March 20, 2009
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Presidential Responsibility
In a recent speech President Obama asserted with confidence that the bickering about who is to blame for AIG Bonuses and the economic meltdown and all that might as well just stop. “I’ll take responsibility.” He asserted. Presumably because he’s the President. That means that in the end even if his will didn’t cause the problems being critiqued, even if he didn’t even know about them or couldn’t predict them, he’s still the one in charge so it’s his responsibility. If he didn’t know, he should have known. If he didn’t do enough, he shoudl have done enough.
How unique a contrast is it that the current President bluntly, openly, and unapologetically takes the blame for the consequences of his administration’s policies or lack thereof when compared to years of coverup, hiding, and stubborn refusal to admit fault in the previous administration? It’s just words true, but surely these words speak volumes in favor of President Obama’s much maligned character.
And the irony of it of course is that the very statement in its emphasis gives light to the absurdity of the lies being spread to malign the President’s endeavors and place the entire blame the entire economic meltdown upon his feet. And of course, consequently erasing the history of malfeasance in previous administrations and Congresses.
Some people seem to be attacking President Obama as if he personally and willfully caused every single economic hardship the country is facing. No matter that he’s only been President 59 days. And the cynicism inherent in the evidence oft provoked in these arguments is enough to make me sick. To blame provisions in the President’s Stimulus package which hasn’t been around long enough to do much of ANYTHING substantial, or to blame the President’s budget proposals which have barely even been debated let alone implemented strikes me as a sick and twisted kind of hate mongering. It’s beyond reason to cite THOSE things as evidence of Obama’s destructive policies when we don’t even know what impacts they will have, be they positive OR negative.
Now the things that the Obama administration has done that have had an impact tend to be things that don’t have an immediate or obvious impact on the economy. Things like closing quantanamo bay, outlawing torture, releasing hidden documents, removing abstinence based restrictions on foreign aid, opening the door for negotiations with Iran, starting the withdrawal process for troops in Iraq, and re-enabling embryonic stem-cell research. Those are hardly clearly economic mission critical. Now I can understand why some dislike those decisions and it certainly makes sense for people to criticize them on their own merits.
So the only thing remaining of course and for which Obama can be directly blamed for with respect to the economic, is the decision to put Geitner in charge and continue with almost an identical bailout policy of the Bush administration.
Even I, of course, am very skeptical of these policies. I’m glad Geitner has redirected money to help home owners, a desperately needed act. And likewise the decision to help auto part makers seems helpful in protecting real jobs. These are changes in direction from the first tarp which was solely bank oriented. And I like some of the changes Geitner has stated that he will be making in terms of demanding accountability and disclosure, but overall we haven’t seen much of that in practice yet. But the overall strategy of Geitner and the Fed does seem overly conservative and extremely dangerous. Why not just take over and break apart themse banks? Why do we engage in policies fundamentally different from what we’ve done in the past and what we encourage other nations to do when faced with a banking failure like ours? It seems like these kinds of actions might yet lead us to economic ruin.
But even should it do so, it’s rather disingenous to say that this is all because we screwed up and made Obama our President. Obama is doing exactly the same thing as Bush was doing. Presumably both were convinced by the same arguments. There’s no reason to believe that McCain wouldn’t have done precisely the same, given his equally vocal support for the initial TARP plan.
No doubt if the economy continue to decline, Obama will deserve more and more of the blame for not finding and engaging in an alternative course of action. But likewise Obama will deserve more and more of the credit if the people find themselves more economically secure in the face of this recession than we otherwise would have been or even if, however unlikely it seems, we find ourselves pulled out of this crazy downward spiral.
But how much do you want to bet he won’t get that credit? Not from the majority of the loud mouthed critics criticizing him now. Because many of these are the precise same people who cheered and defended Bush’s banking policies and now find them unacceptable when wielded by a Democratic President. It’s highly likely those people would be cranking up the anti-Obama rhetoric no matter what actually had happened and no matter what will happen. They desire Obama to fail simply because he’s not on their team. In their mind he’s a Democrat and a liberal and therefore fundamentally evil.
Surely rational people can critique carefully the policies of the President while still giving him a reasonable chance to see what he can do. Surely that makes more sense than judging him a failure after a mere 59 days in office. If over time he CAN’T turn things around and things don’t get better for the majority of the American people or get WORSE, no doubt we WILL hold him responsible. Democrats and Republicans alike. And judging from President Obama’s words, he’s the kind of person who will accept that responsibility with grace and poise as any good leader should.
