There have been three distinct phases of Barack Obama’s presidency, thus far. There was the period when the President worked with the Democratic Party dominated Congress, the period when he attempted to work with the Republican Party dominated Congress, and the present period, with Obama fighting against the Republican Party dominated Congress and starting his re-election campaign. He has engaged in different tactics in each of these phases, geared to the prevailing political environment, but he has also revealed himself as being a political leader with a long-term strategy meant to change the environment, not simply adapt to it.

While most political coverage over the last three years has been focused on the tactics and the day-to-day ups and downs, serious assessment of the first term of the Obama presidency requires evaluation of the strategy, and its successes, failures and continued promise.  President Obama is a principled politician with clear commitments, even if without a unifying simple ideology. He is a centrist, working to move the center to the left, trying to make the American Dream more inclusive and politics more civil, serious and participatory. He is working for a major political transformation, as I have explored carefully in my book, Reinventing Political Culture and have examined here at Deliberately Considered as well. In this post and in two future posts, I will review what we have learned about his attempt to move the political center to the left, specifically as it involves economic policies and social reform. I will review other dimensions of the Obama transformation in further posts as the Presidential election season develops.

Obama with Democrats:

Given the global crisis that greeted the new president, the economy was the initial focus of Obama and his administration. Even before he became president and then in the early days of his administration, Obama was involved in major actions to forestall a complete meltdown of the financial system and a global depression. The “Wall Street bailout” (the Troubled Asset Relief Program), the rescue of the auto industry, and the stimulus package ( The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009) presented aggressive policies that undoubtedly made a difference, even though today it is convenient for Republicans to label all as wasteful. One of the first signs that Obama recognized the hard times was in his inaugural address. The public and commentators expected an upbeat “yes we can” speech. He gave instead a sober appraisal of a country in crisis, seekingto address serious problems. He included ambitious plans, concerning jobs, economic recovery, healthcare, education and energy and the environment. He recognized that realizing the plans would be difficult.

He, along with his allies in the Democratic Party, fought long and hard for healthcare reform. This battle overshadowed much else that was happening in first stage of his administration. The passage of what his opponents call “Obamacare” into law is a singular achievement. I am convinced that in the long run the label will be understood positively. But it certainly wasn’t at first. While much was being done to get the economy going again and to try to create jobs, the controversies around the healthcare reform focused a great deal of his opposition’s and the public’s attention. The Republicans attempted to use it to sink Obama’s presidency, while he worked to make pragmatic reform a reality. They linked healthcare reform with the necessary measures to address the economic crisis, TARP, the stimulus package, and the Auto Industry Rescue, and criticized what they took to be government overreach, politely put, or more aggressively put, the imposition of socialism and worse. The word fascism was casually introduced by Glenn Beck and many others.

There was a strange a-symmetry in public debate. Obama compromised and tried to work with Republicans to achieve a broad bi-partisan agreement on healthcare reform, while he was denounced as an alien-being imposing European socialism on a free society.

Between conservative Democrats (notable that Ben Nelson announced his retirement yesterday) and the united Republican bloc, normal politics proved to be impossible. His liberal critics wanted more, but Obama did everything possible to establish the principle of universal health coverage in the United States. Short of a constitutional challenge, this has been achieved. We observed this here.

Note: most of the media attention has been focused on the news of the passage of legislation and the developing tea party tempest in opposition. But also note that there is a major change in American life. Decent healthcare has been established as a citizen right.

Yet, the political fallout was significant. Obama worked to credit the Democratic House and Senate and his Presidency for this achievement and for the (limited) progress on the economic front. But he was working against the momentum of a major social movement, The Tea Party, and even when he made clear what principles were at stake in powerful partisan speeches, the media tended to not pay attention. It didn’t fit their narrative. They reported on the ups of the right and the downs of the left, Tea Party theatrics, and not Obama’s substantive arguments.

The media focus on short term tactics did anticipate the political contest of the past year, with the high stakes show downs on the debt ceiling and the deficit, taxing and spending. But the long term debate about defining the center of public discussion, which Obama has steadfastly worked on, is again gaining attention. Tactically, this can be and has been explained by Republican overreach and blunders, but it is positively connected to Obama’s leadership and developing social movements concerned with social justice, which I will address in future posts next week (year).