Obama: The First Year

The last year has been a challenge and roller-coaster ride for President Obama. He came in with a lot of promise and optimism. A year later, it is tough to say if the last year was a success or failure for the president.

Health care. Those might be the two words one might chose to sum up a lot of President Obama's first year. Health care expansion and the legislation has taken up much of the president's time and energy. He has been attacked by Republicans for "planning a government takeover". He has been attacked by liberal members of his party for "watering down the bill". And the whole will there or won't there be a public option has been a bigger back and forth then a game of championship chess.

The fact that the legislation is the grand package that some want speaks to what might be one point to take away from Obama's first year: he is laying the groundwork for objectives and promises to be completed this year and the rest of his term. Health care is only one major area that the president hopes to address in his second year. Financial regulation, cap and trade, and energy reform are also high on what the president hopes to accomplish by the end of year 2. The climate is a bit different than a year ago and adds additional challenges to getting these things done. Scott Brown's election and a growing energy from the Republican Party's base have the Democrats thinking about their decisions a little longer and thus affecting how successful Obama's agenda will be. He has struggled greatly dealing with a party that has made it difficult to work with and now with the filibuster proof supermajority in the U.S. Senate; things might get tricky.

The Obama White House has gone from "Yes We Can" in early 2009 to "Yes We Can...Maybe?" in early 2010. Obviously, it would have been foolish to think that the Democrats and Republicans would hold hands. The recession was not going to be solved in a year. Something as a big as health care for over 30 million people was not going to happen over night and the fact that it has taken much of the first year to get where we are at is not totally surprising.

Moreover, President Obama ran on being a different type of leader and reaching across the aisle. He wanted to break the bitter partisanship, but lo and behold things are as bad if not worse than they were 12 months ago. For Obama's part, he cannot be blamed for the actions of members of Congress. He has attempted to reach out to Republican leaders in both the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives to only be shunned and told "no". He has reached out to Democratic leaders to be strong on getting his agenda through and work towards the middle to only see left members of his party fight for a public opinion or nothing and centrist members make demands for their votes.

The goodwill that swept Obama into office in November 2008 has also not stuck around after only a year. His election was a combination of a high voter turnout, an anti-Bush mood, and a sense of change was coming. The American electorate is fecal and when they don't see things changing overnight; they start to turn and get a little worried. Many of those independents who helped elect Obama are either uncertain if they still support or have found themselves leaning towards the Republicans. This is nothing new as independents find themselves in the middle and can go either way or not even vote. However, in today's unstable environment; people are even less comfortable sitting around and watching things unfold even if they require time. Let me remind everyone of something: it is only a year later. If you elected Obama in 2008 because of him and his campaign and what he planned or wanted to do; then be patient because last time I checked he has four years.

During much of the first half of his first year, Obama seemed to be trying to put too much on his plate. In the late part of the summer and early fall, we saw Obama begin to take steps to retake his agenda and especially health care back to get the argument back in a way that appealed to most voters senses.

However, despite his best efforts; the honeymoon is truly over and has been for a few months now. 51% of the electorate approve of President Obama at the end of his first year. The decrease in support is a combination of people not sure about the health care legislation, which includes the large amount that doesn't support it; the Republican message has been loud and strong and united and that has dented Obama and the Democrats; and the White House let the Democrats in Congress have too much power of their agenda and things have taken turns that Obama would not have liked. These plus grass root movements and a high unemployment rate have many wanting change, answers, and results yesterday; not today or tomorrow.

Hardly mentioned in Obama's struggles in 2009 and into 2010 is the fact that Republicans are the minority party and if they can stall long enough; they will prevent as many measures by the president as possible until the midterm elections later this year. Both houses of Congress are in the Republicans sight and have put their political ambitions above the greater good of the country. I will say that the party does have ideologies that don't match a lot of what Obama has attempted so in essence they are just doing what they would normally do. It just seems that there is too much talk and not enough action. Obama has wanted to do as much as possible to fix multiple problems in this country, but has been held back by falsies and a party that makes it hard to meet halfway.

