I simply don’t understand how anyone can be taken seriously when they try to imply Obama is supposed to completely change 25 years of policy in less than 3 weeks. He may be the president who won on "Change", he may be the first Democrat in a long time to solidly beat the Republican candidate, he may be the first African American president (finally breaking through that glass ceiling), but he is not God almighty and his team is not the choir of angels. He’s a human being who has to work his way through each of his promises one-by-one, help rebuild the country brick-by-brick.
Yet, the traditional media and a significant number of bloggers (all over the spectrum) are pre-emptively pissing their pants because he hasn’t walked on water or fed the masses with a few loaves of bread yet. Many of them are claiming that he somehow failed because he couldn’t turn the economy around in less than three weeks of being in power, and with a petulant minority opposition blocking him every step of the way.
So, I have to ask myself, "Have any of them actually worked on a massive project?" or even more appropriately, "Have any of them tried to turn a large sailing boat around?" It takes time to change a country, just as it takes time to build amazing things. If you give up on your mason because after the first row of bricks you don’t have a wall, then the problem isn’t the mason, it’s you. You have to build it brick-by-brick.
Pretty much anything worth doing I find takes a lot longer to complete properly than you’d initially think. It takes even longer if you have to work with other people to accomplish it. It takes even longer still if those people are actively blocking you from getting your job done. This delay frustrates me as much as I am guessing it frustrates you. It is hard when you spend an entire day trying to properly design and implement a project to end the day not feeling like you were much further than where you started. However, you are further. One more day, one more brick.
While the Republicans have been doing their best to be disruptive to the legislative process, I do agree that Democratic leaders like Pelosi, Reid and company also regularly do silly things in fear of losing seats in 2010. At times, I wonder if they realize that they have a majority in both houses and won a clear mandate for change with the last election. Regardless, Even with these blocks in his way, Obama has accomplished an amazing amount of his promises in less than 3 weeks and only recognizably broke one promise (He hasn’t put bills up for 5 days before signing) in order to get his other promises checked off even quicker.
Shockingly, he is actually following through on what he said he’d do, but a prevalent cynicism seems to actively try to block that out. In fact, it feels like a large number of people are determined to have their cynicism proven right, and so they tilt at every windmill they can find — All in the hopes that they won’t be proven that, sometimes, government can work if you elect the right people or implement the right policies.
The only reason I’ve deduced for this behaviour is that if they are proven wrong, then the last 30 years of bad government will, in essence, be their fault.
So, I say to the cynics, "Grow up and give him a chance to get things done. If, in a year, he has broken more promises or clearly avoided following through on them, then complain."
But geezus, he isn’t going to change the world in a little over 2 weeks. He’s a human being, working with other human beings, and it will take time to get it done.
1h
crossposted at 1337hax0r.com