Monday, May 31, 2010

Can He Afford To Sit Back Any Longer? Can We?

The BP-induced, Louisiana-destroying (and possibly nation-destroying) oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has been dominating the national news for weeks.  It will probably continue to do so for months, which is now the time frame being given for getting this environmental monster under control.  And, in the middle of all of this, where has Barack Obama been?

He's been to the Gulf.  Twice.  On what amount to presidential drive-bys.  And he still hasn't convinced anyone that he feels their pain, not even among his friends in the media, who seem to think that is all about the need for him to wear his heart on his sleeve.

Frankly, I couldn't disagree more.  The media coverage of Obama's response to the Gulf disaster has, like so much in what passes for contemporary American culture, shown a preference for endlessly examining style at the expense of substance.  For something a lot closer to the mark, take a look at a recent column by Thomas Friedman in the New York Times.  In it, he rebuts the argument that the spill and Obama's response to it is his "Katrina."  (If anything, it's an extension of the Katrina-sized lack of oversight the Bush administration gave to its oily friends in the petroleum industry.)  Rather, he argues, "It's his 9/11"--that is, an opportunity to seize the moment and redirect ourselves away from a future based on oil.

But, since his inauguration, when has Obama seized the moment?  He's been content to let others (particularly Democrats in Congress) drive the debate and, often, do his proverbial dirty work for him, and then step in at the last minute just in time to claim a victory he didn't really win.  As Friedman himself says, "Why does everything have to emerge from the House and Senate? What does he want? What is his vision? What are his redlines? I don’t know."  Neither do I, Tom.  And I'd like to know.  And there are about 300 million other Americans (not to mention billions in other countries) who would love to know.

Too often, Obama seems to be content to sit back and wait for some sort of national consensus to emerge on every major issue, so that he can then step in and "bless" it.  To me, that makes him seem less like a latter-day FDR, and more like a latter-day Jimmy Carter.  I admit to liking Carter more than many people (I voted for him twice), but even I couldn't stand his dithering on issues--especially when it seemed that, for the most part, he was on the right side of them.

Apart from my concern about the spill and its effects on the Gulf and, possibly, our nation, that's what worries me most right now.  More and more, I don't think this moment is Obama's Katrina, or his 9/11.  I fear that it is his Iranian hostage crisis--and that it may suck down a Presidency, a movement and a great nation with it.

I pray that I'm wrong.  But I fear that I'm right.  Please, Mr. President, prove me wrong.

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