Saturday, October 29, 2011

Obama, FDR, and Me

Warning: I'm in a bad mood. I've been reading comments on a friend's blog (The Rant by Tom Degan) and I've finally reached my limit. I've tried to not let the debate over Obama's job performance among progressives get personal but I've finally accepted that for me, it is personal. President Obama represents everything that I hoped for when I was growing up a little black girl in the segregated South. I remember hearing the grownups talk about politics. They would ruefully shake their heads and discuss the lack of Negroes in positions of authority. No one even spoke of a black man being president; it was so out of reach. But I secretly thought about being president someday, ignoring that my gender as well as my race made that unlikely.

When I read Tom's blog post, "Time to Get Moving," I thought it was reasonably balanced. I didn't fully agree with his assessment of Obama or his review of FDR's presidency but his post didn't engender my foul mood. I concur that a great many Americans of voting age have a deficit of knowledge when it comes to the history of this country. However, I also think one of our failures is that we idealize historical figures and make them into icons that they never were. The problem is that no one in the immediate present can ever measure up to these past icons which never really existed, at least not as portrayed.

Which brings me to consideration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), the president that so many progressives have repeatedly compared Obama to and always find Obama lacking.  Roosevelt just told Congress what he would and would not do and shoved his New Deal through, Congress be damned. Only, that isn't factual; the real story is much more complex.

FDR  moved the country forward through a very difficult time. However, he didn't walk on water. No president ever has.

FDR had to deal with the southern Democrats, the Dixiecrats. They and a great deal of the country opposed anything that even vaguely resembled civil rights for black Americans. Roosevelt needed the southern votes to pass his legislation; so he compromised big time on civil rights issues. FDR failed to support proposed federal anti-lynching legislation. Lynching was a family sport that was ever growing in the South during FDR's administration but he refused to get behind efforts by blacks and white civil rights advocates efforts to pass federal anti-lynching legislation. FDR also refused to integrate the armed forces, leaving that to Truman to begin the integration of the armed forces in 1946. Blacks fought for this country but weren't allowed to train on the white military bases nor to interact with their white counterparts. When they came home, it was to return to the same segregation and Jim Crow laws that they faced prior to joining the military. FDR sold out black Americans in order to push through his New Deal.

It was also FDR's administration that interred Japanese Americans in camps during WWII. FDR made nine appointments to the Supreme Court and eight of those nine justices supported the administrations's decision to strip Japanese Americans of property and homes, and place them in confinement in Korematsu v. United States (1944).

Then there were the provisions of the New Deal, great intentions but not always realized.

The Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 authorized the Secretary of Agriculture to inflate prices by reducing farm acreage. This meant white farm owners (it was 1933 and blacks were sharecroppers, not farm owners) were paid to let their fields lie fallow, which often resulted in the eviction of sharecroppers and tenant farmers, a significant number of whom were African Americans. In addition, the Department of Agriculture, paid farmers to destroy crops and slaughter livestock while millions of Americans went hungry.

The cornerstone of the New Deal, the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) created the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The NIRA also authorized the National Recovery Administration (NRA), which organized cartels, fixed wages and prices, and, under section 7(a), established the practice of collective bargaining, whereby a union selected by a majority of employees exclusively represented all employees. Sounds like a good idea but many of these compulsory unions closed their doors to black workers. If you weren't a member of the union, you couldn't work in that particular industry. The NIRA was in effect from June 1933 until May 1935 when the Supreme Court found it to be unconstitutional.

My point is that when one starts talking about remembering history, it's important to remember all of it. My point is that every president has had his less than stellar moments because politics has always been about compromise. For every gain, you surrender something. It's a balancing act; you hope that what you get is worth what you give up.

