2010: Make or Break for Obama and Palin
Time magazine may think U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is 2009’s “Person of the Year, ” but Time is wrong: 2009 was dominated by Barack Obama, even though it wasn’t a great year for him.
Obama’s human frailties surfaced. Words, not deeds, are his forte.
Critics and fans tended to agree that, so far, his presidency is one of great intentions (if not great expectations). He’s good at saying what he’d like to do, but has difficulty doing (or being able to do) very much.
Cheerleaders confuse rhetoric with results.
Obama is the most accessible president in recent times. He’s everywhere and omnipresent, seemingly hurtling around the world, bowing (if not scraping) to royalty and apologizing for America’s perceived errors, be they real or imaginary.
In some ways he’s more popular abroad than at home. Europeans, while liking him, were not susceptible to his charisma when he flew the Atlantic to lobby for Chicago getting the 2016 Olympic Games. No dice. Rio de Janeiro got them. A first ballot defeat for Obama and Chicago.
A mixed triumph was winning the Nobel Peace Prize for doing little but saying a lot. More Great Expectations. The prize tended to open American eyes and was mildly embarrassing even for his fans. Finally, Copenhagen and climate change was a fiasco that resulted in nothing.
Obama’s grandiose plans to reform health insurance have been compromised into spin over substance and will overlap into 2010. There are concerns about whether advertently or inadvertently he seeks to bring socialized medicine to a nation that for years has been indoctrinated against anything smacking of socialism.
Obama’s bailouts while promising to cut taxes for 95% of Americans still ring in electorate ears. The country’s debt will eventually and inevitably deflate the currency in order to cope with a debt running into double digit trillions.
One of Obama’s more effective election campaign promises was to close the Guantanamo Bay detention centre. That, too, had to be delayed. The more one wrestled with the question of detainees, the clearer it became (to some) that the ideal place for detaining “illegal” Taliban and al Qaida fighters was . . . Gitmo.
As if to replicate his predecessor, George Bush in Iraq, Obama has made Afghanistan “his” war – even though when he adopted it, it wasn’t the catastrophe it now seems. The “surge” in Iraq worked for Bush, so Obama is reluctantly trying it in Afghanistan where success is more tenuous.
As the most popular president of recent times when he was elected, Obama’s job approval rating has plunged to 42% (Rasmussen) or 47% (Gallup) - the lowest ebb of any present in the same time frame. This isn’t fatal, but it is a concern – especially with mid-term elections coming up in 2010 and Sarah Palin “surging” as the only Republican with a solid base of admirers (and a solid base of Republican critics).
Palin’s book (Going Rogue) is now said to have sold one million, indicating that three million sales is a realistic target. Since quitting as Alaska’s governor to revitalize her tainted image. Palin has so far succeeded without a false step. Her likeability factor is higher than any other political aspirant.
So pressure is on both Obama and Palin – he to start implementing noble intentions, she to defuse the Republican establishment’s horror at her popularity.
An interesting year ahead.