Obama makes 'em sob again

FEW leaders have brought so many tears to the eyes of so many people as US President Barack Obama. Oprah Winfrey says she almost cried her eyelashes off when the young Democrat from Chicago accepted the party's nomination. Jane Fonda admits she became a bundle of nerves, crying all night at the thought of Obama losing the election.

Our own Guy Rundle summed up the election of Obama for many progressives. Writing last November, he described how he and the young desk clerk in the lobby of his Washington hotel, who had just come off a 12-hour shift ("because that's how you work in (George W.) Bush's America"), "just held hands and wept for a minute or so, in happiness, in relief, in the victory of something larger than both of us, that contained us both". "It is a victory for the global Left," Rundle wrote. "These are the great days."

More likely those were the salad days. Now, plenty of Obama's most ardent admirers are rethinking their exuberance. Rundle has attacked the "small stuff" - gaffes over gifts to Russians and bad jokes about the Special Olympics - and the "big stuff": complaining at the paltry size of Obama's $1.2trillion stimulus package. Democrats are meant to spend more. Bob Dylan, who once described Obama as "redefining the nature of politics", is shrugging hisshoulders, describing politicians as "interchangeable".

Al-Qa'ida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri is also disappointed: "America came to us with a new face." But it was a ruse, he says. They have not "changed their crimes, aggressions, thefts and their scandals", he says in a statement released by the SITE Intelligence Group.

And Wall Street bankers - who barracked for Barack by bankrolling his campaign to the tune of $US9.9million (not to mention giving Hillary Clinton $US7.4 million) - whine about getting hit by higher taxes. What did they expect? Democrats lowering taxes for the uber-rich?

Of course, Obama could never meet the great expectations surrounding his presidency. Indeed, the greatness of Obama's presidency will depend on him disappointing Rundle's "global Left", not to mention al-Qa'ida. The responsibility of power means the 44th President has already proved he is more pragmatic than ideological. As much as the Left will loathe this, the unfolding of his presidency is a lesson in the old adage that the office changes the man more than the man changes the office.

Last November The New York Times was effusive in its praise about Obama's promise to "restore Americans' civil liberties and their tattered reputation around the world". In office, Obama is talking like a Bushie, disappointed Times editorial writers noted in March.

Given Obama's continuous backpedalling, The Wall Street Journal was right to advise the friends of newspaper editors to remove all sharp objects from their vicinity. Now it's a case of: How do I not love thee? Let me count the ways.

Obama has refused to support the release of photographs detailing abuse of detainees, has supported warrantless wiretapping, boosted US involvement in the Afghanistan war, opposed the prosecution of those allegedly involved in torture and called a halt to rendition practices only to maintain what are conveniently called temporary facilities.

Campaigning for the presidency, Obama said: "As president I'll close Guantanamo Bay, reject the Military Commissions Act, adhere to the Geneva Conventions." He described Bush's military commissions as a "legal framework that does not work" and promised to release Guantanamo Bay detainees, transfer them to foreign countries or try them in federal US courts. Four months after taking office, Obama says "military commissions have a long tradition in the United States" as he confronts the political reality - and presidential responsibility - of what to do with the 240 detainees still in Gitmo. The President's lame changes to military commissions are acknowledgment of what Bush knew from the outset: military commissions are essential in dealing with suspected terrorists. And Obama admits indefinite detention will continue for some.

Ah, the fecklessness of those in search of a messiah. Anti-war group Code Pink is wondering whether Obama is a "war criminal". The American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch are also disappointed. But Obama needn't have bothered inviting human rights leaders to his 90-minute tea and biscuits, please-still-love-me routine at the White House last week. The more they cry foul, the clearer it becomes to a wider audience that Obama is behaving like a President responsible for the nation's security, just as president Bush did.

Last week a leaked Pentagon report revealed that one in seven of the 534 prisoners released from the facility in Cuba since 2002 has returned to terrorism. FBI director Robert Mueller has told Congress that he, too, has concerns about the release of Guantanamo Bay detainees.

Then came the ultimate rebuff to Obama supporters. Last Wednesday, in a 90-6 vote, even Democrats in Congress rejected Obama's request for $US80 million to close down Guantanamo Bay - blocking the release of detainees - until he explains his precise plan. Montana's senator Max Baucus said: "We're not going to bring al-Qa'ida to Big Sky Country." Nebraska's Democratic senator Ben Nelson said: "I wouldn't want them and I wouldn't take them"; and Dianne Feinstein's office in California said: "Alcatraz is a national park and a tourist attraction, not a functioning prison."

Notice too that Europe, only too eager to describe Gitmo as Bush's legal black hole, hasn't rushed out the welcome mat for detainees. Indeed, Europe's embrace of Obama as multilateralism man has produced little in the way of multilateral results. When the US received minimal assistance from European allies in Afghanistan, it was blamed on Bush's brand of unilateralism. When Obama failed to secure more troops from NATO allies during meetings with European leaders in April, it was apparently just a case of Europeans pursuing their national interest. And the US is once again left to do the heavy lifting.

Not much happening over at the UN Security Council either. As the council convenes to consider its response to North Korea's latest nuclear test, it pays to remember that last month it could manage only a lame, non-binding presidential statement because members disagreed on a binding resolution.

Alas, Bush is no longer the reason for UN intransigence.

For some on the Left, the Obama presidency may well be a case of what began in tears ends in tears, of a different, more bitter taste. More canny observers knew that the Obama who presented before the presidential elections would change once in office. When Bob Ellis - who described Obama as "the present world's likely saviour" - expresses his disillusionment, we will know Obama is on the right track.

[e-mail]