I think that all of the expressed disappointment in Obama is unmerited and I'm particular tired of the dismissal of Obama as fearful of not being liked or being a coward. Have you ever been the first person of your race to enter into a position that has always been held by another race? I have and it is the most difficult step that a person can take. You have to deal with your own people expecting that their interests will take priority, those of the other race who feel that you don't deserve the position, and those of the other race who mythologized you into an archetype of nobility and are disappointed to find out that you are only human and don't walk on water. In the mean time, you actually have to carry out the duties of your job and remain civil and calm while not only you are being attacked, but in Obama's case, his wife is the object of ridicule, compared to various members of the simian family in right wing publications on a fairly regular basis.

The courage that it took for Obama to run for president is phenomenal in a country where assassination is not unheard of and it was less than 50 years ago when lynching of black men and women was public entertainment, documented in photographs of the crowds of men women and children in attendance. (According to the Tuskegee Institute, lynching occurred as late as 1968). When Billie sang about southern trees bearing strange fruit, she wasn't merely being metaphorical.

I'm tired of whites who supported Obama in 2008 acting as if they did him a favor and righteously declaring their indignant disappointment. Enjoy your right to be critical of anyone but don't expect me to like it and I'm exercising my right to say so. The man has worked within the confines of Republicans who have publicly declared that their goal is to ensure that he is not re-elected. That has been their stated goal since his inauguration. Instead of bitching about what he hasn't done or disagreeing with what he has, take a look at what he has accomplished in spite of having a rock equivalent to that of Sisyphus to continually push up the hill.

I cried when Obama won. I cried for the years when the signs over the water fountains said white and colored. I cried for the stores in which I couldn't sit and the lunch counters that my mother grabbed me away from lest someone take offense. I cried for the time my mother entered the wrong door at the clinic because my knee was bleeding profusely and she was confused, and she was met at the door by a white woman who told her to go to the colored entrance. I cried because of the job my mother quit because the KKK threaten to kill me and my brother and sister if she didn't. I cried for my father who went to Korea and had to ride in the back of the bus to go to boot camp. I cried because my mother died two months before Barack Obama became president and she never got to see President Obama. I'm proud of the President and what he has accomplished and I think that he has done a far better job than this country deserves.

[Suggested reading for two differing contemporary historical perspectives on FDR and the New Deal: 
Powell, Jim. FDR's Folly: How Roosevelt and His New Deal Prolonged the Great DepressionNew York: Crown Forum (2003).
McMahon, Kevin J. Reconsidering Roosevelt on Race: How the Presidency Paved the Road to Brown. Chicago: University of Chicago Press (2003).
A review, "Bad Deal," of both books by Damien W. Root.]

20 comments:

  1. Sheria,

    I think you offer an accurate assessment of the "indignant 2008-ers." There have been areas where it's legitimate to be disappointed, but for the love of all the dinosaur gods, how many presidents have come up against the sort of idiotic, vile, deliberately destructive and just-short-of-Klan-based opposition one Barack Obama has had to deal with? Clinton had some harsh critics, but the present situation is ridiculous. The GOP suits fall all over themselves inconsistently damning even their own ideas just because President Obama mentions them or offers some adaptation of them. I don't know how they even manage to keep a straight face offering the feeble-minded "critiques" and talking points they've worked up over the last three years. Well, except that those same points resonate remarkably well with the feeble-minded among the electorate.

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  2. It's OK, Sheria. Here's a big hug. (I mean that genuinely.) You know, people just want a better life. And they're finally waking up. Inequality is the underlying dis-ease (as Octo, Nance and others have recently written and as I've mentioned several times before). Obama made it. Full stop. He IS the president of the most powerful nation on earth. Still. He'll weather the criticism, both fair and unfair. Your girlhood dream has been realized. (If only it were a black, female president. But that's yet to come.) He'll get his second term and history will be the judge his performance. You're a wonderful testimonial to his abilities. He's a lucky man.

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  3. This is a beautiful article. I have been up and down about the man. You have brought things into perspective for me with this post. Absolutely excellent points which every progressive ought to have to read and digest before the next presidential election. Thank you.

