The President of the United States cannot remake our society

Did you know that Barack Obama "furtively chews on Nicorette?" Did you know that Michelle Obama is already working on her memoir, which is expected to earn her around twelve million dollars? Did you know that Jimmy Carter is trying to eradicate the Guinea worm in Africa? Did you know that Obama's Secret Service handle is "Renegade?" His favorite alcoholic beverage is the Martini. He is a night owl. He has a "great relationship with Magic Johnson." Those are a few of the things I learned in reading this post by David Remick in the New Yorker.

Of course, Remick portrays the Republicans as

the reactionaries who claim Reagan’s banner display none of his ideological finesse. Rejection is all. Obama can never be opposed vehemently enough.

He completely overlooks Obama's role as a divider, choosing instead to remember Obama's great speeches where he pretended to be a uniter.

Remnick alleges, without citing any factual basis,

The popular opposition to the Administration comes largely from older whites who feel threatened, underemployed, overlooked, and disdained in a globalized economy and in an increasingly diverse country. Obama’s drop in the polls in 2013 was especially grave among white voters. “There’s no doubt that there’s some folks who just really dislike me because they don’t like the idea of a black President,” Obama said. “Now, the flip side of it is there are some black folks and maybe some white folks who really like me and give me the benefit of the doubt precisely because I’m a black President.”

Has Remnick talked to any of these people who are opposed to Obama? There is no sign that he has.

Obama says he pushes federal government power, rather than power to the states, because that is in line with the history of the Civil Rights Movement. Does he not know that it was the Democratic Party that traditionally fought against Civil Rights, while the Republicans were on the side of the Civil Rights Movement? It was Dwight David Eisenhower who sent the troops in to Little Rock. It was Richard Nixon who integrated the public schools. It was Lyndon Baines Johnson who greatly expanded the welfare state and dependency.

Remnick writes,

One of the enduring mysteries of the Obama years is that so many members of the hyper-deluxe economy—corporate C.E.O.s and Wall Street bankers—have abandoned him.

Then, without even acknowledging his blindness, he tells about the 27,000 square foot home Obama goes to in Medina, Washington to fundraise with 70 donors who paid $16,000 apiece to have dinner with Obama!

Remnick says Obama is open-minded and not ideological.

Like a seasoned standup comedian, he has learned that a well-timed heckler can be his ally. It allows him to dramatize his open-mindedness, even his own philosophical ambivalences about a particularly difficult political or moral question.

Unlike Lyndon Johnson or what we have recently been learning about Chris Christie, Obama disdains political hardball, according to Remnick. Obama said this to Remnick about LBJ,

“When he lost that historic majority, and the glow of that landslide victory faded, he had the same problems with Congress that most Presidents at one point or another have.”

On Obama's foreign policy, Remnick writes,

he has extended a hand to traditional enemies, from Iran to Cuba. And he has not hesitated in his public rhetoric to acknowledge, however subtly, the abuses, as well as the triumphs, of American power. He remembers going with his mother to live in Indonesia, in 1967—shortly after a military coup, engineered with American help, led to the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of people. This event, and the fact that so few Americans know much about it, made a lasting impression on Obama. He is convinced that an essential component of diplomacy is the public recognition of historical facts—not only the taking of American hostages in Iran, in 1979, but also the American role in the overthrow of Mohammad Mossadegh, the democratically elected Prime Minister of Iran, in 1953.

What about Iran? Remnick writes,

the White House is prepared to accept a civilian nuclear capacity in Iran, with strict oversight, while the Israelis and the Gulf states regard any Iranian nuclear technology at all as unacceptable. Obama has told Netanyahu and Republican senators that the absolutist benchmark is not achievable. Members of Obama’s team believe that the leaders of Israel, Egypt, Jordan, and the Gulf states, who are now allied as never before, want the U.S. to be their proxy in a struggle not merely for de-nuclearization in Iran but for regime change—and that is not on the Administration’s agenda, except, perhaps, as a hope.

Remnick actually believes

Obama has every right to claim a long list of victories since he took office: ending two wars; an economic rescue, no matter how imperfect; strong Supreme Court nominations; a lack of major scandal; essential support for an epochal advance in the civil rights of gays and lesbians; more progressive executive orders on climate change, gun control, and the end of torture; and, yes, health-care reform.

Remnick met several times with Obama and traveled with him on Air Force One. Obama's last words to Remnick were,

The President of the United States cannot remake our society, and that’s probably a good thing.” He paused yet again, always self-editing. “Not ‘probably,’ ” he said. “It’s definitely a good thing.”

Thanks to Conor Friedersdorf for linking to this article.