March is one of the best times of year. The weather is great, spring training is getting every Cubs fan excited for the inevitable letdown, and college basketball reminds you that picking a bracket is never as easy as it seems. However this March introduced a new element into the mix, politics.
As I write this the health care legislation has been signed into law and now is on to its implementation phase. As a Historian I often find myself looking back before looking forward. I remember being caught up in the election of '08 and being proud when President Obama was elected. For the previous year I had numerous debates with friends and colleagues about who our next President should be. Most of the opposition to President Obama was that he was stretching the truth to get elected and then we would be witness to his true political agenda. I thought this would be a good opportunity to look back at the man trying to get elected and the one running our country today.
Candidate Obama did not make it a secret that if elected he would make great efforts to reform the heath care industry in America. In fact, he even stated that he would judge his first term by whether or not he was able to pass health care reform (http://thinkprogress.org/2010/03/23/obama-flashback-health-care/). Now flash forward and look at the fact the President Obama has done what many other presidents from both side of the aisle have tried for and failed to accomplish, he passed health care reform. It is even more impressive to address the fact that President Obama passed this legislation just over a year into his first term. Regardless of your individual view on the legislation, we should all commend the President for holding true to his campaign promise of bringing change to the American people.
The President took office in a very difficult position. The people were feeling the effects of the worst recession since the Great Depression and many Americans could not afford to live, let alone to prosper. Candidate Obama promised credit card reform and creation of jobs. He has delivered on both of these promises. Unemployment has began to rebound, the stock market has recovered, and credit card companies have now been regulated and can no longer completely push around consumers. As a country there is still work to be done, however, our President has made extensive efforts to reverse the economic course for the American people and I for one am thankful..
