September 19, 2007
If only he lived up to his name
I’ve been referring to the Oval Office’s occupant by the appellation of Our Fine President pretty much since I started this place. Sure it’s a bit childish to call him names – or in this case refuse to call him a name – but it serves as a commentary on his habit of giving everyone around him a disparaging nickname. Also, it expresses my feeling that his job performance thus far does not even warrant mention of him by name.
This name didn’t come about by accident or because it rolls off the tongue in such a stately manner. No, the nickname was chosen because it communicates a key principle of democracy, one Our Fine President clearly doesn’t understand. His (and many members of Congress’) inability to see or understand that concept it’s one of my chief frustrations with the way this man (and this Congress) governs.
My frustration was illustrated even during one of Our Fine President’s most compromising moments, the nomination of ex-judge Michael Mukasey to serve as Attorney General. Mukasey is plenty arch conservative, but he’s stood up to the administration and upheld the rule of law, and is thus tolerable to Democrats but hated by those loyalists who never see wrong in what Our Fine President does.
You see before nominating the man, Our Fine President made him available for questioning at private meetings with undisclosed right wing groups. Unsurprisingly Mukasey was not made similarly available for questions from groups from the other end of the political spectrum. There’d be no need for that sort of meaning because Our Fine President doesn’t see any need for his appointments, actions or decisions to in any way represent those people who do not support him.
His idea of democracy is winner takes all, and once you’re in office your action should only serve the interests of the people who put you there. Never mind that a majority of Americans who are impacted by these decisions did not vote for him in either election, and now many of those who did vote for him have come to dislike him. Sure he was put into office by his supporters to enact his policy proposals and represent his and their ideas, but once in office he became Our Fine President and his responsibility expanded to serve all of us.
That’s not to say he should check a poll of the nation’s opinion on every decision or cave to opposition ideas, but his decisions need to reflect what’s best for the country as a whole and not just what’s best for his friends. Of course he doesn’t see the world that way. He’s a “you’re either with us or your with the terrorists” kind of guy who mistakes optimism for success and loyalty for competence. In his two-tone world compromise is a synonym for defeat, and any idea from the other guys is a bad idea, simply because it comes from those other guys. As much as I believe he is Our Fine President, he probably doesn’t feel he’s been hired to represent me in any way.