Comments (47)
I don’t have much immediate response, other than I agree with most of what you’re saying.
Interesting post. I like your take on the whole thing honestly.
I’m so glad to hear someone speak that actually sees how awesome our new president is. I’m sick of all the Bush-lovers complaining about his every action and even inaction… Sheesh, it’s not like things would have been better with McCain – worse, probably!
yay… Obama did the right thing. Let’s all praise him for it.
It’s interesting to read these post from someone who lives in another continent. French people are not known for their love for bush LOL.
But you really do think that Obama had nothing to do with the stock market sliding with his over-pessimistic pronouncements? You don’t think they had anything to do with that?
You’re assuming that American people are rational.
I don’t really see how they could get worse for people. But still, I liked your post. Thanks!!!
I agree. Obama’s not doing everything right, but he’s doing a good amount of it, including the things you listed… stem cell research, closing Gitmo, etc.
It’s amazing seeing the Bush administration doing the news rounds and saying that the economy can’t be blamed on Bush, but our security can… then in the same breath say that the economy is failing because of Obama and when we get attacked it will be his fault too.
It’s so refreshing to have someone in office who will answer questions and take responsibility. Having been 14 when Bush was first elected, I really don’t remember a time when this was true. (Honestly, I don’t know how well Clinton did in this respect, but obviously Bush was awful at it.)
@Josh_Blog - well on 01/20/2009 the DOW was at: 7,949.09. on 03/19/2009 the DOW was at: 7,400.80. Considering the gargantuan slides we saw before Obama was inducted, it’s hard to see this as a particularly huge slide. Many of Obama’s speeches have been up beat and positive, as positive as you can realisitcally be given the plethora of horrible economic news. Certainly he’s more positive than President Bush was during his last few months. The biggest slide this year though came in response to Obama making the opposite mistake. He was TOO positive. When he talked up Secretary Geitner’s speech as if Geitner would have the cure to the economy and then Geitner let everyone down. That sent the fickle stock market down for no good reason. But that’s the thing with stock markets.
Of course the stock market is not the same thing as the real economy and it’s the real economy we should really be focused on.
@nephyo - Good point about the stock market in that comment. In reality, economist only use the stock prices as a partial indicator. We have to realize that not everyone trades on the stock market. Depending on what is being observed, it’s really only an indicator of the “best”, we might say, businesses. Instead, we look at more important factors such as mortgage rates, unemployment rates and consumer/producer price indexes (and fed fund rate). These are ways of measure inflation, living conditions and momentary production (one can also view more general GDP trends, and other standard of living indicators often neglected by the price or standard economic analysis–see welfare economics).
In my recent blog, “The Error in Supply-Side Economics” I point out at the end that much of the problem we’re seeing today is a general result of our approach–or lack thereof–to our political economic situation (see also my Naturalistic Fallacy in Political Economy, for more).We like to have someone to blame and feel responsible for. Is Obama going to do everything perfect? Is it possible? What is the “right” choice? Who knows! All we can do is wait and find out. There is no definitive proof about what may or may not be better (granted, some things will appear to be just horribly wrong). Obama is far from being an almost utter failure like Bush, and if anything, I think Obama is doing a damn good job considering the limitations and the environment he adopted coming to office. People need to chill and just see what happens. Their predictions about how bad his choices are are going to be far less accurate or meaningful than the real social scientific analyses he has on his side. People act like Obama just comes up with things on his own. He doesn’t. He’s got a whole team of experts, and they’re not idiots.
Impressively written.
When I heard Obama saying “I’ll take responsibility, because I’m the President” the hairs in my arm stood up. This is very rare in this day and age. After 8 years of shady practices, it was VERY refreshing to hear something like this. At 59 days, he SHOULDN’T have to say something like that, but he did. In those circumstances, it takes balls of steel to say something like that. I really wish that he (and his administration) succeeds in taking us out of this mess.
What irritates me the most is the disrespect people have for our President (or former presidents). If people would just show each other some respect, half of this crap wouldn’t be a problem, and credit could be given where it was due.
@bryangoodrich - I agree with you. People do tend to need figureheads to blame when things go wrong even when its in complex systems beyond anyone’s control. It goes both ways too. While Bush’s response to Katrina was less than ideal, he didn’t cause that Hurricane but a lot of the anger and frustration about the event caused the blame to be put on him.
I look forward to reading your entries.
