During the campaign, Barack Obama invoked the words of Martin Luther King Jr. in calling for transformational change. "I am running because of what Dr. King called 'the fierce urgency of now,' " Obama said in South Carolina on Nov. 3, 2007. "I am running because I do believe there's such a thing as being too late. And that hour is almost here." ...(I Have Net). A recent post here asked how good of a president can he be, and pointed out change is not a one branch function.
His critics have a point. His challenge to the status quo may be causing too many powerful forces to line up against him, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, members of the medical establishment, the conservative power structure in Washington, and Rush Limbaugh and his cohorts in the punditocracy of the right. If Obama fails to overcome them, his credibility could be shattered, and his dreams of change could evaporate.
It takes all branches of government to agree, and then business to implement some of these changes, then the people going for it.
An example is climate change. There may be consensus that climate change is a real issue, but how to fix those problems is not as easy an issue to develop consensus on:
Hours after the House passed landmark legislation meant to curb greenhouse gas emissions and create an energy-efficient economy, President Barack Obama on Saturday urged senators to show courage and follow suit.(MSNBC). Even if it passes then it must be found constitutional by the courts, and then used effectively by business and the people.
"We passed transformational legislation, which will take us into the future," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., after the 219-212 vote.
"For some it was a very difficult vote because the entrenched agents of the status quo were out there full force, jamming the lines in their districts and here, and they withstood that," Pelosi said.
The "razor-thin vote in the House spells doom in the Senate," said Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., the top Republican on the Senate's environment panel.
A president can be stopped or slowed down by the D.C. buzzsaw from what that president really wanted, and Obama is no exception.