Swan Song

Barack Obama took an aggressive stance in his State of the Union address. He said he had abandoned hope that a divided Congress was capable of getting anything accomplished; instead, he announced he would henceforth govern by decree wherever possible.

But what sounds so combative is in reality a swan song for one of his biggest 2008 election promises: To change the political atmosphere in Washington and unite the nation. The opposite has happened — and even if that’s not primarily Obama’s fault, it still represents his failure. His State of the Union address bears witness to that fact.

At this point, no one can yet predict where Obama will wield that authority. He has spotlighted many areas in recent years but has not acted on them. Still, because Obama seems ready to try to advance his initiatives in the shadow of 2013, when virtually nothing was accomplished, he is applauded. But real reforms can only be accomplished with real legislation; otherwise, the next president can simply reverse them as quickly and as easily as Obama enacted them.

So Obama’s combative announcement not only serves notice that he has given up on bipartisanship, but that he is also abandoning the hope of accomplishing anything over the next three years that will endure beyond 2016. One exception could be the long-overdue immigration reform. That will have to be enacted by bipartisan legislation; analysis of the last election has led most Republicans to the conclusion that they cannot afford to alienate even more Latino voters, which in turn provides opportunities for more congressional consensus.

The 12 million immigrants with no papers can only hope that Obama’s confrontational course doesn’t turn out to be counterproductive.