Is Obama more Clinton, Carter or FDR?

It is an important question, more so than it sounds. The three are worlds apart, yet which Obama most closely resembles will tell us a lot about what we have in store for the next four or (G-d help us) eight years.

My first impression was Obama was a Carter. Full of naive talk about the power of negotiations, sure our enemies only hate us because of big bad Bush, with silly and unrealistic expectations of magic green energy sources. And if this is the case, we are in for a rough ride, but one that will leave only small traces. If Obama proves a Carter clone, then I expect him to flub foreign relations, let Iran get a foothold in Iraq, Syria return to Lebanon, maybe even weaken Taiwan relative to China. I also expect stupid energy initiatives to weaken the economy, and perhaps some ill considered inflation driving interest rates back into the double digits. However, also like Carter, I expect the problems he creates to mostly disappear with the man himself. Granted, Carter did create a hostile Iran, gave away the Panama canal, put an end to nuclear waste recycling, and saddled us with the Departments of Education and Energy, but in the big picture, that really is small potatoes compared to Carter's predecessors such as Johnson (Great Society), Kennedy (Vietnam), or FDR (just about everything bad about government except income tax and the Federal reserve).

On the other hand, the recent stories out of Chicago, along with Obama ties with Rezko, make me hopeful that he will be another Clinton. Not in terms of philandering, but instead in terms of corruption. Now, admittedly, the Clinton years were not banner years for the US, but they could have been much worse. Clinton was so caught up in his own graft, and later in fighting off Republican inroads brought about by his inept corruption, that he could do little lasting harm. yes, he gutted the military, dispersed our troops around the globe on silly peacekeeping missions, and set the stage that led to 9/11, but he did little of that on his own. all the evil Clinton did was just a continuation of bad Democrat policies already in place. Had we had a president Gore, the world would have been immeasurably worse.

And that may be what we will see from Obama. I could easily see an Obama more interested in horse trading and feathering his own nest and that of his cronies. Granted,t here will be harm. Clearly Obama is beholden to unions, so I could easily see union corruption becoming rampant, and some very onerous closed shop rules coming down at the federal level. And even a corrupt Obama is still likely to flog the dead horse of inflation a bit, if only to generate the money every corrupt politician needs. But, in the long run, we are probably best if Obama is simply the corrupt politician he sometimes appears to be. Even more if he is an inept corrupt politician of the Clinton model. That raises the possibility of another 1994 style voter revolt.

The worst possibility is that Obama is an FDR, that is a true believer with the ruthlessness to exploit every opportunity. FDR was never a clever politician, he was simply brutal, and unconcerned with his reputation. No other president would have been willing to threaten to pack the courts, for fear of his legacy, FDR didn't care. The closest we have come to a domestic Stalin, FDR used every bit of power he had and arrogated to himself powers no president had possessed before, all turned toward the goal fo reshaping the American economy and the nation itself.

And it is possible that Obama may be the next FDR. And that is the most frightening of possibilities. The situation, our current economic woes, coupled with a friendly congress and a press always willing to generate public hysteria in a "good cause" will give him all the tools he needs to try to reshape the way business is done. Not just simple things, like nationalizing the financial sector, government control of the auto makers or even silly green energy plans. With the public hysteria already primed against Wall Street, banks and the energy companies, Obama has the ability to dramatically change our economy if he is clever or ruthless enough. And that is the sort of change from which we don't recover. Just as the changes wrought by FDR and Wilson are with us still, if Obama follows the FDR course, it will take some dramatic changes before we can recover from what he does.

But, on the bright side, I have my doubts that Obama is the next FDR. He may want to be, but he is still too image conscious to play hardball in true FDR style. He may be a true believer, but even that is starting to appear less likely. I may be wrong, and events may change my impression, but I am beginning to think we got lucky, dodged the bullet of a Gore or a Hillary, both dangerous true believers, and instead have ended up with an exceptionally well packaged Clinton-like conman in the oval office. Even if I am wrong, and Obama really does mean what he says (when he says anything specific, which is rarely), he is, at worst, another Carter. I just don't see him being brutal enough to pull off the FDR size changes some fear.

Of course, I may be wrong, maybe his packaging is better than I suspect and he really is a master of manipulation who will reshape everything. But somehow I just don't see it. Master schemers do not run "Fight the Smears" site, nor do they worry that others will know how they used procedural tricks to keep out rivals. Obama gives every sign of being what I always thought, a moderately smart guy, who combined a glib tongue and white guilt, as well as the unexpected support of a few prominent friends, to craft a very nice life for himself. He may be adept at playing the media, but there is simply no way, even with his Chicago experience, he has the clout to bully congress the way FDR did.

And without the ability to cow congress, he won't be an FDR, no matter what he may wish.