How long can President Obama administration ignore its political base?
- Failure to reform health care, esp after first pandering to the drug and insurance companies.
- Expanding the war in Afghanistan.
- No investigations into torture during the Bush administration.
- Delay in closing Guantanamo.
- No efforts to extend gay rights.
- Foreign policy almost a clone of Bush’s policies.
- Bank bailouts and failure to regulate, a clone of Bush’s policy.
I suspect sometime soon Obama’s base will reject him. Since his centrist policy has been spun to the right-wing as that of a nihilist communist, this would leave him a political orphan — like Hoover in 1930-1932. Likely results:
- Serious damage to the Democratic Party’s results in the 2010 elections.
- Failure to achieve significant public policy changes.
- Reduced ability to respond to a domestic or international crisis during the next 3 years.
- Obama’s defeat in 2012.
Sad, but the almost inevitable result of his inexperience playing in the big leagues. A decade of campaigning does not prepare one to govern a superpower. Nice speeches can accomplish little without knowledge of political craftsmanship — the architectonic art.
For more information from the FM site
To read other articles about these things, see the following:
- About Obama, his administration and policies
- About America – how can we reform it?
- Good news about America, a collection of articles!
Reference pages about other topics appear on the right side menu bar, including About the FM website page.
A few of the posts looking at the Obama Administration:
- How long will all American Presidents be War Presidents?, 21 March 2008 — The 7th year since 9/11, with the only debate about the Long War being what nations America should fight. We see this even the speeches of the most “liberal” candidate, Senator Obama.
- These days all American Presidents are War Presidents (part 2), 13 September 2008
- America gets ready for new leadership (or is it back to the future?), 14 November 2008
- These days all US Presidents are War Presidents (part 3), 23 November 2008
- Stratfor looks at Obama’s foreign policy, sees Bush’s foreign policy, 30 August 2009
- Motto for the Obama administration: “The more things change, …”, 5 September 2009
- TomGram: “The Imperial Presidency 2.0″, 18 October 2009
Afterword
Please share your comments by posting below. Per the FM site’s Comment Policy, please make them brief (250 word max), civil and relevant to this post. Or email me at fabmaximus at hotmail dot com (note the spam-protected spelling).