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  4. Sheria - for whatever it may be worth, I'm a white guy supervisor workinrg for a black general supervisor whom I respect because of his ability and intellect. I am one who without reservation will support a black person for president when the right one comes along. Colin Powell and Condi Rice immediately come to mind. However, both are part of the established power sttucture and are therefore suspect to some degree. Obama is pragmatist, and while I do not hold with his philosophy of governance republicans should lighten up on him.

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  5. Okay, I'm in a better mood. I learned years ago not to wallow too long in my angst. After all, I'm a southern woman which means that I'm a steel magnolia. Thanks to each of you for your thoughtful comments and thanks Edge, for the hug. Even steel magnolias need an occasional hug. Dino as always, you have a clear perspective of we humans and our failings. Jadedj, thank you and you are most welcome. Rational your comments are worth a lot, thank you for hearing me so clearly.

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  6. Dear Sister,
    This is an astonishingly powerful and impassioned post, and I am in awe of what you have posted here.

    In a note of optimism, the rabid wingers will not have the last word. When historians write their account of the Obama years, I am confident they will have kind words for Obama's accomplishments in the face of brutal partisan opposition.

    About those liberals who have criticized Obama for not being liberal enough, they too will not have the last word. As you point out, one of the conventions of politics is to practice the time-honored art of compromise to form a consensus on important policy matters; and I appreciate Obama’s more reserved and thoughtful style in sharp contrast to the swaggering, polarizing approach of his predecessor. In hindsight, I think historians will agree. Meanwhile, I will work diligently on Obama's re-election next year, as I did in 2008. The alternatives are too frightening to contemplate.

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  7. Look it.... great write. I often compare Obama to FDR.... mostly in that there have seldom been Presidents like them who have had to face the challenges they have... with as much opposition. The Dixiecrats is a great reference....FDR also had Huey Long and Father Coughlin ... Obama has O'Really and a host of others. Frankly, for whatever faults or failings he may have... Barack is still head and shoulders above anyone else on our political stage. Good on you!!!!

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  8. I couldn't agree more. I'm tired of people talking about FDR as if he was the second coming. Clearly there were a lot of positive things that took place during his administrations (although frankly most of the stuff that people remember him for took place during the first 4 months of his first administration when he had an overwhelming majority in both houses of Congress). This President is given no credit for his successes and absolute blame for everything that goes wrong (whether he had the power to control the situation or not). I know I'm tired of it. Frankly I don't even bother to read the critical stuff anymore. It has reached a level of hysteria at this point. The President is blamed for ecological and weather disasters. He's blamed for either supporting the "wrong people" or not supporting the "right people". Frankly I'm of the mind that he should just pack up his family and just become a rich man being the world's most famous citizen.

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  9. Beautifully written article, lot of wonderful points made. However we need change in this country, that change needs to come with 1st do away with the 2 party system, then 2nd no more millionaires in Congress or Presidency. Middle and lower income people need to step up an effect the changes for our survival.

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  10. Sheria, that was a phenomenal post. I thank you for writing it. It was heart and mind at work in understandable proportion. Your pride in Obama and what he's accomplished is understandable and, I think, mostly warranted.

    Your points about the reality of past presidents not matching the idealized perception history has imbued them with are true indeed. FDR was one of our best presidents, but he blazed no trails for civil rights and couldn't be considered a friend of Jews, either. I don't think hate was involved, just lack of willingness to take on bigots and really champion fairness.

    While I admire Obama in so many ways, he's also been a source of angst and exasperation. Let me see if I can explain this clearly, because it has nothing to do with race or character.

    Right now, Obama is doing what he needed to do two years ago. He's taking it to the people. He had to learn the hard way what Republicans are really like and the futility of trying to bargain with them as if they're dedicated public servants who put a high value on doing things that are helpful and worthwhile for the people as a whole.

