According to newly released internal White House emails, however bad things are now, they’re about to get worse. The messages, which originated within the White House Office of Management and Budget in 2010, admits the train wreck of the Solyndra loan and indicates that “bad days are coming.”
“What’s terrifying,” the note reads, “is that looking at some of the ones that came next, this one [Solyndra] started to look better.”
It’s important to note that these emails were released by Democrats themselves so, in all likelihood, this is the version of the story that presents the best possible picture of the Obama administration’s future. Depending on which poll you read, the President’s approval rating is either a point or two above or below 40% and his administration is mired in multiple, deepening, scandals. This leads many conservatives to speculate that Obama will have no other choice but to bow out of a 2012 contest that he knows he can’t win. They’d better hope he doesn’t. For the sake of the nation, Obama needs to run, and he needs to be defeated in an election.
Some on the right will argue that the chance of him winning a second term is too great and the United States would be better off if he just resigned. The problem is, he won’t just disappear. Ex-presidents may no longer enjoy the perks of the office, but they still command considerable attention both at home and abroad. Barack Obama would present the left with the ultimate rock star of retired politicians, and he’d love to wield that kind of power.
If he simply quits, Obama will return to his community organizing roots. He’ll begin shouting about the nation that was too stupid, too trapped in its own past, to acknowledge the greatness of the future he tried to build. He’ll blame Washington and evil corporations for standing in the way of his vision. He’ll imply that we’re a racist land which couldn’t deal with a black president and, most importantly, he’ll declare that he was never beaten.
A new narrative will emerge – one that claims he chose to leave office because America’s “broken system” is incapable of offering the downtrodden a country they deserve. In short, Obama will have martyred his Presidency, sacrificing his dream of a “rebuilt” America, because it’s simply unobtainable within the current constitutional system.
It’s a message that would prove irresistible to multiple segments of the population. Obviously, much of the left already believes it and the gang of misfits currently “occupying” Wall Street would lap it up. Add to their number the 45% of U.S. citizens currently receiving some form of government assistance, 12 million illegal immigrants, a global network of Soros-funded activist groups, and Obama would instantly find himself fronting a substantial, destructive, political force.
Contrast that with an Obama that runs for, and loses, the 2012 election. Sure, many of the same arguments would be made. Left wing pundits would still do their best to paint the President as a tragic figure whose ideas were too grand for an ungrateful nation. Nothing is going to stop the faithful from making that claim. However, the argument will be severely diminished in the context of a failed re-election bid. The President’s vision will have been presented to the people, and it will have been rejected in favor of a new course. The moral superiority that would come from walking away, false though it may be, will have been lost and America’s malcontents will have been denied their martyr.
At this point, it’s impossible to deny that the country will be in a better position without Obama at the helm. His policies have been nothing but destructive, both in terms of finance and personal freedom. It’s become clear that there will be no turnaround, economic or otherwise, as long as he’s in power.
Obama leaving office is imperative, but how he departs will set the stage for future battles. Those hoping for retirment would do well to keep that in mind.