That combined with tough decisions regarding the economy with bailouts and the second stimulus and the long drawn out health care legislation have all contributed the change in his ratings.

The decisions involving helping corporations, auto companies, and banks were unpopular, but those choices linked the recession and economy were not the only difficult issues he inherited. President Obama was handed two unpopular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and an ongoing threat from al Qaeda and the Taliban. He has made his intention known that he would ideally like to see both wars drawn down and troops out by the end of his term. However, in order to get to that point; he made yet another unpopular decision in 2009: he decided to send 50,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. The Christmas Day terrorist threat has only made things that much worse and complicated for Obama. They prevented anything serious from happening, but the fact that he got on a plane to Detroit has many worried about the U.S. national security after one year with Obama at the helm.

Throughout 2008, candidate Obama was able to point to the Bush White House for many of the problems. A year in office, slowly more and more issues are being shaped by the Obama White House and the credit and blame will be directed towards him. Granted let's not just jump to assume that everything is his yet as he is still working on issues he inherited. His decisions on those issues are what people need to focus their energy on as he begins his second year. Some strategists on the Democratic side have pointed to some disappointments including the Scott Brown election as positive for Obama. The losses and struggles now will assist the president and his party find out what they are doing wrong to safeguard from bigger losses in terms of their legislation and especially the midterm elections.

Both parties have fought to move to the middle often in 2009 and it will up to the president to ensure that at least his party begins to work on being more moderate and towards the middle for nothing else than to appeal to voters. Many have looked at 2010 like 1994. Some things are very similar, but other things are very different. The one commonality and what Obama can learn as his first year comes to a close: politics is a game of electability and sometimes you need to proper strategy as to not put all your cards on the table at once. Obama has approached the health care legislation, in particular, with great care as the midterm election in 1994 were the beginning of the end for health care then and the same might happen if similar results occur this fall. President Clinton was able to regroup and move more towards the middle and got reelected while getting Republicans to vote on some of his items. The political environment is even tougher for Obama in 2010 then it was for Clinton, but the more Obama acts like candidate Obama then like President Obama the better the public will perceive him. At the same time he cannot jeopardize governing as effectively as possible to appease Republicans.

Obama will certainly look to finish off this ongoing health care legislation in the first couple months of his second year in order to at least tackle one if not two major items before the midterm elections. Energy and financial reform, previously mentioned, seem like the most sensible and financial reform is something that both sides agree needs to be changed. It could be an opportunity for Obama and Congress to fix some of their quarrels in 2009 and display decorum and create progress that they have struggled with agreeing on thus far.

So, after one year it is hard to say whether everything that Obama has put forward will work out. However, if health care can get through the final votes; we will see its beginning impact later this year. The stimulus is slowly working as unemployment has begun to improve. Granted it is at a snail's pace and the positive change is minuscule in terms of the whole picture. But people who are very impatient need to be as patient as possible. Jobs are being created. Jobs are also being lost. Yet there are signs that the jobs created will start to become higher than jobs lost.

President Obama stated last year in his first official address after being inaugurated that the tasks are daunting and it was not going to be easy. It certainly has not, but after one year much of what Obama began to work on and put in place in 2009 will reveal how effective they will be this year and in the coming years. If jobs are saved and the unemployment rate decreases. If health care is passed and we see positive results with people being covered and less insurance regulation (aka high premiums). Or if we see the state of Afghanistan and Iraq getting better. Then subsequently, Obama's approval rating should improve whether or not the opposition party or others try to smear his record. But on the flip side, if progress does not occur; Obama's approval ratings will continue to slip and his agenda then becomes at risk at being turned down.

Overall, I would give the president a B to a B+ considering what he had on his table and how he is working with an opposition party not willing to compromise and his own struggling at times to show similar unity as their counterparts. 2010 will be more vital to his success as he will be judged more highly as his term nears the half way point and he will need to show results.