Obama's "questionable" associations

Obama's associations with the likes of Jeremiah Wright, Bill Ayers, Tony Rezko, and Frank Marshall Davis doesn't seem to be hurting him much politically, but they do tell us something about how he would approach the problems he would (will?) face as president.

If there's a theme to Obama's "questionable" associations, it's that he always seems to perceive quite a bit of good in certain characters most Americans would instantly perceive as evil. In fact, this tendency of Obama's has reached comic proportions. The line "That's not the [insert name] I know" has become familiar joke during this campaign.

If there's any truth at all to the "post-partisan" label Obama has hung on himself, it's that he envisions himself as something of a mediator between parties in conflict. As a general rule, mediation assumes that there is some merit in both sides of a conflict. Thus, in his speech decrying certain extreme pronouncements by Rev. Wright, Obama went out of his way to contextualize those diatribes as a manifestation of the racial animosities that all Americans supposedly harbor. Rather than condemn Wright's hateful sermons and let it go at that, Obama had to use the moment to try to explain that Wright was merely expressing the same kind of racial fears that white people experience when they encounter a young black man in a darkened alley. Nobody is right, nobody is wrong; we all just need to understand one another.

Unfortunately, the American presidency is not an appropriate job for someone who basically craves compromise and reconciliation. First, a president is expected to provide leadership, not reconcile opposing viewpoints. While there's nothing wrong with showing respect for the opposition's position -- John McCain does this all the time -- the president's job is to make the ultimate decision and to persuade Congress and the American people why it is the right one.

Second, and more important still, it is essential to the role of the president that he never appear to be a disinterested party when it comes to America's relations with other countries. In the realm of foreign policy, the president should be an unapologetic advocate for America's interests and values. Unfortunately, there is reason to question whether Obama accepts that vision of the presidency. Obama wants to meet with the leaders of Iran, North Korea, and Venezuela, without any sort of preconditions. In the absence of preconditions, such meetings would necessarily imply that there is some merit to the anti-American (and anti-Israeli) ravings of such lunatics. Clearly, Obama wouldn't hold summit talks with, for example, Hugo Chavez, merely to tell him, "We're right and you're wrong." The mere fact of a face-to-face meeting would implied an acknowledgment that there is some common ground to be found between the two countries. Even if Obama made it clear he had no intention of altering U.S. foreign policy toward Venezuela, he would be forced to dignify Chavez's predictable railings by sitting and listening to what the Venezuelan nutjob had to say. It's frankly ludicrous to think that Chavez wouldn't come out ahead in the exchange. And yet that would be, from the American point of view, the best case scenario. In the worst case, Obama would, in fact, liberalize U.S. policy toward Venezuela in some way, thus signaling weakness and implicitly suggesting that Chavez was somehow right all along.

Any student of American history knows that, in order to be successful, a president must be decisive, strong, and fundamentally unapologetic about the course they are steering on the nation's behalf. Lincoln, both Roosevelts, Truman, and Reagan all capitalized on these qualities. Even George W. Bush, whose persuasive skills proved a perpetual liability, had a successful first term as a result of confident leadership in the War on Terror and various domestic reforms. Some of our worst presidents, notably Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, Grant, and Carter, failed because of their apparent lack of strength or resolve in dealing with the key issues facing their administrations. Whether it was Buchanan's refusal to deal with the succession crisis, Johnson's inability to gain control over the Radical Republicans in Congress and in his own cabinet, Grant's unwillingness to confront the apparent epidemic of corruption within his administration, or Carter's weakness in responding to foreign and economic turmoils, all of these presidents suffered due to a failure of leadership.

In Obama's case, it is not even clear he aspires to lead the country. Although the country would undoubtedly move to the left under his administration, it seems more likely than not that Congress will be the moving force and Obama merely a reliable rubber stamp. If and when real presidential leadership is required, such as during a foreign policy crisis, it is highly unlikely Obama will take an assertive position. He will find reasons not to impose or even threaten the use of military force because he will want to be perceived as a peacemaker who can lead the parties to a peaceful resolution. He will resist taking firm positions on America's behalf because he won't want to tarnish his image as a "citizen of the world." He will seek to elevate the role of international organizations and disparage the notion of American exceptionalism. He sees America in much the same way the world sees America, or he at least sees some merit in that point of view.

Obama may be a talented man, but he can't be trusted to stand up for American interests and values on the world stage. He is simply too tolerant of those who hold anti-American views and too enamored by his own perceived ability to rise above the fray and reconcile parties who are locked in conflict. America needs a president who sees the world as it is, not one who will try to reconcile Americans to a lesser vision of themselves.