August 21, 2014--Obama's Past Tense

Over lunch with Loraine and Doug, after lots of catch up about family and work and what they've been doing while in Maine, she asked what we've been thinking about Barack Obama. She made a bit of a face which tipped off what she is feeling.

A lifelong progressive and feminist, Loraine in 2008 initially was a fervent supporter of Hillary Clinton's, but during the primaries found Obama's ability to inspire and his position on issues she cared deeply about to be so persuasive that she switched her support and offered her organizational skills to him and his campaign.

"I remember the excitement I felt when he won the nomination," she said now with a sense of sadness. "I found myself screaming with excitement, just like a teenager, and unashamedly and uncontrollably crying with joy."

I confessed that I found myself doing the same at that time and then later when he managed to get elected. If it were possible, when he gained a majority of Electoral College votes, I felt even more elated.

"The promise he represented," I said.

"For me," Loraine said, "it was more than that. It felt unbelievable that someone from his background, his mixed race background, who had spent his childhood in an Islamic country, that Americans could put all that aside and vote for him, to elect him. To me it seemed miraculous."

"It was a miracle," Rona said, "It felt as if America had healed its racial wounds, that we were voting as if to say--no, literally to say--we are one people. That the worst of our past is receding. For the current generation, hopefully, maybe it is fully healed. Wouldn't that be the end of the worst chapter in American history?"

"I felt it was all that," Doug, who is African-American, said.

"I notice," I said, "that we're speaking in the past tense. Or am I wrong? Am I projecting my frustrations with how things have turned out?"

"No, you're right," Loraine sighed.

"So what are you thinking now?" I asked.

"It's still the same miracle," she said, "But . . ." She trailed off.

"You know," Rona said, "we were at a dinner party last month with three other couples, all liberals, all of whom were enthusiastic supporters of Obama's."

"There's that past these again," Loraine said, smiling.

"Well, to the eight of us it was all past tense. No one was still feeling good about him. We as one said . . ." She didn't complete the thought.

"I still feel good about him," Loraine said. "In the present tense."

"I thought you were suggesting disappointment," I said.

"I am disappointed."

"Then I'm confused."

"In historical terms I feel good about him. Actually, still inspired."

"Because?"

"Because of what he represents and what he achieved. Maybe not in the governing arena--where I have become quite disillusioned--but in his very being. That he was able to inspire much of the nation and figure out a way to get elected. Twice. Amazing. Remarkable. Inspiring. But . . ."

"To be fair," Doug interrupted, "They--and you know who I mean--they did everything to thwart him, from day one to bring him down."

"From even before day one," I suggested.

"Right. So how could he have been more effective with all that fierce, bigoted opposition? His honeymoon lasted, what, maybe 15 minutes."

"Less."

"But, to be fair," Loraine offered, "He never figured out how to work with Congress even during the first two years when the Democrats controlled both houses. And, maybe more significant, where he has a lot of independent power, in foreign affairs, what can we say about him that's positive?"

No one said anything. Or had anything to offer.

"But, and it's a big but," Loraine concluded, "we've had other presidents who turned out to be disappointments."

"Many," I said, "Maybe most."

"And so he will probably be ranked by historians among those who have been disappointments. But I want to stay in touch with how I felt. Not to forget that. To continue to feel some measure of joy and inspiration. Our son, who looks like Obama, if you know what I mean," she glanced toward Doug, "for him anything is possible. That wasn't true the day he was born but today, because of Obama's example, it is. That means a lot to him, to me, to you as well," she winked at us, "And, if I may be so bold, to everyone else in this country. Even to those who don't recognize that or hate him. About this, they haven't a clue."

April 23, 2014--Obama's Drones

Five days after Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula released an audacious video of a daytime militant rally in southern Yemen, President Obama authorized a drone strike that killed at least 55 Al-Qaeda-linked terrorists.

Putting aside for the moment the legal and ethical issues, in many ways this was a good thing. These men are among the world's most dangerous people and drone strikes are a good way to get at them with little risk to U.S. or Yemeni forces.

The openly-flaunting way in which Nasser-al-Wuhayshi, head of AQAP, organized the rally and brazenly made videos of it public, not only emphasized the level of the threat he and his fighters represent but also was a way to humiliate his enemies, especially the United States. He brashly seemed to say, "Catch me if you can."

So Obama was quick to rise to the taunt. At least three drone strikes were carried out over the weekend and as a result dozens were killed.

One thing even fierce critics of Obama's concede is that he not hesitant about authorizing drone strikes against bad guys, including an occasional American citizen.

Putting tactics aside--drones' ability to respond quickly to threats--it is striking to see Obama acting so decisively about . . . anything.

The very same Republican critics who poke him about "leading from behind" give him begrudging credit for being so aggressive about the use of drones. But I suspect Obama is uncharacteristically decisive and forceful when it comes to the deployment of drones for other than just military or political reasons.

Political-Psychology 101 would suggest the unfettered use of drones is the one arena in which Obama has undisputed power and can act out his frustrations.

For a president who knows that at least half the reason conservatives oppose everything and anything he initiates or even supports is because he is African American, for a president who is reluctant to play the race card much less even openly confront this political bigotry, fearing being characterized as an "angry black man," having a means to act out his frustrations and, I am sure, rage about this must be irresistible.

The giveaway that this is not a preposterous notion is that authorizing the use of drones without seemingly endless cogitation--a quality for which Obama is known and not-entirely-unfairly criticized--is the one area of leadership in which he clearly leads from the front and is expeditiously decisive.

In Freudian terms--this is an example of displacement theory.

As a close reader of the Constitution, he knows that much of this is extra-legal or, minimally, questionable; and yet, time after time, instead of being cautious or timid, he acts boldly. And, it would appear, successfully.

It may be unfeeling to suggest that ordering the killing of people--even terrorists--is in some ways therapeutic, but considering the circumstances in Washington and in Red-State America, on some level it is understandable.