    My exasperation stems from the high cost of Obama's long, hard education in the reality of his situation, and the country's situation, where gaining Republican cooperation is concerned. He has let Republicans set the agenda (deficit reduction); set the terms of debate; hold innocents hostage for ransom, and then paid the ransom; and he's gone along with one bad "deal" after another that more than anything served to give his Republican nemeses bragging rights while retarding the jobs recovery his chance of being re-elected hinges on.

    Unquestionably, Obama was dealt the worst hand of any president since FDR's first term. He's gotten some good things done in spite of the worst obstructionism in more than a half century. Through it all, he's kept his bearings and maintained his dignity. (I would've gone ballistic a long time ago, if I was in his shoes.)

    I just wish I could talk with him for 20 minutes face to face. I would tell him:

    "Mr. President, you're dealing with bullies who have no interest in what's good for the country or the people, except their wealthy backers. Forget niceties, compromise and appeasement. You'll never gain their admiration or friendship. You can win their respect by whipping their worthless butts every time you go up against them, or at least by leaving them trembling because you put up such a ferocious fight. Having the maximum amount of public support behind you when you go up against them is key, so keep taking it to the people. Doing that, you might lose some battles but you're much more likely to end up winning the war."

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  11. Sheria:

    I am a white steel magnolia, and I cried for all the reasons you did when Obama was elected.

    My hobbit friend who blogs at “Frodo, Keeper of the Ring” recently pointed out how the Republicans attempt to lay claim to and embrace the standards of our “Founding Fathers.” He then pointed out all the FF’s warts. I tried to think of a president without some character flaws. Truman popped into my head until I remembered he sent out Fat Man and Little Boy. Even Carter lusted in his heart.

    History is warped by what I call “deification of the dead” such as the rise of Ronald Reagan to sainthood during the days immediately following his death.

    Your honest and heartfelt words are appreciated. As some who commented pointed out, and I share their opinion, President Obama’s accomplishments and influence in the world will stand the test of time.

    America with all her warts will, too. You and our president are testaments to this country’s ability, in time, to right systemic wrongs. As evidencd by the most illogical and unfair attacks on our president, the struggle continues.

    BJ

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  12. Sheria. Brilliant and so very moving. You touched my heart to its very depth. I too cried with joy when Obama was even nominated. When he was elected, it was almost too much for the pumper to bear.

    Apparently the armchair critics just can't seem to get the message. But..., But..., But..., they say. Here are a couple of my buts:

    But...can you name a president who did everything just the way you thought he should? But...have you agreed with any president all the time? But...did you measure Clinton by the same impossible-to-reach standards? But...when Clinton didn't achieve all that you thought he should have, did you accuse him of being "fearful of not being liked or being a coward"?

    But, but, but... just asking.

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  13. I just want to say that I read every comment and I appreciate the time that you take to leave your comments. Just wanted to say thank you.

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  14. Sheria, thank you for the history lesson and the perspective that brings things into balance. I am Canadian, and watch US politics with my hands over my face, partly because it's scary stuff and partly because I just can't believe what goes on. (We're headed in the same direction, I might add)

    I've heard the 'I'm disappointed in Obama' sentiment from a lot of American bloggers who had such high hopes for him, but have wondered where the realism is. You've done an excellent job of finding it.

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  15. I'm late to the discussion, but want to make sure that you know how much this post is appreciated.

    Rightly or wrongly, I'm guessing the reason even lefty lefties are so disheartened by the slow pace of change is that, for the most part, these are the people who were raised on a sitcom/sitdram mentality, where a problem is presented and resolved in 20 minutes. Mr. Obama himself has said that it took this country a long time to get to the disaster that was handed off to him, and it is unrealistic to think that he could change it in 2 or even 4 years, and it is insane to expect anything to happen when the GOP is marching lock-step to defeat anything Mr. Obama proposes.

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  16. Obama is pragmatist, and while I do not hold with his philosophy of governance republicans should lighten up on him.

