How President Obama Can Win The Affection of His People and of The World

I decided to add my own voice to the many that have made a contribution to the Great Barack Obama debate. With his official term of office about to begin soon, now seemed an appropriate time. Some might argue, why bother to say anything? With all the billions of words that have been written about him, how can there be anything left worth saying? At least, until his government has properly begun to do whatever it is going to do.

Others might say, what right have you to say anything, as you are not even American. Well that's true. But being not entitled to say something has not stopped me from talking in the past. And the same could be said of many other people too. Besides, the things the US President does affect all of us, don't they? So I DO have a right to speak about him.

My first thought is, how absolutely splendid it is that a black person has been elected to the White House. I heard that Jesse Jackson had complained that he wasn't black enough, which seems a rather absurd thing to say, if he really did say it. I think Jackson must have meant that Obama's mother is white, so the president is of mixed race. Or he could have meant that Obama's father is from Kenya, and therefore is not a son of slavery; in this case, "not black enough" would mean he had no ancestral background in the struggle of blacks for recognition in the USA.

It certainly does seem that Obama has inherited a lot of problems to sort out, both at home and in the wider world. A lot of people are hoping that he will roll his sleeves up, and start dealing with these problems right away. Each one of these people of course assumes that the only right way to do this is to do exactly what they would do. Or anyway, what they dream they would do... But they all seem to be looking for Obama to take a strong and active line on many current issues. They want him to be filled with reforming zeal.

I'm actually hoping for something different. After all, the US president has many teams and committees of advisors and experts in every possible field. He has the greatest economists, political thinkers, federal bank officials, military strategists, police experts, lawyers and all the rest. These people are perfectly capable of sorting out the problems, as long as they are given some clearly defined guidelines and parameters to go by. So let them get on with the job. All the president really needs to do is oversee the whole thing, and make the occasional stirring speech, something that Obama has already proved himself to be very good at.

This kind of approach in a Head of State can be described as "masterly inactivity". In my opinion, it is by far the best way to govern a country. The people will love him if he does that. Despite what the theorists say, most people have an intense dislike of change. Ordinary people really are as conservative as cats. I don't mean they are political conservatives, I just mean they don't like change. They like things to carry on pretty much as they are, even if those things are not exactly perfect. They are reluctant to try repairing anything if it's working reasonably OK. They are happy to try making constant small improvements day by day. They just don't like the kind of root-and-branch reforms that we see all the time these days. There's a saying in Spain, The best day is when nothing new happens. If you scratch the surface, you will find that most people all over the world would agree with that.

Most of us have had it up to the ears with "strong government" in the past few decades. Politicians seem to feel it is their duty to change everything, to turn everything upside down, to introduce radical new measures, to interfere with everything, to make their mark.

What we really do need now is a president of the US who will set an example to other world leaders. Someone who will just run the country, and keep things ticking over. Sphere: Related Content