How the Gingrich Stole Patriots' Day

Some of you might have seen this story in the news last week, in which a certain former Speaker of the House referred to our current president as the "most radical president in American history." I must ask, has Mr. Gingrich ever studied any American history? Somehow Barack Obama, by most accounts to this point a center-left leader with a number of policies identical to Bill Clinton's and a Defense Department and judicial branch largely composed of Bush appointees, is the most radical president EVER?

For the sake of discussion, I'm going to note a number of other presidents by which you, my readers, can make your own judgments on this issue. Is the president more radical than a president who bore arms against the country he fought in service of 20 years prior, the president who set precedents still being followed to this day? Is he more radical than a president who not only promised to make principled, unpopular decisions, but actually did it? Is he more radical than a president who, by any measure, vastly overstepped his Constitutional authority in making a business deal with a foreign power? Is he more radical than a president who let the White House burn to the ground? (Something tells me that would probably lead Glenn Beck's show today.) Is he more radical than a president who actively promoted a campaign of genocide? Is he more radical than a president who almost single-handedly destroyed an insidious institution that pervaded the country since the earliest colonial days, who had to declare martial law and suspend the writ of habeas corpus to do it? Is he more radical than a president who eliminated the last vestiges of isolationism and promoted peace throughout the world? Is he more radical than a president who broke many of the long-standing precedents of the presidency, attempted to dissolve the Supreme Court, gave the federal government more power than it had ever known, and somehow found the time to drag the country out of the worst financial crisis the country had seen? Is he more radical than a president who spent sizable amounts of taxpayer dollars on the largest infrastructure program in American history, who slashed the defense budget to promote education and health care? Is he more radical than a president who epitomized the term "cover-up?" Is he more radical than a president who remade the financial system for the benefit of his wealthy buddies, who created the economic climate that transformed the country into the cesspool of corruption and greed it is today? Is he more radical than a president whose policies resulted in the (in terms of raw dollars) greatest financial disaster in history, who transformed a budget surplus into a record deficit within two years, who refused to rule out the use of nuclear weapons in the war on terror?

I'm willing to bet that you, as I do, see the obscene hyperbole in Mr. Gingrich's words. The only way Obama is our "most radical" President is if Mr. Gingrich is using surfer lingo. It's not particularly surprising; after all, he is trying to position himself for the nomination to oppose said radical president in two years. However, I do think it epitomizes the primary issue that the Obama Administration has had to face, more than adamant Republican opposition to doing the job they were elected to do, more than having to face the challenges of four separate centuries. The biggest issue the President has right now is bridging the gap between Obama the Idea and Obama the Man.

As numerous others have elaborated far more eloquently than I will, as a candidate Obama positioned himself, and ultimately became, the "tabula rasa" candidate. More than any other presidential candidate, and thus more than any other president, Obama represented an open canvas onto which any American could project his or her ideals and dreams (or in the case of the other side, their fears and nightmares). It's part of why he won the Nobel Peace Prize; he represented the ideal of a better, more peaceful future for the world, in part because he represented the ultimate triumph of the American ideal of equality. It's also the biggest reason his approval rating is under 50% right now despite having not outright defied any of his campaign promises and despite the economy beginning to turn around. See, to those on the left, Obama became the Champion Of Progressive Issues, the Born Liberal. The fact that he hasn't lived up to their expectations of pushing the country much further to the left is a large part of the reason so many liberals are constantly angry with the Administration. Never mind that he stated from the beginning that he would increase troop levels in Afghanistan; actually doing so makes him a lying warmonger, somehow. Never mind that he's promised to repeal "don't ask, don't tell;" because it's not done RIGHT NOW, people are chaining themselves to the White House fences in protest. Never mind that no president had ever gotten any bill regarding changes to the health insurance system through Congress; because this bill didn't have a public option, it's trash and the President should have to answer personally for it. By the same token, because the right has become so radicalized (there's a proper use of the word, Mr. Gingrich), anyone who doesn't stand for their beliefs represents a dire threat to the future of their country (which happens to be an idyllic country similar to the 1950s that never actually existed, but that's another story). Facts are irrelevant; it's whatever's been projected onto the man that becomes the driving factor in the opposition. Never mind that the health insurance reform bill does nothing to anyone's current insurance plan; somehow it's a government ploy to install socialism everywhere. Never mind that the primary "hockey mom who cried socialism" is more of a socialist than the President (that's not coming from me; that's coming from actual Socialists!). Here's the real kicker: someone actually believes that Obama (who was, as you might recall, Senator Obama...State Senator Obama in the Illinois Legislature, to be exact...at the time) was responsible for 9/11, not based on any facts or evidence, but because to him, Barack Hussein Obama represents all the fears the world can dredge up.

What we need to remember as we judge the President is that he, like any other president, is eminently human and thus eminently fallible. As he himself has said, he's not the last son of Krypton come to save humanity from itself. By the same token, he's not the Anti-Christ spawned from the blackest reaches of Hades, either. When I voted for him I did so knowing that I wouldn't agree with all of his positions, and to this point I haven't. Hell, I'm even guilty of falling into the aforementioned trap of associating my ideals with Obama the Idea (you should have seen me when they dropped the public option). What I knew at the time was that he possessed a pragmatism born from careful thought, reasoning, and rationalism. I voted knowing that I was electing a man who based decisions on scientific fact and hard evidence, not "gut feelings" or "words from God". As a thinking public we need to remember that the President is not the physical manifestation of what we want for America (or what we most fear), but instead a steward of democracy, a single man with his own thoughts and ideas on how the country should be run. He represents neither impossible extreme, but a reality somewhere in the middle.

I leave you with this quote to keep in mind when trying to classify the President right now, and it's one he would do well to remember: "Don't try to be a great man, just be a man. Let history make its own judgment." Until next time, never confuse the Ideal with the Reality.