Will The REAL Obama PLEASE Stand Up

Though Barack Obama was far from my favorite Democratic Presidential candidate in 2008, and I did criticize him frequently during the primaries, after he locked up the Democratic nomination I found plenty of substantial differences between him and John McCain, in Obama’s favor. So large did I perceive those differences to be that I frequently wrote about them and the reasons why I felt it was crucially important that Obama be elected president.

Sadly, those differences turned out to be far less than I had hoped or anticipated, while the differences between Obama’s campaign promises and his actions as President turned out to be much greater than I had anticipated. I think those differences are worth recounting, as I think it is time that progressives/liberals (or anyone who believes that government should not be controlled primarily by the rich and powerful) start giving considerable thought to whether a second Obama administration is something they should work for, or whether their time, effort, and money would be better spent elsewhere.

To recount those differences I go back to a 2008 post of mine that more than any other of my writings systemically pointed out the differences between candidate Obama and John McCain. These were the issues that I considered to be of great national importance – on which I argued the need to elect Barack Obama president. If I had it to do over again I would remain silent on the subject because, given Obama’s actions as president I no longer consider the good majority of what I wrote on May 10, 2008 about candidate Obama’s plans to be valid. So let’s consider the status of candidate Obama’s plans then (as I documented them at the time), compared to what he has actually done as president.


Torture and human rights

Obama then
Obama had been universally and strongly against torture. This is what Obama had to say about George Bush’s Military Commissions Act (which McCain voted for) and his torture programs:

The five years that the President's system of military tribunals has existed, not one terrorist has been tried. Not one has been convicted. And in the end, the Supreme Court of the United found the whole thing unconstitutional, which is why we're here today. We could have fixed all of this in a way that allows us to detain and interrogate and try suspected terrorists while still protecting the accidentally accused from spending their lives locked away in Guantanamo Bay…

Instead of allowing this President – or any President – to decide what does and does not constitute torture, we could have left the definition up to our own laws and to the Geneva Conventions…

But politics won today. Politics won. The Administration got its vote, and now it will have its victory lap, and now they will be able to go out on the campaign trail and tell the American people that they were the ones who were tough on terrorism.

Obama as president
President Obama does deserve credit for banning torture on the second day of his presidency. However, as Alain Nairn explains in “The Torture Ban that Doesn’t Ban Torture”:

What the Obama dictum ostensibly knocks off is that small percentage of torture now done by Americans while retaining the overwhelming bulk of the system’s torture, which is done by foreigners under US patronage. Obama could stop backing foreign forces that torture, but he has chosen not to do so. His Executive Order instead merely pertains to treatment of “an individual in the custody or under the effective control of an officer, employee, or other agent of the United States Government…”, which means that it doesn’t even prohibit direct torture by Americans outside environments of “armed conflict,” which is where much torture happens anyway since many repressive regimes aren’t in armed conflict.

The Military Commissions Act of 2006 that Obama spoke so eloquently against as a U.S. Senator enabled our military to kidnap people around the world, accuse them of being terrorists, and ship them off to Guantanamo Bay to waste away, without any due process to establish their guilt. But a U.S. Supreme Court decision in June 2008, Boumediene v. Bush, ruled that this process was unconstitutional. Glen Greenwald describes the close similarity of the Obama and Bush administrations on this issue, as they both thumbed their nose at the Supreme Court ruling:

In the wake of the Boumediene ruling, the U.S. Government wanted to preserve the power to abduct people from around the world and bring them to American prisons without having to provide them any due process. So, instead of bringing them to our Guantanamo prison camp, the Bush administration would instead simply send them to our prison camp in Bagram, Afghanistan, and then argue that because they were flown to Bagram rather than Guantanamo, they had no rights of any kind and Boudemiene didn't apply to them. The Bush DOJ treated the Boumediene ruling, grounded in our most basic constitutional guarantees, as though it was some sort of a silly game…

Back in February, the Obama administration shocked many civil libertarians by filing a brief in federal court that declared that it embraced the most extremist Bush theory on this issue – the Obama DOJ argued…as Charlie Savage put it, "that military detainees in Afghanistan have no legal right to challenge their imprisonment there, embracing a key argument of former President Bush’s legal team." … and they argued that those individuals can be imprisoned indefinitely with no rights of any kind – as long as they are kept in Bagram rather than Guantanamo.

