Assessing Obama's Washington lift-off

Obama’s first 100 days reveal a strategy that is less post-partisan than it is moderate.

There is both great hope and great expectation surrounding the Obama Presidency. Few doubt that Obama's first 100 days will be one of the busiest of any President in American history, and will necessitate maintenance of public optimism.

Obama has Democratic majorities in both the House and Senate. Yet, given the economy and the pressing litany of foreign policy issues, more important is the sense that American politics is constituted by a rare sense of urgency. There are big things that have to get done now, and only the Government can do them.

To use the language of his predecessor: Obama has incredible political capital, and he intends to use it.

How is he faring? Obama's first week was marked by two important signals. First, in taking action to close Guantanamo Bay, Obama came through with his commitment to undo the egregious excesses surrounding the Bush Administration's war on terror. All well and good, but the more challenging issue, which was the number one question posed by citizens on his transition website, will be whether to instruct a renewed Justice Department to investigate the prosecution of Rumsfeld, Cheney, and Bush himself for violating laws on torture.

The second signal, which is more immediately troubling, concerns the nomination of William Lynn as Deputy Secretary of Defence. As a former executive at Raytheon, a defence and aerospace systems provider, Lynn's appointment would violate the Obama Administration's new ethics rule on employing ex-lobbyists, and do so within what is perhaps Washington's most polluted government-industry relationship.

Both of these signals foretell an important tension between Obama's ability to remain effective, and his desire to present himself as guided by verity instead of politics. In the short term, there is a temptation to see these objectives as mutually exclusive. Judging by his courtship of the right and even the selection of Rick Warren to lead the inaugural benediction, it is possible that Obama's governing strategy is not as much post-partisanship as it is moderation. Instead of stamping out politics, the idea here would be to avoid alienating rivals by (to mix metaphors) throwing them bones and leaving sacred cows un-tipped.

Conventional wisdom supports this approach. Many believe, for instance, that a trial of former Bush officials would reignite the bitter inter-party recrimination that characterized Watergate, Iran-Contra and Monica Lewinsky – dashing Obama's hope of focusing the country on the challenges ahead. Similarly, Obama insiders suggest that Lynn is uniquely qualified to manage the Pentagon through the sensitive transition from an Iraqi draw-down to Afghan build-up, and that tough ethics laws need to include exceptional waivers when it’s in the national interest.

Such an approach, however, underestimates the transformational opportunity of the contemporary context. Yes, Obama has incredible political capital, but the real question concerns whether this capital should be spent on Washington lawmakers or on a broader American – and even global – constituency. Whose support does Obama really need to get things done?

President Obama ran a superlative campaign, chiefly notable for conveying a consistent message that straddled being both an underdog and a front-runner. Yet Obama's message of hope and change achieved inspirational credibility because he was able to present himself, at once, as smart, honest, and, most importantly, committed to something uniquely different than ideology. Obama's power stems from something about his quest for excellence – about needing to get the answer right because the country is in too much trouble to play around. It's about a belief that the U.S. is practically and morally equipped to lead.

Obama must collaborate and compromise with Republicans and Democrats alike if he is to succeed in implementing his agenda. His economic stimulus package, for instance, hasn't faced a single hearing and has already been criticized by the left for not spending enough money, for directing too much money towards tax cuts, and for not being sufficiently progressive and green with regard to 21st-century infrastructure.

Yet in Obama’s first 100 days, it is not the critics of substance that will matter but the critics of principle. Regarding the former, the president is going to get what he wants. Obama has both sufficient majorities and a sufficient climate of crisis to render Congressional opposition unviable (it seems unlikely that the 2010 midterm election will be decided on issues of "direction"). Rather, polls indicate that Americans extend to Obama both their trust and their patience – appropriate parallels to the notions of hope and change.

This public faith in Obama is what matters, and is what can erode quickly if the President is called out for straying from his own principles. Amidst the bombardment of 24-hour news cycles and internet media, hypocrisy is the true opponent. For the first two years, at least, the President will be judged not on what he does, but how he does it.

The Lynn appointment is a flat out mistake – it lacks the appearance of inclusiveness that Obama was able to invoke by tapping Warren, and it smacks of the same hubris of the previous Administration's view that it is acceptable to violate the law in the name of security.

The torture issue is a mistake in waiting. While undoubtedly it would take courage to subject Bush and his company to prosecution, in doing nothing Obama would deprive the U.S. – and indeed, the world – of the tonic required to restore faith in American democracy. This country is governed by laws, not people, and to refrain from investigating whether a law has been broken for political reasons would be a violation of the law itself. Moreover, the U.S. cannot defend freedom and rule of law abroad if it, itself, fails to uphold its responsibilities on its own.

Obama appears to recognize that he is President during an extraordinarily blended moment of goodwill and anxiety. Amidst these high stakes, it’s possible that his effectiveness will hinge not on being politically expedient, but on denying any foundation for cynicism.