Defining Obama’s presidency

Ramzy Baroud

Ramzy Baroud

He may still possess the poise of a confident leader and is an eloquent intellectual, but the presidency of Barack Obama is now passing through its most difficult phase to date.

Obama cannot solely be blamed for all the factors that have stifled his country’s chances of recovery from the failures of the Bush era. But the man who promised the moon has now extended the abhorrent and morally unjustifiable tax cuts for America’s wealthiest class. The “sweeping” $858 billion tax bill was signed into law on December 17. It includes an $801 billion package of tax cuts, extending Bush’s tax break for the rich for two more years at a time when the majority of Americans are reeling under the weight of a failing economy and persistently high unemployment.

Still, the tax bill was presented by the self-assured president as “real money that’s going to make a real difference in people’s lives”. The cuts will help stimulate an ailing economy, he claims, despite the fact that the rich gambled with America’s wealth to increase their own, stimulating a market crash that led to millions losing their small investments and savings.

All we know for sure is that the cuts will add a gigantic chunk to an already impossible deficit of $1.3 trillion, another Obama battle that is likely to be lost to the Republicans early next year.

This concession and its presentation as a victory for America’s middle classes say more about Obama’s style than the weakening of the Democrats since the mid-term elections. Even in his foreign policy management, Obama’s approach seems to teeter between giving facelifts to ugly realities and postponing urgently needed action. The agent of change has become the quintessential American politician who is more consumed with his chances of reelection than with bringing about the kind of long-term change that can really benefit his country and the world at large.

Obama’s handling of the short-lived peace talks between the Palestinian Authority and Israel’s rightwing government is another example of striking failure followed by whitewash. Although he adamantly demanded a halt to Israel’s construction of illegal settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, Obama began capitulating before an obstinate Israeli prime minister. Benjamin Netanyahu, supported by much of the US Congress and backed by a strong Israel lobby in Washington, finally forced Obama into a humiliating retreat. Even a generous bribe to win a limited Israeli moratorium on settlement construction failed.

Obama administration officials finally declared that the US would abandon its efforts to halt Israeli settlement expansion, effectively signalling an American exit from the “peace process”.

Instead of laying the blame squarely on Israel, the Obama administration delved into the long-discredited rhetoric that only Palestinians and Israelis are capable of accomplishing peace without any outside intervention. That was the core message of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who argued that it was up to Israeli and the Palestinian leaderships to “settle their conflict”. It signalled a complete shift in US foreign policy, which Israel has naturally welcomed, for the US-financed military occupier prefers to be left to its own devices in this very unbalanced conflict.

Afghanistan is another example. The eagerly anticipated strategy assessment of the war in Afghanistan was released on December 16, with illusory talk of “gai