Last month, a federal judge emphatically rejected the Bush/Obama position and held that the rationale of Boudemiene applies every bit as much to Bagram as it does to Guantanamo. Notably, the district judge who so ruled – John Bates – is an appointee of George W. Bush…

Climate change

Obama then
During the 2008 campaign, candidate Obama emphasized the need to combat global warming, saying “I don't believe that climate change is just an issue that's convenient to bring up during a campaign. I believe it's one of the greatest moral challenges of our generation.”

Obama as president
It was widely recognized by climate scientists prior to the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference of December 7-18 in Copenhagen, commonly known as the Copenhagen Summit, that failure would likely portend world-wide disaster. An article in Scientific American by Douglass Fischer, titled “What Would Failure at Copenhagen Mean for Climate Change”, written a month prior to the Summit, summed up the stakes:

Climate experts, scientists and negotiators say that, absent international agreement, the children and grandchildren of those living today will negotiate a world where planetary geo-engineering is a part of daily life, sea-walls defend coastal cities, the world's poor are hammered by drought, floods and famine and our planet is heading toward conditions unseen for the last 100 million years…

The accord that the 30 leading countries agreed upon dropped the goal of 80% greenhouse gas reduction by 2050, despite the fact that our best climate scientists say greenhouse gas emissions must be cut 80% from 1990 levels by 2050 to avoid catastrophe. It retained a (non-binding) commitment to reducing global temperatures by 2050, but contained no concrete plans for achieving that goal. Consequently:

Many countries almost immediately tore to shreds the compromise plan that the group of 30 countries presented in the main hall. Those countries that could face destruction as a result of climate change, in particular, could not see any solutions in it. Now we are faced with the threat of an impasse in global climate politics. And the consequences of this holdup will primarily be felt by the poorest of the poor. Experts anticipate that they will be subjected to storms and flooding stronger than ever before. Their crops will wither. Melting glaciers might deprive several million people of their water supplies and deprive them of their livelihoods.

Later, the United States committed to a 4% reduction in greenhouse gas emission from 1990 levels by 2020 – a puny and laughable gesture compared to 80% reduction by 2050 that climate scientists say is necessary in order to avoid catastrophe.

An article in the Guardian by Suzanne Goldenberg, titled “Barack Obama’s Speech Disappoints and Fuels Frustration at Copenhagen”, summarizes the disappointment over the lack of U.S. leadership felt by much of the world:

Barack Obama stepped into the chaotic final hours of the Copenhagen summit today saying he was convinced the world could act "boldly and decisively" on climate change. But his speech offered no indication America was ready to embrace bold measures, after world leaders had been working desperately against the clock to try to paper over an agreement to prevent two years of wasted effort from ending in total collapse.

Obama, who had been skittish about coming to Copenhagen at all unless it could be cast as a foreign policy success, looked visibly frustrated as he appeared before world leaders. He offered no further commitments on reducing emissions or on finance to poor countries beyond Hillary Clinton's announcement yesterday… He did not even press the Senate to move ahead on climate change legislation, which environmental organizations have been urging for months.

Economic issues

Obama then
Obama’s tax plan was in many ways the opposite of McCain’s. It would have reversed the Bush tax cuts for the rich, while reducing taxes and simplifying filing for working and middle class Americans. Specifically, he said:

The Bush tax cuts – people didn't need them, and they weren't even asking for them, and they ought to be relaxed so we can pay for universal health care and other initiatives.… We have to stop pretending that all cuts are equivalent or that all tax increases are the same…. At a time when ordinary families are feeling hit from all sides, the impulse to keep their taxes as low as possible is honorable. What is less honorable is the willingness of the rich to ride this anti-tax sentiment for their own purposes.

