Rutland Herald

Supporters of President Obama may be inclined to interpret events as they reflect on the political fortunes of the president. Thus, they view with dismay the growth of the Tea Party movement and the outcome of the midterm elections partly because they are a sign of the president’s declining fortunes.

In the same way, they view with satisfaction health care reform, financial reform and Obama’s latest victories — the repeal of don’t-ask-don’t-tell and the ratification of the arms control treaty with Russia — because they boost his fortunes.

During the summer, the BP oil spill was bad because it reflected badly on Obama. Capping the well was good because it ended Obama’s embarrassment.

But there is reason to believe that not even Obama himself interprets events in such stark, self-interested, political terms. In fact, he has been criticized, especially by his supporters, for not more aggressively defending his political interests against the relentless political attacks of the Republican Party, which has declared that its top priority is defeating him in 2012.



There is another way of looking at Obama’s political fortunes and that is through the lens of the nation’s welfare. The important question is: How is the nation doing, at home and abroad? Answering that question involves more than assessing the effect of events on Obama’s political standing. It involves a long view of America’s unfolding history.



The dominant event of the past two years has been the Great Recession and, more importantly, the realities about the economy revealed by the recession. The recession itself may be over, technically, but unemployment is lingering, nationally, at just under 10 percent, with figures about underemployment telling us that nearly 20 percent of Americans are either unemployed or underemployed. That’s one in five.



Americans are not great complainers. Even during the Great Depression, historians have shown how people tended to become depressed more readily than they became angry. People blamed themselves. But this downturn was not caused by the individual worker who suddenly found himself or herself downsized out of a job. It was about large economic forces; irresponsible, unregulated business practices; and the colonizing of the American economy by unaccountable corporations.



It is becoming more widely understood that America has entered a new Gilded Age. A few lucky robber barons are able to jet off to their vacation homes; millions of others are left standing in line at food shelves.



That we are gaining understanding about these trends is a sign of progress. The White House is now occupied by a president who recognizes the damaging consequences of the vast inequality of wealth. He has tried to address the problem — succeeding with passage of health care reform but failing to effect tax policy that would begin to rectify the inequities.



The Republicans successfully tapped into popular unrest by helping to direct the people’s anger at the government — just as it happened that the government for the first time in many years was trying to side with the people. Democrats fumed at this paradox. But they failed effectively to convey in the November elections the ways they are on the people’s side. Partly that’s because many Democrats, like many Republicans, are in the thrall of big money. But mainly it was that they were blindsided by the way that Republicans were capable of manipulating popular unrest.



Many things are better than they were when Obama took office. We averted a great depression. We have ended the human rights abuses that were part of the Bush administration’s anti-terror policies. We have begun to address the health care crisis and taken small steps to address climate change. We have ended the military’s anti-gay policy. We have moved toward better relations with Russia on nuclear weapons. We have adopted new realism on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan — though Afghanistan remains a bleeding wound.



And yet the class warfare waged against the American people by the wealthy elite proceeds at full force. Only when the people understand the full extent of this warfare will they be able to give Obama the political victories that will burnish his reputation and secure his place in history. It is up to us.