President Obama said something very profound yesterday when he told President-Elect Donald Trump in their White House Meeting, “If you succeed, the country succeeds.” I think I know what he meant, but being a coach, I would see it in a different way. “If the whole country succeeds, then you succeed.” I believe that that is exactly the problem for this president. He thought if he succeeded with his political agenda, he would make the whole country succeed. What he succeeded in doing was alienating half of the country, and half the country who felt left behind and disenfranchised showed up with anger to state their case at the polls. What is ironic, is that President Obama ran on the “hope and change agenda.” He set about trying to change life for segments of America he felt had been left behind. His problem was that in trying to better their lot, he neglected the lot of the Middle Class of America. In fact, he hurt them. While telling us, as many politicians have, that we wanted to make the Middle Class stronger and that “small business was the backbone of America,” his actions had the opposite effect. For example, President Obama and his allies told us that through Obamacare “20 million people now have healthcare who did not before.” The citizens who already had healthcare had that argument rammed down their throats daily. While others were getting subsidies, they were told that they could keep their healthcare and keep their doctors. In other words, the change to help a minority of people to get health care, would not upset the entire apple cart and change their lives. But it did! It was forced on them, despite protestations, then they were told that if they wanted to stay with their plans, which President Obama and his administration called “substandard,” they would have to pay a mandate. In other words, they would be penalized by government if they did not want to make the government’s choice. Many classified it as a new tax, but President Obama said that it was not so. Unfortunately for the President, the case against this mandate went to the Supreme Court. Chief Justice , John Roberts, speaking for the Majority Opinion said that the mandate was unconstitutional. “Yay” said the Middle Class. That “Yay” lasted for one minute, because the Chief Justice, in one of the great legislative moves of all time said that, “while mandates are unconstitutional, Article 1; Section 8 of the Constitution does allow taxing power to the Legislative branch” totally giving the President a victory based on that which he said wasn’t true; that it was a tax. The Middle Class filed it away. Another example is the number of “executive orders” to help illegal aliens, or the adding of new regulations based on the President’s fervent belief in climate change. the allowing of new aliens to come into the country from Central America, then shipping them into communities in all 50 states without permission of the citizens there, many of them Middle Class. This gave them yet another example of helping a segment of the population, but ignoring the regular citizen. No one ever asked them, and gradually, they slowly burned, and circled November 8th, Election Day on their calendar. President Obama was doing well with his political agenda, with his ideology and changing of America, but it was affecting the Middle Class in real and adverse ways in their daily lives on Main Street. So we return to what President Obama told his successor after their meeting last week, that if President Trump was successful, the country would be successful. That is fools’ gold. For President Trump, if you follow the same course and fail to listen to and govern for all in this country, you will face the same wrath in two years that President Obama, Secretary Clinton and the Democrats faced this year. If the Whole of the Citizenry of this country does well, and knows that they are being heard, and that real change is being made to protect their liberty and independence, then President Trump will do well. If not, then he will be condemned as yet another politician that didn’t hear the authentic voices of America. To ignore those voices, be they any voices in America, he does so at his own peril….Gary Sutton.
