“Point Your Finger Elsewhere: Our Real State of Affairs”
Four years ago, Barack Obama started running for President of the United States and he gained star-status within the country. His popularity sky-rocketed not only because he is well-spoken, but because of his ideas, his promise, and his hope for the future. His campaign was amazing and moved millions, but didn’t expect the country to go in such a deep recession. The recession was a game-changer. In 2008 he was elected president with 365 electoral votes and the 66.86 million votes, the highest amount of any president and during one of the worst times.
President Obama was brought in to a presidency while the nation went in a large recession, while we had a war in Iraq, and the largest budget deficit in the history of our nation. Despite all of these adversities, President Obama has been picking up the pieces from the last eight years of a horrible Bush presidency. And so far in two years Obama prevented our country from going in to a deeper recession with the bailouts, is fighting terrorism in Afghanistan, brought us a national healthcare system, and worked with the Governor’s Association to help bring much needed changes to our educational system nation-wide. The President made campaign promises that he kept, but how come people disapprove? Obama’s approval ratings were at 65% when he was inaugurated, but have consistently decreased to the low 40’s for four reasons.
What are the Causes?
1) People expect President Obama to perform miracles with his campaign promises. What people don’t understand is that he is only one man and must have congressional approval to pass a bill in to law. This usually takes a while. Because the President’s agenda is sizable, it will take time to complete, but he’s doing everything he can, one issue at a time. The past two years is evidence that he’s working to get things done. Unlike multitasking at work, having multiple major bills at once is very difficult for Congress; each one takes up a lot of time and arbitration. Yet, people expect the President to instantly fix all our problems.
For instance, the bank and auto industry bailouts were necessary to help our economy recover. Most of these banks have been repaying their debts and the car companies are trying new ways to market their vehicles and are also making some headway. But, if we had a full-on collapse of the banks again we’d be in huge trouble and not bailing out the American auto industry would have also have put tens of thousands more people out of jobs. Yet, people being polled disapproved how he handled these situations; as if the President had full control and as if people really know how exactly the President handles these circumstances. Moreover, the oil spill in the gulf was something the President had little control over; he can only assert so much pressure without breaking the law. Mr. Obama also has no engineering degree and no knowledge of deep sea engineering, so how exactly was he supposed to fix it? From his part, he was doing everything he could. If you’re going to blame someone for these things blame BP, blame the banks, and blame the auto industry heads.
2) People hold the President wholly accountable for the economy. The thing about the economy is that state and local government affects your quality of living more than the federal government does, with things like property taxes, gas prices, energy costs, and state sales taxes. Economically, what the federal government is responsible for are regulations on the banks, international trade negotiations, and national debt. Business incentives and tax cuts are voluntary. Pretty much the only time the government interferes with the free market is for anti-trust cases.
Most of the people answering these polls probably lived through the recession in the 80’s. Did it end overnight? The answer is no; it took time for recovery and it’s going to take time for us too. The bailout that was passed was basically a huge infusion of money in to different sectors of our economy to help stimulate growth. Despite a large bailout package, our President can’t snap his fingers and the economy will instantly go back in to its pre-recession place. Sure, it started to help immediately, but it wasn’t meant to immediately resolve the major issue at hand, but more so to prevent it from getting worse. The good news is our economy has been showing signs of recovery; our unemployment rate has stabilized and the private sector has been growing slowly, but surely.
3) Another huge problem is the President’s director of communications. In not even two full years, the president is on his third communications director. The communications department is where the President’s message gets shaped, redirected out to the public, and where the Press Secretary is supposed to be quick on his/her feet in collaboration with the director, by making sure news stories about the presidency are quickly responded to. President Obama’s first two were unsuccessful and his third isn’t doing so hot either. The reason I say this is because a strong e-mail campaign is not going to reinvigorate most people and create presidential approval. Instead, the news cycles need to be utilized and almost dominated so that the President’s messages of positivity and progress of each individual issue is being made and distributed out everywhere. I am talking about distribution of a clear and coherent message that his electoral constituency will grab on to again and rally behind, once again. This would have to be dispersed through media outlets and made attractive enough as “stories” so the major newspapers will pick them up and write headlines about them. What’s happening is people aren’t seeing the President’s message and they are not experiencing the things that are going on at Capitol Hill. For the general public, they see less action than there really is. When a president’s message is diluted and his current agenda unclear to the public, the constituency is going to waver in their support too. I look at my Google homepage every day and over the course of a week I feel like I’m lucky to see one good Presidential headline.
