San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
The illusion of Obama’s ‘Promised Land’
WASHINGTON — Have you seen the Promised Land? For a president with perfect stage timing in office, Barack Obama’s bestselling memoir title is “a bit much,” as the British say. The 44th president played coolerthanthou in a podcast with pal Bruce Springsteen, his fellow “renegade.” That was it for me.
Obama was a good president, but not great, as he sometimes suggests. As a freshman senator, he compared himself to Abraham Lincoln.
Sorry, but “The Promised Land” does not meet the present moment well.
We’re proud of the first Black president and his beautiful way with words. Amazing grace, elegance and wit were his to burn, but masked his mistakes.
The nation is now in shambles and despair, rocked by a pandemic and a violent attack on American democracy. And Obama bears some blame.
(Are we there yet? Wake me when it’s over.)
Never mind the misery. Barack has deep thoughts and stories to tell in “The Promised Land.” Straight from his legal pad, all 768 pages, with another volume to go. He dwells in a mansion nestled in an enclave here.
After turning over the Oval keys to Donald Trump, Obama should be humbled, searching his soul for how he could have saved us from that fate.
Overconfident that Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton would win in 2016, Obama never played party politics as a team sport. He was always a solo artist. We paid a high price for that.
Let me count some ways.
In the last summer of his presidency, Obama never fully leveled with the American people about the FBI Russian investigation into Trump campaign ties. Why? Because Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, RKy., acidly refused a bipartisan announcement. Obama had appointed Republican James Comey as head of the FBI. That was a fateful unforced error in 2013, that came home to haunt his party.
Pious Comey publicly scolded Clinton, the 2016 Democratic nominee, twice over email investigations that were closed. He violated FBI protocol twice.
Polls say Comey may have cost Clinton the election, but Obama did not fire him, as another president might have.
Sadly, the charismatic president could have campaigned harder for Clinton to lock in his own legacy. She was the chosen one to succeed him. One mark of a great president is securing a lasting legacy.
If Obama had gone to say, Wisconsin, to boost voter turnout in the final days, we might be living in a country closer to the Promised Land with the first female president.
Obama is not known as an avid campaigner for other people. The House flipped in 2010 — the Tea Party year — when he did not help vulnerable House Democrats. He called it a “shellacking.”
Obama failed to stand by a notable nominee, Judge Merrick Garland, and lost a Supreme Court seat. He let Garland twist in the Washington wind for much of 2016, not a good look for a president. He never confronted McConnell for refusing a Senate hearing for Garland.
(The archconservative Antonin Scalia died on a fancy hunting trip in Texas, so his seat was open.)
Obama’s stance was like a shrug. “Hillary is going to win anyway” was the West Wing refrain for the 2016 general election.
Here’s what you do if you’re president. First, never surrender to a Senate leader from the other side. You channel your inner Lyndon Johnson, a master of the Senate, and go facetoface to remind him that you’re president. Talk about his old Kentucky home. Hold up signing bills McConnell cares about. Remind him that you, Obama, extended tax cuts for the wealthy.
Obama didn’t work Congress enough to get that engaged. Ironically, liberals who urged Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to quit at the top of her game did not hold the president responsible for not filling an open seat.
McConnell is old school and may have been disappointed that he could play the president so easily.
President Bill Clinton bargained, cajoled, invited members of Congress over to watch football and talk about their districts. Clinton won close votes. Obama lost close votes on gun control and immigration.
Obamacare survived by a single vote — cast by the gallant late Sen. John McCain. Trump dismantled much of the rest of Obama’s legacy, including major treaties on climate and the Iran nuclear deal.
Abroad, Obama did not end wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and conducted new drone warfare in deep secrecy.
Everyone I know loves Obama. He’s already reached the Promised Land. Let Joe Biden lead the people out of the wilderness.
We’re proud of our first Black president and his beautiful way with words. Amazing grace, elegance and wit were his to burn, but masked his mistakes.