Change. Yes we can! This slogan galvanized the public during the 2008 Presidential election, propelling Barack Obama past John McCain. In January of 2009, Barack Obama delivered a powerful inaugural speech, continuing the promises of change- change in the multifaceted war that the United States was waging, change in the failing economy, change in partisan politics and change in health care. Change.
What has changed? Since President Obama has taken office, politics in Washington continues just as it has in the past. Party-line politics continues in both houses of Congress. President Obama’s primary domestic policy, health care reform, has hit a roadblock that seemed unlikely. It is not the Republican Party that is grinding reform to a halt but instead it is the President’s own Democratic party that is putting up a fight. In July, Republican Senator Jim DeMint stated that a loss on health care reform would be his Waterloo. How could it not? The Democrats have control in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. When the Republicans had this control, President Bush took advantage and pushed his agenda through with ease, yet today President Obama seems unable to pass health care reform, which would provide a public insurance option that the American public deserves.
While on the campaign trail, then Senator Obama vowed to bring the American troops home from Iraq. Since taking office, the President has lowered troop levels in Iraq and devised an exit strategy. However, according to congressional reports, troop levels in Afghanistan have increased by 30,000 in 2009 alone, while the U.S. will maintain a military presence in Iraq until December 2011. The ongoing war in the Middle East is one that the American public wants to see come to an end, but there is no end in sight. The cost of American lives continues to mount by the day. When are these soldiers truly coming home? When will we stop committing our military as a global policing force?
When President Obama took office, the American economy was in the worst shape that it had been in since the Great Depression. The solution was to inject large amounts of money into public works in hopes of creating lasting jobs. According to the Department of the Treasury, since January the national debt has increased by over 1.1 trillion dollars, while the unemployment rate has increased from 8.5 percent to 9.7 percent. It is still far too early to judge these decisions, as they will take years to truly make an impact. However, jobs created next year mean little to those who are laid off today.
President Obama’s administration had a major victory with the success of the Cash for Clunkers program. The U.S. Department of Transportation announced that nearly 700,000 cars were traded in under the program. However, the program raised many public concerns. If the government is having such great difficulty paying car dealerships a few thousand dollars for cars, imagine the difficulty paying health care bills on a much larger scale.
There are those who say, “Leave the President alone and let him go about his business.” That’s difficult to do when he is making a public address nearly every week. The President is spending so much time on network television, he may be replacing Jay Leno before Thanksgiving. President Obama came into office under huge expectations. He was hailed as the next FDR. However, today’s society is impatient. We want everything now and cannot wait. The problems that President Obama has set out to change are not going to be solved overnight. We will have to be patient and let the President do his job. The President is doing the best job that he can, and we have to have a little hope and faith the situation in our country can turn around. Change will happen, it’s just going to take time.