Defending the Obama Administration's Record

[ProSense]

Defending the Obama Administration's Record

by Phil Sizemore

From the beginning of his administration, there has been a perennial flaring up of tensions between President Obama and the liberal wing of our common party. His compromise on the stimulus package at the beginning, followed by his choice to avoid nationalizing the banks, deals cut with instead of given to the auto industry, cutting of the public option from the healthcare bill, and subsequent limitation of abortion services provided in the high risk pools dictated by that bill have all riled up the left against their President to the extent that many are threatening to refuse their vote to Democratic candidates in protest. I am writing tonight to defend what I consider to be this administration's considerable record of accomplishment.

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The more direct investments in the bill gave billions in aid to states that prevented cuts of necessary services, particularly teachers. It spent more than a hundred billion dollars on infrastructure improvements from roads to the electric grid to environmental restoration, the largest such expenditure since the Interstate Highway Act (in real dollars positively dwarfing the amount given to the Public Works Administration under FDR), and creating hundreds of thousands if not millions of jobs along the way.

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If the President should accomplish nothing more at all between now and the end of his first term, he has a record of accomplishment that need not feel inadequate in the company of the New Deal and Great Society.

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Discouragement about the completeness of our President's accomplishment should in no way make us disparaging of its scope. I would defy any of my readers to find a more productive congress in recent history. This is real change that is happening in our society today. And in order to continue its march, and in order for us to realize the full extent of our ambitions, we need to be not discouraged but still more excited about the ground that we have gained and are still gaining. Now is not the time to despair and turn on our own leaders. Now is the time to double down, give them the support they need in the coming elections and challenge them to continue our work.