The Conservatives Strike Back: No Chance for Obama’s Re-Election?

In today’s election the Democrats will lose their majority in the Congress. Without the majority, it will be even more difficult for President Barack Obama to give Americans the “change” he promised them two years ago. And without this change, he may lose the battle for the White House in 2012.

The Democrats may lose up to 50 of their 256 seats in the House of Representatives — these are the results shown by the latest public opinion polls. Thus, the new distribution of seats will be as follows: about 200 for the Democrats and about 230 for the Republicans (with the total of 456 seats in the House).* “We’ve lost all hope, and we don’t want to fight anymore because it’s useless,” the dispirited members of the Democrats’ headquarters unofficially told journalists.

The situation looks a little bit better in the 100-person Senate, where only 37 Senators will be elected; there, the Democrats will most likely have a slight advantage.

Obama’s party is losing due to the crisis it had inherited from George Bush’s administration, and which it could not handle. Unemployment is already reaching 10 percent, and hundreds of people are being evicted from their houses because they are unable to pay off their loans. The disappointment with Obama — who had promised a “change” two years ago and kept saying “Yes, we can!” — has in many places turned into rage.

Attending a little political rally in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, one may have the impression that America is preparing itself for another civil war, not for the election. “Obama and his accomplices are stealing and wasting the money coming from our taxes! We have to take back the country they took from us!” the rally leader screams to the cheering crowd of activists and followers of the tea party, a populist movement within the Republican Party. “We must bring down the aristocrats from Washington, just like the forefathers of America drove the aristocrats from London!”

The people in the crowd are complaining about the fact that the Democratic Party frittered away hundreds of billions of dollars through the enormous help given to banks and car companies going broke, as well as the fact that the national debt is increasing alarmingly, and their children would not be able to pay it off to the Chinese who are buying American bonds. Some of the people are wearing badges with the image of a wide-eyed infant asking, “How much do I owe already?”

There are insults against President Obama — he is called a socialist, a dictator “resembling the president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez,” and an impostor limiting people’s freedom and forcing them to participate in the public system of social insurance. There is a stall with T-shirts saying: “Somewhere in Kenya, a village is missing its idiot” (the family of Obama’s father is from Kenya).

But a few dozen yards away stands a group of people with a poster: “Jesus hates the tea party.” There is a picture of Christ making an obscene gesture with the middle finger up. “Look at those from the tea party — they’re white trash and haters who hate the whole world,” says Carl Silverman, who presents himself as a liberal and a rational thinker. “They’re having hard times, as we all are. But rational people are looking for a way out of the crisis, and they’re just holding rallies, shamelessly using religion and patriotic feelings.”**

As if to prove it, the crowd of tea party followers swear on the American flag, before God, and sing a hymn. Silverman looks at them with disgust and says that fortunately on Saturday, hundreds of thousands of people came to the Rally to Restore Sanity, organized by two famous comedians, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, who mercilessly made fun of the tea party.

However, this gives little comfort to Barack Obama, since he now will have to work things out with the hostile Republican majority in the House of Representatives. Even though the tea party takes things to the extreme, its arguments — in a more sober form — are also repeated by moderate Republicans. That is why Obama’s ambitious reform plan, such as the green revolution in energy, may be torpedoed by the Republicans. Even when the president did have the decisive majority in Congress, he wasted many months trying to persuade his own party to introduce health reform and social security.

That is why the president, while appearing on Stewart’s television program, did not say: “Yes, we can!” but only: “Yes, we can, but. …”

*Editor’s Note: Although these figures do not add up, the translation is accurate to the original text.

**Editor’s Note: Silverman’s quotes, accurately translated, could not be verified.