Here's to a One-Term President Obama

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 14:41:56 +0000 – By Richard MillerAuthor, "In Words and Deeds: Battle Speeches In History"

On Monday, the president of the United States, a man who never had to meet a payroll in his life, fired the chief executive officer of General Motors. Obama did so because he didn't like General Motors' reorganization plan--it was reportedly not tough enough on the bondholders. In Old America, GM would have gone into bankruptcy and been forced to sit down with bondholders, shareholders, unions and other creditors and worked it out. But no more. Obama, having failed to deliver on card checks to his union constituency, wasn't about to let established bankruptcy procedure resolve the problem possibly at the expense of unions.

Welcome to the New America.

What should we call this place? Lately, on the right, and in various Tea Parties held across the country, the word "socialism" has cropped up. But this doesn't quite fit.

But it's not too early to label what to call this New America: Authoritarian. At the moment, it's a mild authoritarianism, not too burdensome, more conceptual than actual.

New America's Managerial State has not been that programmatic. There's no wholesale nationalization or expropriation. Instead, these statist elites seem to be operating more episodically, accumulating power in increments large and small, and here and there -- to what cumulative end none can say.

But it's not too early to label what to call this New America: Authoritarian. At the moment, it's a mild authoritarianism, not too burdensome, more conceptual than actual.

Sound too paranoid? Perhaps. But consider some recent troubling events. Congress passes a 400 page, $780 billion dollar budget without bothering to read it! -- If this happened in a country called Nicamala, we'd smile and call it a "rubber stamp" legislature; then, when President Obama gets caught including AIG bonuses in that budget -- an tax subsidized organization with suspiciously close ties to the president's resume and campaign -- he helps deflect attention by sponsoring menacing visits to the homes of AIG executives. Meanwhile, paid political hacks and presidential surrogates are sent forth to attack radio talk show hosts, TV stock gurus, all the while whispering "Fairness Doctrine." If this happened in a country called Venezil, we'd call it political thuggery and figure that one can't expect any better from banana republics. Obamistas?

Meanwhile, the private sector is breathlessly hyper-focused on Washington rather than building a better mousetrap. The irony of all this is that owing to voters' bad judgment and stupidity (yes, I'll be among the first to publicly say it), we've elected a man to find us jobs who has never had a real job and a guy with no corporate experience to straighten out our largest companies.

As my father used to say, there are reasons why state governments don't let 11-year-olds drive cars. There are also reasons why Americans have generally not elected neophytes to high office. But to paraphrase another old saying, if you're having bad presidency, make it a short one.

Here's to a one-term President Obama.