Here's what I didn't wonder about: whether his administration would be competent, and whether he would be skilled at the using the most powerful and important tool at a president's disposal, mass communications and the bully pulpit.
Turns out I shoulda, as Obama so far has failed on both fronts. This presidency is centrist in every respect, except on those occasions when it is as regressive as George W. Bush's. That's a huge disappointment, but not a shocker by any means. Far more surprising, however, is the ineptness of the administration, particularly concerning its communications strategy.
This should never have happened. Obama is rightly considered one of the most eloquent and moving speakers in American political history. I came to that conclusion with some skepticism, too, having seen him campaign in person, and having watched his 2004 convention speech that everyone thought was so spiffy. I was unimpressed with both. But since then, Obama has astonished me on a couple of occasions, beginning with his race speech in Philadelphia, and perhaps most recently with his talk in Cairo. Importantly, it is not the delivery of these addresses -- which is actually fairly muted, as political speeches go -- but rather their content that shines. It's been so long since an American politician spoke to the public with this degree of honesty, and demanded as much maturity from listeners, that I couldn't help but be struck by these powerful orations.
Otherwise, however, I would rate the communications ability of this White House at just slightly above catastrophic. These failures were on full display last week with the healthcare press conference disaster, but, in fact, they have been in the making right from the beginning.
But instead of a majestic oration charting a new course and calling upon us to be the change we need, Obama gave a short and not at all sweet speech to his planetary audience. It was a talk that was most notable for not being notable. Do you remember anything from it? Any of the amazing turns-of-phrase that marked Lincoln's or Kennedy's inaugural prose? Any of the courageous willingness to call out the economic predators who are destroying the country, as FDR did, or that's president's courage-inducing language, giving hope to a despondent nation? I don't. In fact, I don't remember a single word or theme from Obama's inaugural speech.
Oh well. I figure everyone's entitled to a dropped ball now and then, though it would be preferable to have that happen some time other than at the most watched political moment of the decade.
The problem is, of course, that this wasn't just a one-off screw-up. The essential theme of the last six months is simply this: Barack Obama has not taken control of the political agenda in America.
He waited far too long in his new presidency to give a major speech on what ails the country and how we ought to proceed, and when he finally addressed a joint session of Congress for this purpose, he was only somewhat better than at his inaugural address. Again, does anyone remember anything memorable from that event? Can anyone list his topics, without making obvious retrospective guesses (it's the economy, stupid)? Can anyone identify from that virtual state of the union address one call to action, one bold assertion, one controversial claim for which the president was willing to spend political capital? I honestly cannot.
Since then, Obama has given a couple of pretty memorable speeches, like the Cairo address, the Arizona State commencement, or the Notre Dame abortion speech. But even these are deficient, because they smack of lofty verbiage unsupported by serious policy -- sort of one-off flights of rhetorical fancy. For example, in Cairo Obama somewhat forcefully (or as forceful as, pathetically, these things go) told the Israelis to stop expanding their West Bank settlements. Leave aside for the moment that this is about the least that could or should be demanded concerning these incredibly unhelpful actions exacerbating already illegal developments which, by the way, do absolutely nothing for Israeli security. Nevertheless, now that Israel has essentially told the president where he can stick his pretty words, do you expect Obama to act? Will he throw any carrots or sticks toward Jerusalem to get what he wants from an ally for whom the US has done so much? I'd be plenty surprised if he were to actually back even this minuscule demand with action.
These speeches, much as I admire them at one level -- and I really do -- are also narrowly focused and essentially athematic. That can be okay, up to a point. Certain problems exist in relatively contained isolation, and can be addressed, to some real degree, apart from others. Yet, there are also many good reasons for an administration to tell the American people a grand story or two, and to root their more specific policies and actions within the context of those larger themes. George Bush, for example, told us the tale of the war on terrorism, and he got tremendous legislative mileage and popular support from that unifying theme.
It was almost entirely deceitful, of course, and it caused horrific damage here and abroad. But that is no reason necessarily to throw out the communications approach, any more than we should dispense with having presidents because Bush was such a bad one. In fact, there are good and true and real unifying, thematic stories Obama could be telling, and they would benefit the country enormously. Imagine, for example, if there was a war on greed, instead of a phony and destructive war on terrorism. Imagine how far that might go toward framing solutions to so many of our problems, from the economic crisis, to healthcare, to foreign policy militarism, to global warming.
Of course, the absence of such a recurrent motif -- that one in particular -- has everything to do with Obama's bigger problems, his utter lack of progressive principle, and the concomitant political courage needed to drive them home. But what is more astonishing about this administration is the degree to which they can't even get the little stuff right -- the things that don't cost you anything, but determine your fate, not least including your chance of getting a second term.
For instance, Obama has now given something like four or five prime-time press conferences as the primary vehicle to sell his agenda (assuming anyone can figure out what that is -- but more on that question in another piece). Forget for a moment all questions of content and courage. This approach is just plain strategically stupid, no matter what you're trying to sell.
It's catastrophically dumb, for at least two reasons. The lesser of these is that, while Obama seems relatively comfortable in these sessions, they are absolutely not his best communications element. Nor, likely, would they be anybody's. What will be a stronger, more forceful argument to the public -- on any subject -- a precisely tailored and carefully delivered address to the nation, or a semi-spontaneous two-minute response to a reporter's question? And that assumes, of course, that you're capable of a two-minute response, which Obama evidently is not. His long, passionless, academic disquisitions, riddled with hesitations, ums, ahs and uhs, sell no one on nothing.
There actually was, remarkably, a take-away from his press conference last week, but unfortunately, it had almost nothing to do with the intended content of the press conference. Viewers -- especially those who are smart enough not to devote their lives to being political junkies and policy wonks -- got nothing from the investment of their time, save perhaps a reluctance to listen to this guy next time around. They got no healthcare plan from the White House, they got no clarification as to who are the white hats and who are the black hats on this issue, they got no meta-story about responsibility, sacrifice and greed, and they got no rallying call to action.
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