Obama's Mid-term blues

In many ways this was always going to happen. As a Presidential candidate Barak Obama emotionally moved Americans in way that no other American politician has done, at least in our lifetime.

His heartfelt oratory was able to do the near impossible: it challenged, suppressed and at times healed prejudice.

Obama was crowned the messiah President. But his victory was far from universal. 45% of America voted against Obama, and in defeat they would plot and plan his demise.

With a war chest of billions some set about literally painting Obama in the physical image of Adolf Hitler with the trade mark moustache. His universal health care programme –something here we take for granted, was described as ‘demonic’, and when he argued that it was American to permit a Mosque to exist  in the broad vicinity of Ground Zero , his detractors pejoratively labelled him a Muslim in disguise.

This on going vitriolic campaign has been so effective that when asked in a recent poll one in five Americans thought Obama was a Muslim.

Against a mountain of odds Obama’s only chance to defeat his many detractors would lie, not directly in his hands,  but in the global markets and in particularly the American economy.

Sadly, for Obama, turning the American economy around after such a deep recession has been one miracle too far. As a result, Obama and his Democrat party suffered heavy defeats at the polls.  

They-the Democrats lost control of the House of Representatives, and some argue if it had not been for the more outlandish ‘Tea Party' candidates, they could have lost the Senate too.

So what now for Obama?

Well, he has pledged to listen to the American people and like Bill Clinton before him; he will have to do deals with the Republicans to get anything through. Which will be easier said than done.    

And as I’ve said before, and no doubt will say again: with Iraq and Afghanistan still in turmoil, and a domestic economy that shows little sign of recovery, who would want to be the President, much less the nation’s first Black President?

President Barak Obama we still salute you.

Simon Woolley