In addition to his tax proposals, Obama had an extensive economic plan, which included: fighting for “fair trade” instead of “free trade”, as manifested by NAFTA; job creation; restoring workers’ rights to unionize; the creation of a universal 10% mortgage credit to give relief to homeowners; a crackdown on mortgage company abuses; and a crackdown on predatory lending policies.

Obama as president
Far from reversing the Bush tax cuts, Obama waited until they were about to expire, and then he castigated progressive Democrats for not submitting to Republican blackmail to hold extension of unemployment benefits to the unemployed hostage to tax cuts for the rich. The first major clue to his plans to give in to Republican blackmail on this issue was when he clarified at the G20 Conference in Seoul his plans for dealing with it. At this conference Obama said, “I continue to believe that extending permanently the upper-income tax cuts would be a mistake and that we can't afford it". What exactly does “temporary” mean in this context? These tax cuts have already been operating for close to close to 10 years, contributing to an ever-expanding income gap between the wealthy and ordinary Americans, which is tearing our country apart. What meaning did his pledge to reverse them have if he allows them to be continued to the end of his first term? When exactly does he intend to reverse them?

So far job creation has been negative during the Obama administration – representing the worst job creation record since Herbert Hoover. One thing that could be said in Obama’s defense is that he has been president for only two years, and that he inherited a nation in economic crisis. That is true, but so did FDR. Yet the philosophy and actions of the two administrations have been very different. In fact, Obama’s philosophy leans towards the Republican side of the spectrum, as he made clear in a statement:

See, I’ve never believed that government has all the answers to our problems. I’ve never believed that government’s role is to create jobs or prosperity. I believe it’s the drive and the ingenuity of our entrepreneurs, our small businesses; the skill and dedication of our workers… that’s made us the wealthiest nation on Earth. I believe it’s the private sector that must be the main engine for our recovery. I believe government should be lean; government should be efficient.

He’s bragging about us being “the wealthiest nation on Earth” during the midst of an economic crisis that is driving millions of Americans into poverty? Worse than that, his actions have not been commensurate with the magnitude of the crisis: Though our best economists recommended a much stronger stimulus package, he decided instead to go with the advice of his much more conservative economic advisors; his solution to the home foreclosure crisis was “Making Home Affordable”, a program that William Kuttner explains in his book, “A Presidency in Peril”, was orders of magnitude more favorable to banks than to homeowners; his continuation of the Bush bailout of Wall Street without demanding much fiscal reform from Wall Street failed to improve our financial situation; and in his 2010 State of the Union message he indicated that deficit reduction would be a priority over stimulation of a stagnant economy. Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman’s response was scathing in his criticism of that:

A spending freeze? That’s the brilliant response of the Obama team… It’s appalling on every level. It’s bad economics, depressing demand when the economy is still suffering from mass unemployment… And it’s a betrayal of everything Obama’s supporters thought they were working for. Just like that, Obama has embraced and validated the Republican world-view.

And what happened to the Employee Free Choice Act he claimed to support?


Civil Rights

Obama then
During the 2008 presidential campaign, Obama described a plan to strengthen civil rights on his website. That included: overturning of the USSC decisions that weakened laws against employment discrimination based on race or sex – including passage of the Fair Pay Act to ensure that women receive equal pay for equal work; ending deceptive voting practices that prevent citizens from voting; a plan to end racial profiling; elimination of racial sentencing disparities for drug offenses; and the use of rehabilitation, where appropriate, to replace prison for first time non-violent drug offenders.

Obama as president
Obama did in fact sign equal pay legislation to ensure that women receive equal pay for equal work, early in his presidency. And he also signed the Fair Sentencing Act to reduce extreme racial disparity in sentencing involving crack cocaine (more commonly used by blacks) vs. powder cocaine (more commonly used by whites). His administration also signaled a minor thaw in the “War Against Drugs” by announcing that it “will not seek to arrest medical marijuana users and suppliers as long as they conform to state laws”. And he did authorize a review of mandatory minimum sentencing.

