Actually, We Can’t

“Actually, we can’t”

Obama has set for himself a formidable challenge of change that has managed to gain the support of millions of fans. Reality has come to supplant this challenge with another, Herculean one: to bring the country, and with it the global economy, out of crisis.

Barely elected, he announced the hope that his team would “hit the ground running” on the coming January 20th, the date of his inauguration. In regards to his transition, we have never seen this before: Obama and his team launched so quickly, and the urgencies of the economic crisis were becoming so pressing that the power swing began even before the new tenant took his place in the Oval Office.

The financial crisis was decisive in Obama’s electoral victory (His polls nosed up literally the day following the bankruptcy of the Lehman Brothers). Now it seems that it was already decisive in the enlargement of the presidency that it heralds.

When Obama, like his rival McCain, was asked what he would give up from his plans in the face of the economic crisis, Obama, like his rival, refused to consider this possibility.

Since then, the economic crisis has only grown, obscuring perspective. One cannot help but notice that the elected president, like any good member of the Democratic camp who has been thinking of the midterm legislative elections in two years, has begun the process of lowering expectations. It’s as old as the world: after the time of promises comes that of “Realpolitik.” The “Yes We Can,” one of the best slogans in recent decades, is already sung to the tune of “Not Everything is Possible.” As if the plane is going down without ever taking off.

Obama has set for himself a formidable challenge of change that has managed to gain the support of millions of fans. Reality has come to supplant this challenge with another, Herculean one: to bring the country, and with it the global economy, out of crisis. This situation has revealed considerable danger for Obama. His voters hold him accountable for the latter, but won’t forget the first, this “inspirational” promise that has defined his stature. Rather than lower expectations, the time has come for Obama to magnify the difficulties like Churchill, who promised victory but only after blood and tears. Because we know now that this will be the cost of change. If they want it.