In the past few months, I’ve had a lot of friends (particularly DC policy wonks) ask me how I can be disappointed with President Obama when he’s accomplished so much! I’ve answered that the accomplishments didn’t DO enough, that if passing bills doesn’t bring change it doesn’t matter, that his administration has betrayed labor, that they’ve been too hard on teachers in trying to push for education reform–probably because they don’t really understand the problems that beset education and teachers, that he’s been too willing to compromise on the things that we never should have compromised on, that he squandered his goodwill too early. But my disappointment – as one of the earliest Obama supporters, I’ve believed in his ability to bring change for so long so it hurts all the more now – has made me inarticulate and incoherent on the subject.
Luckily, I have a very articulate, much-smarter friend and colleague who has summed up the reasons for disappointment in a sharp, spot-on piece on his blog. Jason Lefkowitz, speaking for me and for many, many other disappointed progressives:
In the final analysis, the measure of a President is not how many programs he passes, or how sweeping those programs are. It’s how those initiatives impact the lives of the American people. The bills and the programs are not the ball game; they are merely the ball.
And while it is true that the Obama agenda has been legislatively ambitious, it has also been, in practical terms, invisible to people outside Washington, D.C. A stimulus was passed, true; but it was so severely gimped that it barely dented the unemployment rate. Health reform was passed, true; but the parts that will touch most peoples’ lives won’t take effect until 2014. Financial reform was passed, true; but the “too big to fail” banks that dragged us into financial crisis managed to pull most of its teeth. And so forth.
Plenty of bills have been passed, in other words; but for the average American, very little has changed in their daily lives. They still live in fear of losing their job or their health insurance. They still struggle under the burden of crushing credit card interest and deceptive fees from their banks. They still see their government run with greater concern for the tender sensibilities of hedge fund billionaires than for the future of the middle class.
They voted for change, but when they look around, there is precious little change to be seen.
In Washington, the wonks doth protest too much. “He’s passed bills! Look! Legislation! See!” But when I talk to my parents, my friends, my loved ones back home in the Midwest, they don’t focus on those legislative accomplishments. They still like Obama and they give him credit for the health care bill and other achievements–but they don’t see the change. They still see friends losing jobs. They still have family members who can’t afford health care. They still see the down economy, see growth continuing to lag, can easily imagine it tanking again. They wonder where the change is that that voted for. They wonder whose champion Obama really is. They don’t believe he’s bad for the country, or wrong for America, but they don’t see things getting better. So what do legislative accomplishments matter to them?
Jason’s whole piece is here. And it’s well-worth reading.
Ethel Rohan’s 