@GodlessLiberal - Yeah the news rounds of previous administration officials are particularly disturbing. Bush is writing a book. Cheney in particular is all over the place. This always happens though. After every administration, the people in it come out and try to rewrite history in their favor. Take them with a grain of salt.
@Laryssa - Yeah. Since Clinton, I’d say the idea of respect for the presidency has been declining. I never really got the whole “Bush bashing” thing. It did go overboard. Why can’t people present their very real criticisms politely? Why must it be an attack on the person? I never really understood it.
@nephyo - And the thing is, there is never one person, or one group really, that is entirely to blame for this stuff. And people try so hard to just pick that one person to blame, and end up making themselves and everyone around them angry and irrational and ugh.
The media has also had a huge role in fostering people’s disrespect as well, because they show no respect in what they project and publicize.
Sigh. I don’t get it either.
@In_Reason_I_Trust - Taking responsibility means staying in Iraq to get the job done and not pulling out for the sake of political expediency.
@nephyo - I guess we disagree then because investors don’t really like socialism. Look at where the Stock market was on november 4th.
@Josh_Blog - Yeah, let’s keep pouring millions every month into a war that pretty much should’ve never happened in the first place, while our economy tanks, causing havoc *here* in the continental US for millions of Americans. I don’t know if you have a job or not. I don’t know if someone pays for your expenses or not. I don’t know if you’re doing ok financially. I don’t know if you have a place to live that you’re not at risk of losing. But, if the answer to any of those questions is “yes” for you, then consider yourself lucky. I am lucky too (I have a good-paying job which covers all my expenses nicely and I own a place that I’m not in any danger of losing), but I realize that millions of others are not so lucky. I worry about them, and I think steps should be taken to minimize their plight. They’re our fellow countrymen, right here in our soil.
You sound like a Bush-bot. Adieu.
I would like to recommend Laserlawyer’s post to you.
Speaking of responsibility and cover ups. Go to youtube and look up the cspan footage on who pushed for the banks to give mortages to people who can’t afford them and which two men brought the problem up numerous times, a few years back and were told that there isn’t a problem. (Bush and McCain).
No coverups in Obama’s administration? Really? What about the details of that stimulus package? Just to mention one thing.
True character comes out when a teleprompter isn’t in front of you. What a slap in the face to disabled people when the POTUS compares his bowling skills to those of special olympic participants and how could anyone consider a baby, a human life, a punishment?
There are quite a few people complaining about Obama, even on xanga. It’s absolutely ludacris to think he could just have band-aided the USA overnight, to just stop this recession and make things all sparkly and better with a cherry on the top.
People need to get real, and honestly put themselves in his position. Could they do better? No. Not even if they had all the information he has. He’s qualified, despite the fact that many people don’t believe so. But do you think Sarah Palin, HONESTLY, would have helped? Hell no.
Stop bashing Obama. He said he would need time to put a fix to things, and people aren’t even giving him a chance. He’s responsible, he’s respectable, and he’ll be the best thing for the USA yet.
@Josh_Blog - We have no business in Iraq since (1) they’re kicking us out eventually, and (2) they should be doing that because they need to manage their independence and utilize and express their sovereignty.
@Josh_Blog - I will agree with you about the investors not liking socialism. Investors look for where they can make “fast money” and socialism is more responsible and less erratic (though, that does cause it to be less flexible and reactive to shocks, depending on how systemic the socialist practices are, or more about how centralized the organization structure is–you can have socialism with a decentralized structure–see market socialism). Of course, that’s a generalization. It’d be a whole different market structure, and the role and attitudes of “investors” would be different since they’d play a different role. There’s no such thing as a class of investors independent of the market structure. That social environment in part defines the very thing described, but that’s a wholly other philosophical issue
@bryangoodrich - As I understand it, many Iraqi soldiers and political leaders are quite apprehensive about us pulling out.
Whether we have any business being in Iraq is a moot point at this time, don’t you think? the country was in shambles before and the violence has dissipated tremendously thanks to the troops.
