Graphic by Mr. Fish

I subscribe to Harper’s Magazine. Although the editors and contributors drank the Kool-Aid many moons ago, it is still a genuinely left-leaning publication, with a left-leaning perspective and many fascinating articles for us librul types to peruse. Imagine my shock when the July issue arrived in my mailbox, with the words “Barack Hoover Obama: The Best and the Brightest Blow it Again - By Kevin Baker” displayed prominently on the cover.

Intrigued, I started reading. (Apologies to non-subscribers, but the link is pay-only.) The usual nauseating, opinion-masquerading-as-fact, obligatory fawning and drooling ensued.

Three months into his presidency, Barack Obama has proven to be every bit as charismatic and intelligent as his most ardent supporters could have hoped. At home or abroad, he invariably appears to be the only adult in the room, the first American president in at least forty years to convey any gravitas. Even the most liberal of voters are finding it hard to believe they managed to elect this man to be their president.

Obama, The Savvy World Leader

Oh, really, Kevin? You call THIS gravitas? Although I agree with your last point: being among the most liberal of voters, I am having a REALLY hard time believing that this man has been elected President.

In any case, after lifting my head weakly from the vomit bucket, I read on, and I was glad I did so.

Obama’s failure would be unthinkable. And yet the best indications now are that he will fail, because he will be unable—indeed he will refuse—to seize the radical moment at hand.

Every instinct the president has honed, every voice he hears in Washington, every inclination of our political culture urges incrementalism, urges deliberation, if any significant change is to be brought about. The trouble is that we are at one of those rare moments in history when the radical becomes pragmatic, when deliberation and compromise foster disaster. The question is not what can be done but what must be done (emphasis mine).

We have confronted such emergencies only a few times before in the history of the Republic: during the secession crisis of 1860–61, at the start of World War II, at the outset of the Cold War and the nuclear age. Probably the moment most comparable to the present was the start of the Great Depression, and for the scope and the quantity of the problems he is facing, Obama has frequently been compared with Franklin Roosevelt. So far, though, he most resembles the other president who had to confront that crisis, Herbert Hoover.

Well, hallelujah. The insult to rationality and reason that results from comparing this puppet of the oligarchy/ patriarchy to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a man who had the courage to tell the bankers to go to hell and set up a social safety net that still holds, although rather shakily, even today, well, let’s just say it makes me really, really peevish.

Mr. Baker then goes on to tell the forgotten history of Herbert Hoover – a man who became a self-made millionaire through hard work and entrepreneurial skills, then decided to turn his efforts to public service for the sake of pure idealism. Serving under Harding and Coolidge, Hoover successfully led the post-World War I efforts to feed the millions of starving victims of that conflict world-wide, risking his personal fortune and his life in the process. He was such a beloved figure that both the Republicans and the Democrats wanted him to run for President on their tickets, and his election was considered a chance for genius to shine.  

Come to think of it, drawing a personal parallel between Hoover and Obama is also an insult. Hoover was a heroic, idealistic person who spent many years in the federal government earning his stripes in public policy before becoming President. Obama served barely two years as a U.S. Senator, concentrating mostly on not rocking anyone’s boat and whispering in the right ears, and suddenly began running for President on the basis of…what accomplishments? Being a community organizer? Herbert Hoover surpassed that when he was a teenager.

But of course, the essayist must flatter Obama at all costs, because after all, Obama is the greatest man ever, the most awesomest Preznit in 40 years. (The obligatory digs at Bill Clinton do come in the end, if you were wondering – the inability to recognize, and indeed, hatred of, Clinton’s accomplishments is a signature component of the incomprehensible adulation that so many “progressives” have for our Dear Leader.) In fact, a lot of the article is just an excuse to praise Obama and blame Bill Clinton for his total capitulation to the corporatocracy (yes, of course it’s Bill Clinton’s fault, isn’t everything?), so I’ll skip to the end, where Baker nails it.

Franklin Roosevelt also took office imagining that he could bring all classes of Americans together in some big, mushy, cooperative scheme. Quickly disabused of this notion, he threw himself into the bumptious give-and-take of practical politics; lying, deceiving, manipulating, arraying one group after another on his side—a transit encapsulated by how, at the end of his first term, his outraged opponents were calling him a “traitor to his class” and he was gleefully inveighing against “economic royalists” and announcing, “They are unanimous in their hatred for me—and I welcome their hatred.”

Obama should not deceive himself into thinking that such interest-group politics can be banished any more than can the cycles of Wall Street. It is not too late for him to change direction and seize the radical moment at hand. But for the moment, just like another very good man, Barack Obama is moving prudently, carefully, reasonably toward disaster.

Very well said.

There are many assertions in the essay to the effect that Obama understands the nature of the crisis. The basis for the author’s belief in this myth? Some speeches penned by a drunken 27-year-old with a fixation on Hillary Clinton’s breasts. Here’s a question for Mr. Baker: If Obama understands the nature of the crisis, why is he not acting to remediate it? Surely a President who enjoys a high approval rating and a submissive Congressional majority (neither of which FDR had) could get whatever he wants accomplished, at least in the first six months of his Presidency. Where is the revitalization of industry? Where is the return to regulation and the trust-busting? Where is the concern for equality for the least privileged and disenfranchised among us, especially women, the LGBT community, and the African-American community? Where is the focus on job creation? (“Create or save” is about the most pathetic load of donkey doo-doo I’ve ever heard. Create, or don’t.)

Although many Americans are starting to realize Obama ain’t the one they were waiting for, the oligarchy/patriarchy couldn’t be happier, since there is very little chance their bought-and-paid-for minion will actually grow a conscience and implement the kind of real, sweeping change this country desperately needs. So, in the next four years, more people will starve to death. More people will fall ill and be unable to afford the health care they need. The gap between rich and poor will continue to widen as unemployment rises to double digits. Bigotry and hate crimes will continue to multiply and become more acceptable. The environment will continue to deteriorate. More Americans will die and be wounded overseas in senseless wars. And the massive damage Bush has done to America’s reputation and its Constitution will be exacerbated. Torture, secrecy and the radical abuse of presidential authority will continue unabated, possibly with even greater alacrity and frequency than before.

Why will all of this come to pass? Because just like Hoover, Barack Obama is unable to rise to the “fierce urgency of now.” Dear Leader’s character is not made for taking up causes that do not benefit him directly. He will do exactly what he needs to do in order to be re-elected: no more, and no less, and his most cherished constituency is the corporate elite. The have-nots of America deserve a lot more than a few cosmetic regulatory “improvements” and a weak climate change bill in order to survive; but alas, that is all we are going to get.

Barack Hoover Obama. The words have the ring of truth, don’t they?