President Obama deserves credit for all of these things.


Health Care

Obama then
Obama offered a national health care plan to all Americans to buy affordable (through government subsidies) health care coverage that is “similar to the plan available to members of Congress.” Unlike the McCain plan, this plan would have made healthcare coverage affordable for everyone, prohibited discrimination based on preexisting illness or health status, and substantially changed our current private for-profit insurance company domination of the market by making available to everyone a Medicare-like, government sponsored program as an alternative.

I noted at the time that some criticized Obama’s plan because it left the private for-profit insurance system intact. While it is true that private insurance companies would not have been prohibited under his plan, they would have been seriously wounded by the competition provided by the far superior government programs. That competition would have forced insurance companies to either provide a product comparable to the government insurance programs or else get out of the market. It would have been a vast improvement over our current situation, and there is every reason to believe it would eventually have morphed into a single payer system as private insurance companies decided that there isn’t enough profit left in the business to encourage them to stay in it (See Paul Krugman’s discussion of this issue).

Obama as president
The plan that Obama eventually offered the American people as president was nothing like the one he promised as a presidential candidate. Instead of a plan “similar to the plan available to members of Congress”, he offered us the option – or, rather, mandate – of purchasing a plan from the same health insurance industry that has consistently abused its near monopoly of its product for the past several years or decades – albeit restrained by some government regulation. Instead of a system that provides competition to that insurance industry he offered us a system that mandates most Americans to purchase health insurance from that same industry – thus solidifying their monopoly.

Worse yet, Obama didn’t even appear to fight for the plan that he promised the American people. It simply slipped off the table. Worse still, he didn’t even acknowledge his about-face. He unveiled his shocking surprise in a speech of September 2009, in which he said:

An additional step we can take to keep insurance companies honest is by making a not-for-profit public option available in the insurance exchange. (Applause.) Now, let me be clear. Let me be clear. It would only be an option for those who don't have insurance. No one would be forced to choose it, and it would not impact those of you who already have insurance. In fact, based on Congressional Budget Office estimates, we believe that less than 5 percent of Americans would sign up.

In other words, the plan that as a candidate he offered to “all Americans” – the not-for-profit public option – was now being offered to “less than 5 percent of Americans”, as Obama struggled to make clear to the insurance industry that threatened to fight him tooth and nail at the slightest indication of competition to their racket.

But even that proved to be too much for the health insurance industry to accept. Obama was forced to take even his measly offering of 5% off the table – without a semblance of a fight.


Children

Obama then
As a presidential candidate in 2008, Obama produced an extensive plan to combat poverty if elected President. A plan to fight poverty, which disproportionately affects women and children in our country, is perhaps the one most important thing that a President could do for American children. In 2008, 14 million American children lived in poverty.

Obama as president
The poverty rate for 2009 was 14.3%, representing almost 44 million Americans in poverty – the highest U.S. poverty rate since 1994. More than 20% of those Americans are children, most who are considered to be living in food insecure households.

In short, our rising poverty rate is largely a function of the Obama administration’s too conservative approach to the economy in general. I discussed that above, so I won’t repeat it here.


Iraq

Obama then
During his presidential campaign, Obama promised to withdraw from Iraq, while committed to meeting our humanitarian responsibilities there. He stated on his website:

Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months. Obama will make it clear that we will not build any permanent bases in Iraq. He will keep some troops in Iraq to protect our embassy and diplomats; if al Qaeda attempts to build a base within Iraq, he will keep troops in Iraq or elsewhere in the region to carry out targeted strikes on al Qaeda…

Obama believes that America has a moral and security responsibility to confront Iraq’s humanitarian crisis – two million Iraqis are refugees; two million more are displaced inside their own country. Obama will form an international working group to address this crisis. He will provide at least $2 billion to expand services to Iraqi refugees in neighboring countries, and ensure that Iraqis inside their own country can find a safe-haven.