@bryangoodrich - Socialism is more responsible, Bryan? Oh really? Then why is Europe trying to turn away from it? But hey, who am I to support the capitalist system which has upheld this nation for 400 years…
@Josh_Blog - the violence has dissipated? Maybe the news is ignoring it more, but it’s still the same crap, different day. Sure, the Iraqi’s are going to be apprehensive, but it is a change that is needed and something they need to do. A child is apprehensive to move out but that doesn’t mean their parents should make them live at home because they’re anxious about leaving. Iraq is a big kid now. Let them play with their own toys in their own sandbox! It is a moot point about what business we have there because we cannot change the past. In economics, we call them sunk costs. They’re done. Choices already made. Evaluate what can be effected here and now (or in the future). We also have certain international relations going on that, as I said, need to go forward such as our troops pulling out and Iraq regaining its sovereignty (and exerting its dominance over its own country and regulations). That isn’t going to happen in any meaningful way or meaningful timeframe if we stick around babying them.
@Josh_Blog - Try not to make Naturalistic Fallacies about political economics.We’ve also had an oil economy for years, is that a justification for denying green fuels? Slavery upheld this nation for many years, should we have kept slavery? That argument doesn’t mean anything, especially without qualification, and it is a form of an is-ought problem. Socialism can and has been shown useful numerous times. Many states practicing socialist policies rank in the upper tier of standards of living indicators (see referenced blog above). Joseph Stiglitz, the most cited economist to date, showed the error of arguing out the role of government in economics because the criticism against socialism was an argument against neoclassical economics (I believe I brought it up in my anarchy series). In “Whither Socialism?” he demonstrates both neoclassical economics and socialism based on it were in error. Modern economic theory (particularly information economics) demonstrated that government can play a significant role in improving welfare (Pareto efficiency). Thus, it isn’t a question of IF we should have government involvement but in what ways, in what sectors and to what extent.
@bryangoodrich - actually Bryan, the reason why Iraq has not been in the news as of late is because the violence has died down. no pun intended. It’s Afghanistan that has grown more deadly. I’ll be back. I’m going to class.
@Josh_Blog - Afghan’s violence has increased and captured more of our attention, but that doesn’t imply that the violence in Iraq has gone down. But I’m sure it has, as would be the natural course of Iraq becoming more sovereign and being able to exert more control over it’s country. More reason why we should let her go. But do you happen to have any statistics to support your claim about the violence actually being less?
Wow. I completely agree with you… Yeah, very well spoken. (or written, haha)
Well, you now have debate on your site, anyway…
@ModernBunny - lol. YES!! FINALLY. My long awaited goal is finally achieved! VICTORY! Maybe now it’s time for me to start over and become Clockwork Nephyo
@bryangoodrich - what do you mean? The numbers don’t lie. Every official who has gone to Iraq has said that the nation there has gotten better. My older brother is an infantrmen in Iraq. He’s not getting shot at.
@Josh_Blog - You say the numbers don’t lie. I’m asking where the numbers are at!
@bryangoodrich - Dude, believe what you want. Be happy in the world inside your mind that you’ve created for yourself. I’ll send you postcards from reality from time to time.
@Josh_Blog - That’s rather uncalled for considering all I’m asking for is what evidence you’re appealing to in making the inference that you make. You sit there and say “the numbers don’t lie” yet where are these numbers that aren’t lying? Considering the only appeal you’ve made to is the small sample of third-person reports you hear, it seems you’re the one constructing reality inside your mind. If you have solid evidence for what you say, you should be able to offer it up, right here and now so that I can say “yes, you are correct” and agree. That is all I have asked for. I have not made any definitive statements about whether or not the violence is lessening. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. Maybe it’s a temporary cooling period that will flare up again, maybe it is an absolute change. But if you’re going to assert what you have, then where is your justification? Don’t get all butt hurt because I call you out on it and you cannot produce the numbers that don’t lie. Apparently you’re just making shit up?
@bryangoodrich - Your views are so offensive to me I just had to respond the way I did. But believe me, I’m actually being polite.
@Josh_Blog - Polite? So am I, because you can ask any of my readers, I’m a major asshole. Nevertheless, you’re taking shit way too personal considering all I’m doing is asking for your reasons for believing what you assert. So far, you’ve amounted to the equivalent of saying “God exists because someone else said so” and then having the gall to say I live in la-la land because I’m asking for why you say such things. That’s laughable. The difference with the analogy, of course, is that you’ve made an empirical claim. You’ve made an empirical claim in such a way as to admit there is evidence for it, and insinuate I’m crazy because “the numbers don’t lie” and I’m not believing you on your word! Again, laughable. So, I’ll repeat. What are the numbers? Why do you believe such things so absolutely, so definitely, without evidence? Do you have justification you can offer or are you just going to get your panties in a twist because I’m pointing out your bullshit?
