Columnist Jamala Rogers
President Obama is about to celebrate his first year in office. Unlike former Vice President Dick Cheney, I hardly think the nation’s first president of color has been “dithering.”
Many will say there could be no election of a Barack Obama without the eight years of George W.
They were thinking about the two illegal elections that mocked our democratic process, the financial corruption that took the country to the brink of an economic collapse, foreign policies that had most of the world despising us and military operations (including secret, illegal ones) that help to increase terrorists in the world.
According to exit polls, Obama received 96 percent of black votes, 67 percent of Hispanic votes, 61 percent of the Asian vote and 43 percent of white votes. This was the kind of mandate a president needs to make his vision a reality.
President Obama hit the ground running with a very ambitious agenda. Implementation of the agenda was complicated because of the necessary efforts expended to clean up the Bush mess and deal with the relentless attacks by the right. It’s like trying to run a marathon while defending yourself from flying objects being thrown by people lining the route.
PolitiFact tracks the president’s promises made during his campaign. Periodically I check out the website to see the progress. Most of us don’t even know all the promises made and therefore can’t begin to keep up with them. According to their website (http://tinyurl.com/6unxgt), Obama has broken 12 promises and compromised on 31 of them.
The good thing is that he has kept 91 of his commitments, with 256 still in the works.
It is much too early to define Obama’s presidency. After all, he has a nit-picking GOP and a divided Democratic Party as the Congress he has to work with. If anybody has been dithering, it’s been the sorry group of people in Washington, D.C. who forget they represent constituents and NOT themselves.
Obama also has a powerful, entrenched financial class that isn’t about to ease up its stranglehold on our economy by giving up mega-profits.
The Dems may be facing a flitting moment of majority rule in Congress. They have squandered a historic opportunity to really do something when they had their hands on the steering wheel.
The 2010 elections will determine if the Dems can maintain their gains but it’s not looking good. Without that majority, the “Yes, we can!” mantra by Obama will be replaced with “No, you won’t!” The Party of No has been quite consistent in its strategy to undermine the president’s popularity and progress.
Now is not the time to be disillusioned or to give up. Obama is the president, not the Messiah. Those of us who rode the wave to the White House with this dynamic, bright leader still have unfinished business. Obama told us to hold him accountable, and that must be our commitment if we want this historic presidency to have an enduring legacy that changes the moral, economic and social direction of this country.