Don’t blame Obama for Trump’s rise to power

President Obama’s first inauguration saw well over 1 million people flood Washington. An air of celebration and yes, revolution permeated the city. My comments from the time: 

Make no mistake. Tuesday was a revolution. We, the people, came together to make it very clear that this is a revolution. Monday, on Dupont Circle, a “15 foot blow up Bush” actually drew throngs of people throwing shoes at the bobbing and dipping effigy. Tuesday, on the national mall, a huge number of eyes followed the [M]arine helicopter (no longer called Marine One) carting Bush from downtown DC and power[;] many people raised their arms with hands giving what Time magazine long ago called the “international symbol of derision.” Revolutions are not always classy but they certainly seem to be clear.”

Obama’s victory was a demand for drastic change.

{mosads}But this change never came.

Many of the same people who elected Obama voted for President-elect Donald Trump, still demanding that drastic change. Unnoticed by most at the time, the Obama revolution began to wither away even before that historic day on the Mall.

Obama ceded the moral high ground on torture prior to taking office. In perhaps the most serious error of his soon-to-be presidency, The New York Times documents Obama’s changing position on torture in an article from January 2009, which quoted from a George Stephanopoulos interview:

Mr. Obama added that he also had “a belief that we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards.”

“And part of my job,” he continued, “is to make sure that, for example, at the C.I.A., you’ve got extraordinarily talented people who are working very hard to keep Americans safe. I don’t want them to suddenly feel like they’ve got spend their all their time looking over their shoulders.”

That was a clear signal that any change was not going to be drastic and actual criminal acts (the torture of helpless prisoners) could be both condoned and even rewarded.

Following the debacle of the George W. Bush years, the federal bureaucracy suffered from lack of attention and stagnation. It was ripe for transformation. Yet the guidance from an increasingly cautious White House was not to rock the boat.

Members of Congress and even Obama staff came to realize that change would be incremental.

This go-along-to-get-along, no-drama approach served Obama and, it could be argued, the country, well. Few people now recall how the nation was tottering on the very brink between economic recession and depression. Badly needed stability was restored to both the government and the economy. A plodding competency enveloped the administration as slow improvement was evident within six months.

Abroad, the Obama administration slowly restored a tattered American reputation damaged by warmongering and military incompetence — for incompetent it most certainly was. The nation started a war with mediocre goals and quickly failed to achieve them, a fact not unnoticed by our global opponents. These conflicts were eventually declared to have ended, but the instability and results continue to fester.

Obama won reelection handily, and drastic change was never an election offer to an increasingly frustrated electorate. A broad federal bureaucracy struggled on with decreasing capability and attention, creating even more frustration among the citizenry. Infrastructure continued to decay and services tightened as a Republican Congress failed to either govern or care.

Politicians and media corporate giants refused to acknowledge the pain. Loud and clear warnings existed in the increasing popularity and support for fringe candidates like Trump and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). A master showman and flimflam artist, Trump saw the opportunity and sold his show (and it was, and is, a show) to an angry people still tired of going-along-to-not-get-along and still demanding drastic change.

While offering extremely change-driven polices, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton did not seize the banner of real change. Her caution provided an opening grabbed by a historically weak leader like Trump, who knew his audiences and how to manipulate them. The Russians grasped this opportunity to both disrupt America and open a path to restoration of Russian influence in Europe.

Thus it came to pass that Trump is president-elect of the United States. Obama is still playing go-along-to-get-along and looks unlikely to release the historic Senate report on torture. The original sin remains, providing both cover to torturers and a pathway to future U.S. crimes against humanity.

However, Obama did not pave the way for a President-elect Trump.

The Democratic Party did.

Isolated local party pooh bahs and national party operatives deluded themselves that the path to power lay solely in urban areas. Clearly skewed to cities and populous states, party officials ignored rural and Rust Belt concerns when developing their strategies.

The results showed in the decreasing numbers of Democratic state governments and legislators. In too many places, the Democratic Party model relies upon old, declining influence groups like unions and political patronage while failing to address the real issues: the economy and effective government.

The economic component was slighted by not listening to dissonant voices from every county in every state. The Democratic message should have stressed the truisms that immigration, LGBTQ, women and other minorities are all components of a vibrant and growing economy. The bottom line in every election should be providing good government that works without favor because that type of government provides proven economic good and long-term political growth.

Both the Democratic and Republican parties ignored the pain of middle America; only the Democratic Party had the capability to stop Trump.

Do not blame President Obama.

Hal Donahue is a senior adviser at Grieboski Global Strategies, a veteran and political activist. Follow him on Twitter @haldonahue.

The views expressed by contributors are their own and not the views of The Hill.