Obama as president
In September, 2010, Obama announced an end to U.S. combat operations in Iraq, thus apparently fulfilling a major campaign promise. Some have reported additional evidence that the U.S. military is planning to exit Iraq, as in an article from August, 2010, titled “Obama is Also Pulling Equipment and Bases from Iraq”. And indeed U.S. military casualties in Iraq during the Obama administration have been only a small fraction of what they were during the Bush administration – only 60 U.S. dead in 2010 as of October of that year. But the extent to which Obama actually intends to end U.S. military involvement in Iraq is open to question. From “Business as Usual in Iraq” by Marjorie Cohn, one week after Obama’s announcement:

Last week, President Obama ceremoniously announced that U.S. combat operations had ended in Iraq… Obama felt he had to make good on his campaign promise to move the fighting from Iraq to Afghanistan. But while he has escalated the killing in Afghanistan, it’s business as usual in Iraq. The United States, with its huge embassy in Baghdad and five large bases throughout Iraq, will continue to pull the strings there…

Obama’s speech about withdrawing combat troops from Iraq is an effort to demonstrate compliance with the SOFA… But events on the ground reveal that he is playing a political version of the old shell game. As Obama proclaimed the redeployment of a Stryker battalion out of Iraq, 3,000 combat troops from the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment redeployed back into Iraq from Fort Hood, Texas. And that cavalry regiment will have plenty of company. The State Department is more than doubling its “security contractors” to 7,000 to make sure U.S. interests are protected. And with them will come 24 Blackhawk helicopters, 50 Mine Resistant Ambush-Protected vehicles and other military equipment.

Fifty thousand U.S. military troops remain in Iraq. Forty-five hundred U.S. special forces troops continue to fight and kill with Iraqi special forces. American troops are still authorized to take preemptive action against any threat they perceive. The policy regarding air strikes and bombings will remain unchanged. And untold numbers of “civilian contractors” – more accurately called mercenaries – will stay in Iraq, unaccountable for their war crimes.

What about Obama’s promises regarding Iraqi refugees? The international Integrated Refugee & Immigrant Services (IRIS) reported on this in June 2009:

So has Obama lived up to his promises ? Is his policy concerning Iraqi refugees considerably different from that of George W. Bush ? … Obama’s promise of change has not yet been realized. Granted, Obama has not yet held office for even half a year… However, the tens of thousands still awaiting resettlement in addition to the continued abysmal conditions of both Iraqis that have been resettled to the United States and also those living in countries neighboring Iraq serves as a stark reminder that significant progress is still much needed.

A report by Human Rights First in August 2010 documented little or no improvement, recommending that the Obama administration “should implement immediate changes that would prevent the unnecessary and prolonged detention of asylum seekers…”


Conclusion

Obama’s adherence to some of his civil rights related promises shows at least that his campaign promises means something to him. Why then has he broken so many of his most important promises?

The crucial factor appears to be the amount of pressure applied to him by powerful and wealthy individuals and corporations. Most of them are not much threatened by such things as equal pay for women or minor reforms of our “War on Drugs”. President Obama is often willing to enact progressive legislation if it’s not opposed by powerful interests.

But taking on the financiers of Wall Street, the Military Industrial Complex, the health insurance or pharmaceutical industries, or seriously challenging the paradigm that excuses our shameful “War on Drugs” are entirely different matters. These people don’t tolerate changes to the status quo that threaten their wealth or power status. They aggressively use their money and control of national communications media, as well as (to an unknown extent) their control of the machines that register voters and count our votes, to influence elections and through that our elected representatives. It requires substantial moral courage to stand up to them.

But when it comes down to a choice of challenging these behemoths or giving in to them, Obama chooses the latter every time. Consequently, the wealth gap explodes, the American empire expands, planetary destruction portends widespread catastrophe, the economic and political power of the wealthy climbs to obscene levels, and the rest of us remain mired in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

I for one no longer believe that Barack Obama has the ability or inclination to reverse these dangerous processes.
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