November 19, 2008--Obamafreude

I’ve been an Obamamaniac for almost two years. Since he announced his candidacy. And I have enjoyed every step along the way as he pursued his unlikely quest. I’ve used up many boxes of Kleenex since he was nominated. I’ve allowed myself to hope again and to believe in the need for fundamental change.

I’ve contributed more than I can afford to his campaign and am tempted to shell out even more for the inauguration, though they feel like an unnecessary extravagance. But he and Michelle and the nation deserve a big party to celebrate them and ourselves so I’m sure I’ll be sending in my check.

You know me well enough, though, and thus will not be surprised that I’m getting worried.

It all started when Time Magazine recently ran a cover with a picture of Obama in the guise of a Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Replete with fedora and a Chesterfield tipped jauntily in his mouth in that iconic FDR cigarette holder.

I’ve been more than OK with the Lincoln references—Obama’s interest in a Team of Rivals—and the speculation about his Rooseveltian first 100 days. But when they begin to morph Obama, as Time did, into Roosevelt himself and I hear that even 75 percent of Republicans are optimistic about the job he’ll do as president, I really begin to get nervous.

It feels as if Obama is being set up for a fall. Not intentionally. I do believe that almost all Americans are rooting for him to succeed. We are in such a series of crises that who except the masochistic lunatic fringe would be looking forward to him failing.

But with expectations soaring toward worshipful heights, can a fall be far behind?

If the economy doesn’t respond quickly to whatever he initiates, if Iraq tumbles into chaos as he begins to withdraw troops, if Congress fails to act on healthcare or education reform or fund public works projects, with so much hope invested in Obama, with him already, even before taking office, imbued with almost superhuman power, we may find Americans taking as much perverse pleasure in tearing him down as they are showing as they currently exalt him.

Look out, in other words, for schadenfreude, an American tendency with a German name—taking pleasure in the misfortune of others, especially when we have previously lifted them too high.

I can live with GQ naming him Man of the Year and the New York Times selling copies of the edition from the day after Election Day for $14.99 (plus shipping and handling), I like the idea that he is reading two, not one book about Roosevelt’s presidency and others about Lincoln’s—I like my presidents to know their history so that maybe they won’t repeat the mistakes of the past—but it worries me when the public gets so ahead of the reality curve that they are already seeing Obama as not just learning from Lincoln and FDR but already being like them.

We need to lower expectations a bit. Maybe he’s helping by naming more former Clinton administration officials to his own team than the promise of fundamental change would suggest. But I’m personally all right with that. It suggests he’s being smart and strategic and yet practical with an emphasis on getting things done.

Here I am doing it again—even as he contemplates naming Hillary Secretary of State and Eric Holder, another Clinton alum, as Attorney General, and Larry Summers to Treasury, I can’t help myself from seeing this to be inspired.

And then what’s this business with Joe Lieberman? Obama’s pulling him back from the brink sure looks like enough of a misstep to turn off some of his most enthusiastic supporters. Well and good. That should help lower our expectations a notch or two. Just what we need.

But then yet, yet, wasn’t that evidence of Obama’s magnanimity? In victory, extend the hand of forgiveness? Or was it to get 60 veto-proof votes in the Senate? In either case—brilliant again!

So I surrender. Let’s see where this all take us. God knows, we need to get to a better place.