Obama’s Summer of Wee Wee

The author of this WSJ article, Foud Ajami has a more elegant title: Obama’s Summer of Discontent which I recommend for a full read but I will use a couple of thoughts and ideas from the article for my own contemplation.

American democracy has never been democracy by plebiscite, a process by which a leader is anointed, then the populace steps out of the way, and the anointed one puts his political program in place. In the American tradition, the “mandate of heaven” is gained and lost every day and people talk back to their leaders. They are not held in thrall by them. The leaders are not infallible or a breed apart. That way is the Third World way, the way it plays out in Arab and Latin American politics.

Those protesters in those town-hall meetings have served notice that Mr. Obama’s charismatic moment has passed. Once again, the belief in that American exception that set this nation apart from other lands is re-emerging. Health care is the tip of the iceberg. Beneath it is an unease with the way the verdict of the 2008 election was read by those who prevailed. It shall be seen whether the man swept into office in the moment of national panic will adjust to the nation’s recovery of its self-confidence.

Picture above (Source: Library of Congress via this page) shows the first page of the US Constitution, which I add to this post to drive home the point that people and not the politicians have the final say — a point seemingly lost on Obama. Remember how he and his cronies react to the town hall protests, remember how he repeats that he is the president, that he won the election, that he wants the opposition to shut up and get out of the way.

I came to this country in the late 1980s. My introduction to American politics was the tail-end of Reagan era and I never understood the fascination people had for him. But when people threw out the lack-luster Bush, the elder for his “Read my lips” folly, I was really impressed. Then came Clinton and I was truly mesmerized by his intellect and his wife, the first brainy first lady with a career who didn’t care to be sidelined even as the Republicans muzzled her in all ways possible. His economic policies were good enough to result in a surplus and the Internet revolution. The Internet is perhaps the truly most glorious gift that the Americans have given to the rest of the world. This was the euphoria that carried me into becoming a citizen in spite of the 2000 election debacle that gave us Bush, the son. With my guarded optimism in the informed American electorate I waited for a strong opposition but that never came. I think that was mostly because of 9/11 which shocked and paralyzed the country for much of Bush years. He took advantage of it to go into Iraq and we are suffering the aftermath of it still. Obama is part of that Bush era aftermath and as Mr. Ajami rightly notes, he rode in on a “moment of national panic”, enthralling the gullible people with his magic ‘hope and change’ mantra.

Mr. Ajami is right — most third world politics is full of such shock and awe between politicians seen as infallible or a breed apart. People want to believe that their suffering which is generally monumental will somehow be alleviated with a divine intervention or a politician who talks the good talk. It however, took me by surprise that the majority of Americans fell for similar gobbledygook (remember the messiah rhetoric) about Obama last year. On NQ we have kept track of everything that happened during the Democratic primary in 2008. We saw many signs of third world politics — the bullying and intimidation of voters and caucus fraud (I still can’t believe Chicago Cook county numbers for Obama), the May 31st DNC fiasco, the thuggery and the race-baiting, the pay to play with the delegates, the chicanery of Edwards’ candidacy (now we know more than before with 20/20 hindsight), the media malfunction that continues to this day, and anything else you want to add to that list. All of this gets euphemistically reduced to this faux-reality bite: Obama ran a better campaign.

In third world politics, when the realization that the elected officials are nothing but corrupt politicians occurs, people are generally powerless to do anything. Will it work out differently for the Americans?

Some of third world politics even when they are democracies, is based on parliamentary system of government. People have the right to vote for a party representative but the leaders are picked by the majority party elites. A lot of cronyism and corruption feeds into that second phase of installing the government. That culture crept into American polity last year with the failure of the Democratic primary. Obama was the anointed one by the party. The people were duped to go along with it through the media megaphone and other political skulduggery. However, what is truly different about the American system is that the people still have the power to kick their political leaders including the president out of office if they don’t deliver. As Mr. Ajami notes, “the “mandate of heaven” is gained and lost every day and people talk back to their leaders.” Are the recent town hall protests a sign of that American tradition? Have they seen the light that Obama is just another Chicago politician fending for himself and his cronies? Will they kick him out of office if he fails to deliver?

The American system of government is truly exceptional with every citizen having the right to choose his/her president, that is if it is allowed to work as it is intended. With a bad choice, a presidential term of four years is long enough to cause damage inadvertently or deliberately but not long enough for the American people to realize and demand course correction. We will have to wait for 2012 to see if they gain their self-confidence back and exercise their control judiciously. “We the People..” is a beautiful and empowering phrase but with great power comes great responsibility. I hope the next time around, the people stay away from mind altering ad campaigns like the one Axelrod or Rove pulled off in the last three elections. Trust me, you need a better than “I can have a beer with that guy” or “hope and change” kind of guy for your president.

A side anecdote: As a new bride, some twenty years ago, I impressed my new MIL (rolling my eyes) when I successfully argued with her old (read wise) and distinguished university professor friend, about why it was easier for India to have produced a female head of state, Indira Gandhi as its prime minister. The professor’s contention dripping with self-satisfaction at that time was that America with all its sophistication had failed to produce a female leader. I, having been in America for only one or two years, had argued that with a parliamentary system of government like India has, it was easier to convince a few party bigwigs to nominate a woman for the highest political office. In contrast, I argued that the American system of government was more retail politics and that it was harder for the female candidate to change the mindset of millions of individuals without a major shift in culture. The irony however, is that twenty odd years later, we had such a female candidate last election in Hillary Clinton that the people approved but the party establishment and the political class opted to usurp a parliamentary type coup during the Democratic primary to steal the nomination from her.