President Obama gave his last important State of the Union earlier this month. Though he has one more address to give, that one will be overshadowed by electoral politics. This speech outlined what he is going to push the Republican Congress to do and in many ways, it represented the Obama many in 2008 and 2012 voted for but never really got. He expressed his support for “middle class economics,” fighting climate change and working through issues such as Iran’s nuclear program through negotiation. Despite that, Obama’s speech failed in several aspects, especially because he did not acknowledge the political reality that he faces and certain issues he supports that undercut it.
Obama called for the Democrats and Republicans to give him “trade promotion authority to protect American workers, with strong new trade deals from Asia to Europe that aren’t just free, but fair.” By this, he means fast track authority to pass the Trans-Pacific Partnership. He acknowledges that past trade deals “haven’t always lived up to the hype,” but it is unlikely that this one will either, given that senators and representatives can’t even copy the bill to analyze it before it is introduced. Passing fast track would also give Obama way more power than he needs in negotiating trade deals. The support for this deal is extremely likely to undercut those “middle class economics” and hurt the American worker.
Obama called for those that oppose parts of his agenda to work with him where they agreed. While he says some may call this naive, it completely ignores the reality of the politics during his presidency. Obama fails to realize that all politicians don’t think it’s a good thing that every woman should have the health care she needs, that people are hurt when an undocumented mother is taken from her children or that the right to vote is being taken away from too many. The GOP has run on removing federal funds from women’s programs, they think those undocumented workers deserve to be kicked out of the country and their election strategy specifically includes denying people the right to vote. These are not things that people in the GOP are going to work with the president on.
Obama’s new aggressive agenda involving a lot of progressive politics is refreshing and has been missing for much of his presidency, but he undercuts himself by pushing more trade deals that will fail and appealing to the almost nonexistent moderate Republicans. In his mind, the American people can all decide upon bills and projects that will improve the nation, but he is facing a party that measures its success by the bills blocked and projects repealed. It’s time he realized that and didn’t tell the American people otherwise.
Matthew Bailey is a third year law student. His column runs biweekly.
