Hope rings hollow in Obama’s first weeks

In his inaugural address, President Obama said, “We have chosen hope over fear; unity of purpose over conflict and discord.” In Obama’s first few weeks in office, I have not seen much in the way of hope, and I certainly have not seen any unity of purpose—on Capitol Hill or in the rest of the country. So far, many of the president’s actions have seemed divisive, and the confirmation process for Obama’s administration has been a cause for concern.
Four of Obama’s choices for senior posts requiring Senate confirmation have withdrawn their nominations, two of them for tax problems. Governor Bill Richardson (D—N.M.) withdrew his bid for Commerce Secretary due to a federal probe into campaign contributions in his home state of New Mexico. Obama’s replacement choice for Commerce Secretary, Senator Judd Gregg (R—N.H.), withdrew his nomination due to “irreconcilable differences” with the administration.
Even advisors who made it through the confirmation process appear shaky, most notably Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner, who managed to be confirmed despite facing tax issues. Attorney General Eric Holder takes office under a cloud of controversy surrounding a pardon by former President Clinton, in which Holder played a questionable role. Lastly, many believe that the head of the CIA, Leon Panetta, does not possess the requisite intelligence experience required to hold such a position.
Although the president has urged bipartisanship, so far he has not reached out to conservatives. Obama’s speech to the Democratic caucus in Williamsburg was highly partisan. Promoting his stimulus in the speech, Obama sarcastically said, “So then you get the argument, ‘Well, this is not a stimulus bill, this is a spending bill.’ What do you think a stimulus is?” As the audience cheered, he added, “That’s the whole point.” The President then told Republicans to not “come to the table with the same tired arguments and worn ideas that helped to create this crisis.” He added that America “did not vote for the false theories of the past and … didn’t vote for phony arguments and petty politics.”
The president made a mistake by letting Nancy Pelosi write the original House bill for the stimulus, resulting in a document towing the standard Democratic party line. If Obama had remembered his legal training, he would have known that the drafter of the bill controls the subsequent negotiations. This lack of good judgment, combined with Obama’s divisive rhetoric in Williamsburg, was a perfect recipe for alienating the Republican Party.
In another partisan act, Obama signed several controversial executive orders mere days after assuming office. According to a Gallup Poll released on February 3, 58 percent of Americans said they disagreed with the President’s decision to sign an executive order granting overseas funding to family planning organizations that provide abortions. In addition, 50 percent of Americans opposed the executive order closing Guantanamo Bay.
We should also be deeply troubled by the way in which the new administration handled Mark Dybul (COL ’85, MED ’92), the head of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). Dybul is widely recognized as someone who helped make PEPFAR a reality. Under his tenure, the budget for PEPFAR quadrupled, and PEPFAR’s impact on the AIDS crises in recipient countries is arguably one of the greatest successes of the Bush Administration.
Due to this success, Obama’s transition team initially asked Dybul to remain head of PEPFAR. However, one day after the inauguration, Dybul, who was facing criticism by the president’s senior advisors over his alleged decision to steer funds to abstinence-only programs while running PEPFAR under former President Bush, received a call asking him to submit his resignation and vacate his office within two days.
Dybul’s dismissal drew criticism from conservatives and liberals alike, and rightfully so. Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson called it “petty” and “malicious,” while the editorial board of The San Francisco Chronicle said that the move was “unexpected, unceremonious, and undeserved,” blaming Obama for making Dybul a scapegoat for a policy that Dybul himself did not support. If Obama did not want Dybul on his team, he should have made that clear from the very beginning. The way that the president handled the situation, however, was extraordinarily clumsy and insensitive.
President Obama still has time to make up for his shortfalls. However, if he wants to get reelected in four years, he is going to have to be more measured in his judgment concerning both personnel choices and strategies for working with Congress, and less partisan in his rhetoric.