Though he may not yet know it, the role for which the US President-elect has been chosen is the management of national decline. He will be the first US president in history to accept, and (if he has the gift) to teach, not the possibilities but the constraints of power.
The fate of his predecessor George W.Bush was to test almost to destruction the theory of the limitlessness of American wealth and power - and of the potency of the American democratic ideal too. With one last heave he pitched his country into a violent and ruinous contest with what at times seemed the whole world, and the whole world's opinion. He failed, luminously.
Obama can't fix the mess Bush has made. He has, at most, eight years to patch a few holes in the leaky ship but it will take several administrations to get the listing behemoth steered into calm waters. It will require the realization that we must live within our means and, while we mind our own affairs, let others tend to their own affairs.
No comments:
Post a Comment