Looking Forward – Obama
We have a new President, and I wish him the best. As a solid conservative, many have questioned the sincerity of this statement. They do not believe that as a conservative I can be hoping for President Obama to succeed.
Now with my sense of justice, there is a part of me that desires to treat Obama exactly as the Left and Democratic leaders treated Bush. But I will resist such temptations. For me the wellbeing of the country comes first. I want the country do to well, even if it means Obama will get the credit which he undoubtedly would.
Perhaps the best way to explain this is to point the last campaign. I have been a strong critic of John McCain for years. Other than Ron Paul, he was last on my list of candidates in the primary, and I believed that if nominated he would go down to defeat. If elected, he would be worse than Bush. Yet when he won the nomination, I supported his candidacy and really hoped that he would win.
This was not because I was just being a loyal Republican. Frankly, from strictly a Republican party point of view, I believe that electing Obama will be better for the party than McCain, as McCain would have divided and split the party. I supported McCain and truly hoped that he would win, because, right or wrong, I believe he would be better for the country than Obama.
But now we have President Obama. So in the same line, I truly want him to succeed, at least in the sense that in four years the country is doing well, even though it would mean his almost certain reelection. That is my hope. But like McCain, my expectation is a lot different.
As for my expectation, what will the Obama presidency bring? The best I can say at the moment is: uncertain. I , like many others, am not at all sure what President Obama will actually do. Even during the campaign there was considerable uncertainty. Candidate Obama was very clear on such vagueries as ‘hope’ and ‘change’ but the closer he came to any sort of specificity the more likely his comments were to be followed by a string of caveats, exceptions, and nuances. In short, no matter what he does as president, his supporters can probably go back into the hours of sound clips and find statements that will allow them to claim “see, that is what he said he would do all along.” Still, it is telling, and reassuring, that since he won the election, those most upset with Obama have been those on the left who wanted the most radical change.
Still a few things seem can be gleaned. Despite all the campaign rhetoric, it currently seems that other than a few cosmetic changes, many of Bush’s policies on the war will remain in unchanged, and this is a good thing. One possible exception to this would be the patriot act and coerced interrogations, which have proved every effective in preventing terror attacks. Still once Bush is out of office the calls for their repeal will probably lessen, as much of this was driven more by an irrational hatred of Bush than any actual objective analysis of the policies themselves, so again this remains uncertain.
It seems certain that there will be at least some pullback, if only for show, and therein lies one the biggest gambles of the Obama presidency. Bush did what seemed impossible and prevented another attack on American soil after 9/11. In doing so he set a very high bar. Many still believe it is only a matter of time until we are hit again, and given the country’s growing complacency about the war on terror, they are probably correct. Thus Obama is taking a huge risk betting that he can back off on the war in some areas without another attack. I hope he is correct, for if we are hit again, he will not be able to say that he did everything possible.
On the domestic front, all the attacks we have heard from the democrats for the past eight years about the deficit and their calls for a balanced budget will now quietly be forgotten, though this was hardly unexpected. Candidate Obama looked to be a Big Government liberal, and the current financial crisis is showing that assessment to be correct. The size and scope of government will explode, with a corresponding loss of liberty to the people. One thing that most on the left simply do not understand is the simple fact that increased government always comes at the expense of liberty. The more government, the less liberty.
Obama is betting that the increase in government will do more good than harm. History is strongly against this idea. It is now pretty clear that Hoover’s attempts to use government to avoid the depression only ensured it, and that FDR’s use of government to end the depression only extended and deepened it. Thus we may be looking at a repeat of history where Bush’s massive bailouts serve as the pretext for Obama programs. I have heard Obama supporters claiming that we cannot look to the past because this crisis is new and unlike others, that we are in uncharted territory. Therefore Obama’s plans will work despite the evidence of the past. Again I hope he is correct.
On perhaps my biggest issue, judges, I can only hope that no Supreme Court judges leave the bench, particularly no judges who reject the concept of a living Constitution. One of the few areas where I heard Obama speak without hedging or caveats is on judges. He clearly supports the idea that judges should see the Constitution as a living document, one where judges are free to rule based on what they think is right, not limited to what the constitution actually says.
There are a lot of other areas, but the closer one gets to details, the more the uncertainty grows. These I will address in the coming years as the details become clear. But one big thing has changed. Obama can no longer vote present. He will have to make the tough decisions, and will have to take responsibility for the consequences. He is betting big that the war on terror will remain as it is now a secondary issue, and that his massive spending will improve the economy. I really hope he is right, just like I really hoped that McCain would win. But, deep down, I have a lot of nagging doubts.
