Barrack Obama: The Betrayer of Belief in Democracy

The Legacy of the Obama Administration is fast becoming one of Lies, Broken Campaign Promises and False Hope for Change

When Barrack Obama was declared President on November 4^th, 2008, there was an unparalleled sense of hope and of belief in democracy. Under Obama, everything would be different. He promised ‘Change that we can believe in’. He told us that ‘Yes, we can’. He promised to shut down Guantanamo Bay, end the war in Iraq within 16 months, make real progress in fighting climate change, end the culture of lobbying in Washington and extend health care to all. His fundraising campaign - targeting individuals, rather big business – told us that he would be a President for the people, not for corporations. Alas, we didn’t listen to our Mothers when they told us that anything that seems too good to be true probably is.

There was no change. Guantanamo Bay is still open, still holding foreign citizens without charges or any illusion of due process, still trying individuals in military tribunals with no judicial oversight. The war in Iraq is officially over, but only because Iraq refused to give American soldiers criminal immunity (thanks to Bradley Manning, now in a military jail awaiting trial for ‘adding the enemy’). Also, there are still 16,000 individuals employed by the American government being left in Iraq, half of whom are military contractors – doesn’t sound like the end of a war to me. Fighting climate change? As the recent conference in Durban shows, nothing is being done. Under Obama, the White House is still in the hands of large corporations – a recent report shows that lobbying is just as effective under Obama, as it was under George W. Bush. Finally, his fundraising campaign is no longer about the individual who believes in him (hmmm, I wonder why). Obama is getting a massive amount of money from Wall St, and is expected to raise $1 billion for the campaign – that kind of money buys a lot of favours.

Democracy falters when there is no trust left. We become disenfranchised, we lose the will to vote, we feel powerless. We opt out of the democratic system, and when that happens, all we get is what we’ve got – a system that doesn’t listen to us or care about us. Barrack Obama isn’t the worse President the US has ever had, not by a long shot. He is a definite improvement over George W. Bush, both internationally and for the US. His real crime is the betrayal of trust among those of us who dare to believe in something better. Obama was that something better – and he turned out to be no different than the rest of them.

As a Canadian, I don’t have a huge vested interest in Obama, but I still feel betrayed by his promises that he would bring change. I can’t imagine how someone who voted for him must feel.