Letter From America
Obama takes charge
AMERICA is unique among the world's democracies. The transition to a new administration takes close to three months. In the UK, if a party wins the election, it takes over in a couple of days. Obama was elected president on November 4; but will not be sworn in until January 20.
The current president cannot take major decisions that are not to the liking of president-elect. The president-elect has no real power to exercise for three months. Both have their hands tied.
Obama supporters keep on reminding everyone that there is only one president, President Bush. However, President Bush is not to be found anywhere, whereas president-elect Obama is omnipresent.
Anytime President Bush makes a public appearance, the stock market takes a nose-dive. Every time Obama rolled out new members of his cabinet on television, the stock market shot up!
The writer has never seen a president-elect act so quickly to fill all his cabinet posts. In basketball jargon, Obama went full-court press the day after winning the presidency. Obama did not take a single day off after election because he realises that monumental hurdles await him when he takes office. He wants his cabinet members to start working on the solutions before they are sworn in.
With the country's economy in a deepening recession, Obama introduced his economic team first. Next week, Obama will introduce his national security team, the importance of which was underscored by the events in Mumbai.
Obama will draw down the US troops from Iraq quickly, probably before 2011. However, Obama will redeploy many of those troops in Iraq to take on Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. This may not be a wise move. The British and the Russians fought a century-long Great Game for the domination of Afghanistan and Central Asia, but did not succeed. America will fare no better.
American and Nato presence in Afghanistan has destabilised Pakistan, which in turn is destabilising India. It is better to leave Afghanistan to the Afghans. As for India and Pakistan, will they ever solve Kashmir? This dispute between two nuclear powers makes Kashmir the world's most dangerous dispute.
Al-Qaeda's second in command greeted the election of Obama by calling the president-elect a "house negro." Now we know that, like the Ku Klux Klan in the US, Al-Qaeda is not only a terrorist organisation, it is also a racist organisation!
Paradoxically, President Bush had a lot to do with Barack Obama's election as president. Americans have caught on to the fact that Bush is not what he was packaged to be by Karl Rove and the Republican Party machine. He is neither a leader nor someone who grasps things easily.
The job proved way over his head. President Bush's first question after learning of 9/11 was: "Where's Cheney?" Disdainful of deliberation, like someone with little knowledge but eager to make a big impact, he acted first and asked questions later. Despite warnings from his father's advisors not to invade Iraq, he rushed in where angels fear to tread.
Americans saw the nightmare of the Bush presidency unfold before their very eyes. Chastened, they wanted someone different. They wanted intelligence in place of bluster. They wanted deliberation before action. In Obama they found one. Americans now feel proud that they have a president-elect who is articulate and intelligent, and who knows what he is talking about.
Of course, Barack Obama can be maddeningly honourable. He advised the Democrats to not only let Joe Lieberman, who backstabbed him and the Democrats repeatedly as a John McCain surrogate, to caucus with them, but also to let him keep his chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee. Such magnanimity has rewards.
Democrats now have 58 Senators; only two less than the filibuster-proof 60. If the Democrats can win the run-off in Georgia on December 2, and if the recount in Minnesota favours the Democratic candidate and former Saturday Night Live comedian Al Franken, they will have it.
As with comedian Al Franken, American politics has been enriched by the infusion of talent from every profession. The writer's boyhood hero, former world mile record holder, Jim Ryun, was a Congressman from Kansas for ten years (1996-07). Olympics gold medalist in basketball (1964), Rhodes Scholar and the New York Knicks' superstar, Bill Bradley, was a US Senator from New Jersey for 12 years (1984-97).
Austrian-born action hero and movie star, Arnold Schwarzenegger, has been the Governor of California since 2003. And a B-rated actor, Ronald Reagan, went on to become a two-term governor of California (1966-74) and two-term president of the United States (1980-89).
As the Bangladeshis go to the polls, hopefully, they too will look for talent outside the realm of pure politics.
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