@bryangoodrich - The moon landings were faked.
this is great its always good to see someone who isnt taken in by republican senseabilitys
@Josh_Blog - Yeah, and there’s invisible pink monkeys that hang from my ceiling and clean my shoes every night while I sleep.
I must say this is the most well-written post I’ve seen in awhile. Great topic, great points, great argument altogether. I’d be astonished to see if anyone, political affiliation aside, would disagree with the main point of this entry. It is something I constantly try to get people to think about. People are too hopeful, or too skeptical, or too immediately expectant of the President.
@bryangoodrich - I feel compelled to say you are a xanga badass when it comes to arguing through comments. Just saying.
assholes fuck things up; those decent enough to try and fix the damage wrought by the assholes are the ones who get blamed for it. not only in this case. it’s a general pattern having to do with the statistics of human nature and the way bad news flows through time (phase lag). i’m afraid it’s absolutely fundamental – as if human events took lessons from gravity itself. indeed, god (if god exists) wouldn’t require omniscience in order to ensure a plan involving an inevitable super-fuckup; just build the system, crank it up, and press GO.
It is refreshing to have a President take responsibility for something-even if it wasn’t entirely his fault. Some of his policies are questionable. Things are such a mess right now, it’s hard to second guess what McCain would have done things differently or not.
Another great entry! two thumbs up.
An important part of leadership is making decisions now which will have long lasting effects. The virtues associated with those decisions is often patience and the ability to see it through even though not everyone may agree with you. Obama definitely is trying very hard to make decisions which he hopes will positively effect the country in the long run. I think we need to get off our asses and take responsibility as citizens for the wellbeing of this country instead of just sitting around critisizing the president for this or that.
The general apathy in people is scary though, cause most of us are just like…let the other person do it…let the president take care of everything and blame it on him when things go wrong….
We need to get moving!
@complicatedlight - lol. Interesting theory. I tend to hope though that it’s at least possible to improve systems so that their fuckups aren’t nearly as bad and so that it’s at least more likely that the right agents are blamed for them. Just like when you write a computer program at first bugs are inevitable but that doesn’t mean we can’t get off our lazy asses and fix them. Modern economic and political theory is infantile and nowhere near as refined as Science for all its millenia of development. It’s got a lot of bugs that still need to be worked out. In the mean time at least we have leaders willing to try and lead even if they end up having to take unjustified blame.
@buckeyegirl31 - It’s very hard for economic matters and difficult for everything else to see where McCain and Obama would have been different. But we can make reasonable educated guesses based on their parties and their platforms. For social issues we can expect McCain would have done the exact opposite or kept things the status quo. Probably a weaker proclamation on stem cell research and probably not until later in his Presidency and more quietly. And none of the policies perceived as pro-choice that Obama has implemented. For foreign policy and security matters McCain would have been fairly similar. Iraq withdrawal would have been identical since that’s what’s required by the Iraqi people and what our military leaders are saying. Likewise with the boost in troops in Afghanistan and sending national guard to the border. And also the proclamation against torture would definitely have been high on McCain’s list. Guantanamo bay would probably have been the point of departure.
For economics though? Obviously their budgets would have looked very different but that’s to be expected. Probably McCain would have come down with a more hard line stance on the appropriations bill but almost certainly he would have still signed it as he wouldn’t have wanted to shutdown the government. Would McCain have vetoes the Democratic Congress’s stimulus bill? Probably he would have threatened to and in the process gotten the bill shrunk down considerably before signing it. But the core components would probably have been the same thing. So the only real difference would be the TARP money which McCain would have full control over. Like I said before, Obama hasn’t used it substantially differently than Bush has and McCain and Obama both supported the TARP during their candidacy. Unless McCain would have had a radical shift in opinion it’s likely his use would have been similar to Obama’s. But who can say for sure? Many many economists worldwide, liberal and conservative alike are arguing a more aggressive approach from the adminsitration but Obama is holding out thinking the current course might work. Would McCain have been more easily swayed? I have no idea.
@duckling8912 - Thanks for the praise ^_^. That’s a very fair point and I agree with you. Apathy has been probably the deepest problem in the American political system for decades. Part of it isn’t necessarily the people’s fault though. People are naturally hard to motivate and if you don’t give them a clear and easy way to contribute most won’t do it. If you can’t see how you can make a difference you’re most likely to curl up in your couch and just watch and complain at a loss for anything better to do. It’s important for people to work to create outlets for people to get involved and make things better. That alone will give people confidence and improve the economy.