citizen to criticize those I've chosen to lead.
I'm drawn more to analyzing patterns inherent in the incidence of specific events and pieces of anecdotal evidence, than to each and every specific event or piece of anecdotal evidence.
The pattern that I perceive has it that Obama ran a campaign based on principles, but in office, faced with the possibility of being a one term president, he has succumbed, as so many presidents have, to the fear that he might not get re-elected if he leads based on his principles.
During the campaign in 2008, as many of you know, I predicted no significant change in how things are done in D.C., regardless of who was elected president.
Sadly it seems I was correct in that prediction.
Lighthouse Keeper
2 comments:
Glad to see you expressing your views; we want to know what you think, not just links to others, no matter how worthy.
I take a different view: The President is elected to serve. He (or, someday, she) has to deal with problems every day; in fact, many times each day. Compromise is often needed. But that is as it should be. Most Americans do not have the luxury of waiting until a coalition of the principled can be assembled. Indeed,if we wait for principle to dominate, we shall be very old--or worse--before anything is done. As Keynes wrote, "In the long day, we are all dead."
This is not to say that I agree with everything that Obama has done, far from it. But the difference between the Obama and the Bush administrations is real and important.
I agree and understand that we can't have our cake and eat it too;
U.S.Presidents are not monarchs, though W believed Cheney when Cheney told him he was.
My biggest disappointment with Obama is his caving in when up against the military/industrial complex. He's just the most recent president to cave, to be sure.
That Neocon complex is so deeply entrenched and resistant to change and challenge that it is a real threat to our democracy.
Just today, the news has it that Obama has caved to it again by continuing to maintain the secrecy of millions of pages of military and intelligence documents, some dating back to WW II
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