So what does the President have to do to fix this? He needs to either work with his communications director to get a clear and steady message aggressively being re-broadcasted across the country or he needs to get somebody that will. A sound message is very important in gauging public opinion on the work he’s getting done as well as overall voter confidence. This is politics, and by doing so, it will also increase the chances of a Democratic Mid-term election win once again. He may not be on the top of the tickets, but incumbent and challenging Democrats can align themselves with the President rather than distancing themselves and will be more successful in the agenda they plan to bring to Congress.
4) The last major cause is Republican lies, slander, and propaganda. When the economy is in the dumps and people are depressed and disheartened, they will cling to almost anything. And, since the President is not continuing his message for hope, most people have fallen off of that bandwagon. That void becomes filled with anger and hate instead. You see, when Democrats ostracized President Bush, it was because he was an illegitimate president, stupid, gave more money to the wealthy and none to the middle class, and started a war with no just cause, putting us in to the largest budget deficit in history. On the other hand, President Obama is actually doing good things; what people elected him to do. But if he is doing so much good why is there so much hate and lying from the Republicans? What did the President do to them?
The Republicans use hate and lying as defense mechanisms so to try to not make themselves look weak. They spread lies about the President because lying and propaganda work. If they told the truth about President Obama then there would be little to rant about! One of the worst parts is that I have heard numerous Republicans refer to our President as the next Hitler. But in fact, their tactics of lies and deceit to gain numbers and strength identify much more with Hitler’s. And, if gaining massive public support with the largest popular vote in history from a campaign on hope and promise for the future means he is Hitler, then I don’t even know what to say.
Glenn Beck goes so far as to call Obama racist – is he kidding? The sad part is that he was not. Fox News fuels Republican ranting like that even if it makes no sense and is completely false. Seemingly they will give people shows that have no credentials if they bash the President convincingly enough. I find it to be disappointing that people stoop to such a level of indecency, and even my hope in people at times diminishes because people believe this garbage.
What Can You Do To Help Us Move Forward?
I firmly believe that thinking on your own is the first step to start overcoming Republicans’ diabolical agenda as well as becoming your own person. Taking a step back and looking at the situation, in not how an election will affect you, but how it will affect everyone else too will bring light to the state of affairs. Also, believe nothing that any political pundits on Fox News say; take everything with a grain of salt, and this also includes the Tea Party. It is the most biased information out there.
My next advice: read the paper, and not the New York Post; I’m talking about the real news sources like New York Times or the Washington Post. It is good to be informed about what’s going on and then make up your opinion. Try to be mindful that our President is working hard to deliver his promises in a challenging economic climate and that he is still the same person you elected in 2008. Remember he has been successfully fighting terrorism in Afghanistan and has killed some of Al-Qaeda’s top leaders, has successfully passed health care reform, stabilized our economy from going in to a deeper recession, passed massive financial regulation reform, recently became the catalyst for country-wide education reform, bailed out our banks which have paid almost everything back, and likewise with most of the auto industry. In a society of instant gratification we must be patient. He can not magically fix things and is human like all of us. Remember the principles we all stand for, and be mindful of his role as President.
I believe a general lack of understanding is a huge reason why his approval ratings have dropped and why the country’s attitude has become darker. And, even if his approval ratings are flailing right now it doesn’t mean that we have to flail. If I were the President, I would say that: It is in our own selves where we have to be the masters of our destiny and with hard work we can make our dreams come true, even in this ailing economy. If we meet our challenges head on and persevere we can become victorious in whatever we choose. And finally, don’t give up hope. That feeling of hope is still inside us even if we have to rediscover it. Instead of looking for hope from your president, remember that you have the power to bring it out within yourself.