    That's nice coming from a guy who throws the term Obamanation around like he just finished watching FOX and Friends. Just go to RN's blog for some choice examples of going easy on the president. How about, "Obama, the biggest lie ever told to the American people?" I couldn't find the one with Obama in a a brown shirt leading the SEIU sometime around all the controversy in Wisconsin. But "Meet the Dunces" complaining about the Obama's vacation to Spain more or less gets the point across.

    Rational Nation, the lovable libertarian who just can't resist going over to the liberal blogs for a little bit of loving.

    You might want to purge your blogs before you get so lovey-dovey next time.

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  17. Sister,
    I have shared this personal account previously, and it is appropriate to share it here too. My account begins in the summer of 1964 at the Democratic National Convention held in Atlantic City, NJ.

    It was less than a year after the JFK assassination, and LBJ was determined to honor the JFK legacy by moving landmark civil rights legislation through Congress. Angered Dixiecrats, resenting civil rights as the official party plank, boycotted the convention.

    Since it was bad PR to have those Southern delegation seats empty in front of national TV cameras, the DNC decided to recruit young civil rights activists to fill those seats. Why I am personally familiar with this story? I was one of those young activists at the DNC Convention in the summer of 1964 - occupying a seat for the TV cameras.

    I share this account here because the election of President Obama is the fulfillment of a dream for me too, one that began in my youth and has finally come to fruition.

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  18. Brilliant post Sheria and, as always, you bring us such a unique perspective and remind us we did not all grow up in the same America.
    FDR played politics because that is how Washington works and how things get done. Disgusting as we may find that, it is the reality of our world. Our current president must also play the same game sometimes - not because he wants to but because that is the only way he can get things done. Given the situation he walked into I say he is a courageous man who is doing the best he can for this country.
    I lived through the civil rights era also and participated in various protests. Always hoping for a day when we would all stand side by side as Americans and human beings and nothing more or less. The fulfillment of my dream is that in '08 we elected who we thought was the best man for the job - not the best black man, just the best man. This country has so many problems but little by little, we do inch forward.

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  19. Octo, what a great story! Thank you for sharing it here.

    Shaw, great analysis regarding the limited attention span of the public; I like the term sitcom/sitdram mentality; it explains why the best way to influence the public is with an exchange of catchy phrases rather than in-depth debates.

    Deborah, I also watch U.S. politics with my hands over my face, much the same way that I watch horror movies.

    FJ, thanks for the insight into the world of Rational Nation. I checked out his blog, an interesting place to visit.

    Rocky, I share your belief that we are inching forward.

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  20. My good woman, it is not easy being a SAWB. Being a SAWB, I get to hear all that would be unsaid in front of you (try the acronym MARTA on for size, since it does not solely refer to the Metropolitan Atlanta Regional Transit Authority, but is a commentary on segregated housing and "moving Africans rapidly through Atlanta").
    Yes, my good woman, some things are as insidious today as they were when Mississippi burned. Fear not that you are alone.
    The President of the United States probably saved an entire industry, and more than a million people are going to go to work tomorrow morning because of the actions he took.
    Was it sheer happenstance that he makes an eloquent statement to the Arab World early in his first term, and that is soon followed by a dissolution of dictatorships unrivaled in human existence?
    This SAWB can go on and on, but he is not to be confused with someone who constructs an icon long on substance, but short on style. The President of the United States was naive, just as Jimmy Carter was naive (Carter believed he could sweet talk the Russians and the Iranians), but every single day he grows stronger, and even the whimpering wiseasses of Faux News fear the fact that his strongest opponent will be named Willard (there was a movie about a rat. . .).

    We do it because it is hard, so said he who opened the stars. Together, we cannot lose. As for those with weaker hearts and fractured vertebrae, screw 'em.

    Frodo, SAWB (a term coined by Andy Young to describe the arrogance of white youth in political campaigns, it is "smart ass white boy). (http://loveysdaddyga.tripod.com/blogdirectory/

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