Silly me. I thought that when Barack Obama won the Democratic nomination we had finally entered the post-racism era in America, with the Revs. Jackson and Sharpton consigned to the dustbin of history, replaced by a new man, willing to abandon confrontation and claims of victimhood.
Then a new Reverend appeared on the American scene, damning white, genocidal America while serving as spiritual mentor to Obama for 20 years.
Still, it came as a shock when Obama played the race card, maligning none other than Bill Clinton, “the first black president” and longtime friend of the African-American community. Now it seems that any critic of Obama reveals himself a racist. Back to square one in the race game.
Silly me. I thought that the defeat of Al Gore had finally made it clear that class warfare just doesn’t sell in America.
But it seems that it is now mainstream-respectable in liberal Democratic circles to rob from Joe the Plumber to give to his workers, or his customers, or anyone not making enough money to satisfy Obama.
Trickle up replaces trickle down as the preferred policy, never mind its effect on incentives to start small businesses, or to work that extra job.
Silly me. Like many others, I assumed that, with Obama, Hillary Clinton safely disposed of, Obama would make the usual move from left to center. Wrong again. The redistributionist programs remain. The move for what is in essence a government takeover of a large part of the health care industry remains.
The opposition to development of domestic energy resources — masked in the case of offshore drilling by leaving the matter to states that will be denied a share in the benefits — remains. The Clintons are gone, and the center cannot hold.
Silly me. I thought that character and judgment matter. Richard Nixon was a brilliant foreign policy practitioner, but in the end character and judgment failings brought him down.
Bill Clinton had the intellect and instincts that would have made him a great domestic-policy president, but character and judgment failings got in the way of greatness.
Obama has the intelligence, the cool, and organizing skills to warrant serious consideration as a leader of the nation. But character failings that led him to accept a tainted real estate deal, and judgment failings that led him to associate with the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, William Ayres, and Acorn should give us pause.
Silly me. I thought that some passing acquaintance with economics — enough to enable a president to ask the right questions of the right people — is essential to a successful president. Doubt that, and think Jimmy Carter.
John McCain disagrees, and as a consequence lurches from program to program when the economy does appear on his radar screen.
Then, he turns to Phil Gramm, the author of the current financial services industry’s regulatory regime for advice on —- how to reform the financial services industry’s failed regulatory regime.
Advisors Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina were reasonably well regarded corporate managers, but they do not pretend to be economists in a class with those available to McCain but unconsulted by him.
So character, judgment and a bit of economic understanding matter. But there is more to a successful president than that. George W. Bush is an exemplary family man, an early-to-bed-early-to-rise president who is scandal-free.
And he had the good judgment, finally, to scuttle a failed strategy in Iraq and adopt a new one. But inability to communicate the broad ideas on which any successful presidency is built, unwillingness to fire the incompetent, and a refusal to countenance dissent in the White House economic team more than offset those personal virtues.
So much for 43. Where does this great country stand on the eve of electing its 44th president? My guess is that the recapitalization of the banks and related measures will, when implemented, get credit flowing again, based on more sensible appraisals of risk than during the recent boom.
But a recession is unavoidable, which will enable the left wing of the Democratic Party to persuade an amenable Obama to damn the red ink, full spending ahead.
Dick Cheney will come to regret his statement that “deficits don’t matter,” and Ben Bernanke will begin to dial back the interest rate cuts he so sensibly put in place in past months.
But that’s for later. Or perhaps never, if it turns out that character and judgment do indeed matter.
Examiner columnist Irwin Stelzer is a senior fellow and director of the Hudson Institute’s Center for Economic Studies.
