President Barack Obama ends his first year in office with his to-do list
still long and his unfulfilled campaign promises stacked high.
From winding down the war in Iraq to limiting lobbyists, Obama has made some
progress. But the president has faced political reality and accepted -
sometimes grudgingly - compromises that leave him exposed to criticism.
Promises that have proven difficult include pledges not to raise taxes, to
curb earmarks and to shut down the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba
by the end of his first year.
"We are moving systematically to bring about change, but change is hard,"
Obama told a town hall crowd in California. "Change doesn't happen
overnight."
That was in March.
During his two-year campaign, Obama thrilled massive crowds with soaring
speeches, often railing against an Iraq war that now is seldom mentioned.
His presidential comments now are often sober updates on issues like
terrorism and the economy, a top priority now that emerged as a major issue
only in the campaign's final weeks.
Obama's campaign ambition has been diluted with a pragmatism that has been
the hallmark of Year One - without much of the progress he had hoped.
A look at some of the promises:
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THE ECONOMY, TAXES AND DEFICITS
Obama inherited an economy in severe distress that has since shown marked
improvement. With the crisis developing so close to last year's election, it
wasn't the focus of his earlier campaign promises. But Obama managed to
craft his main anti-recession measure to address one of the top political
commitments.
He campaigned on a pledge to provide a $1,000 tax credit to 95 percent of
all working families, and almost delivered.
The $787 billion stimulus bill included an $800 tax credit for couples
making up to $150,000, and a declining credit for those making up to
$190,000. The Tax Policy Center estimates that 90 percent of taxpayers
qualified for a tax cut under the stimulus package.
In a Dover, N.H., campaign stop, Obama pledged that "no family making less
than $250,000 will see their taxes increase - not your income taxes, not
your payroll taxes, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes."
True, unless you're a smoker.
Obama, himself an occasional smoker, signed into law a 159 percent increase
in the tax on a pack of cigarettes. Other tobacco products were hit with
similar or much steeper increases to help pay for a children's health
initiative, enabling him to keep another promise to make sure all kids have
health insurance.
Obama also promised to cut the federal budget deficit by more than half in
his first term. That now appears unlikely, given the spending on the
stimulus and the billions of dollars spent on bank and auto company
bailouts. The 2009 federal budget deficit hit a record $1.42 trillion, and
the red ink in the first two months of fiscal 2010 was nearly 6 percent
higher than the same period in 2009.
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FOREIGN POLICY
As a candidate, Obama touted his early opposition to the Iraq war and
pledged to pull all U.S. combat troops out within 16 months. As president,
he pushed that deadline back two months, to August 2010.
Even then, he will leave 35,000 to 50,000 military personnel in Iraq through
2011 to train, equip and advise Iraqi security forces, and to help in
counterterrorism missions.
As a candidate, he vowed to prosecute the war against al-Qaida in
Afghanistan, arguing that Iraq had distracted the U.S. from its anti-terror
priorities. By the end of his first year, he had retooled the Afghan war
strategy, replaced the U.S. commander there, doubled the number of U.S.
troops in the country and ordered another 30,000 there by the middle of this
year.
He also promised to "end the use of torture without exception" in U.S.
anti-terror campaigns and to close Guantanamo Bay, which he called "a
recruiting tool for our enemies." He signed an executive order outlawing
torture, cruelty and degrading treatment of prisoners. A companion order
closing the Guantanamo prison has proven more challenging.
Congress refused to fund the transfer of any Guantanamo detainees to U.S.
prisons, and foreign countries are reluctant to accept them. Obama did order
the purchase of an Illinois prison to house up to 100 Guantanamo detainees.
Still, Guantanamo cannot be closed until the disposition of more than 200
remaining detainees is resolved. A failed attempt at bombing a Detroit-bound
airliner on Christmas has made that more difficult.
Obama also campaigned to restore U.S. prestige abroad by engaging allies and
adversaries alike, a direct swipe at George W. Bush, his predecessor. Now,
he's finding that rhetoric tough to live up to.
He vowed to use "tough, direct diplomacy" to keep Iran from obtaining
nuclear weapons. Once in office, he offered dialogue to Tehran, made direct
appeals to the Iranian people and included Iran in multinational
discussions, while insisting that Iran not be permitted to develop nuclear
weapons.
The power centers in Tehran have largely shrugged, and Obama so far has been
unable to unite a coalition of countries behind new economic sanctions
intended to block Iran's development of nuclear weapons.
A solution for North Korea's nuclear program also remains elusive. Its envoy
to the United Nations said his nation is willing to conduct talks, but only
if all sanctions against it are lifted.
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TERRORISM
On his 2008 campaign Web site, Obama declared that "we must redouble our
efforts to determine if the measures implemented since 9/11 are adequately
addressing the threats our nation continues to face from airplane-based
terrorism," including screening all passengers against "a comprehensive
terrorist watch list."
The verdict on that promise came last month, when an alleged terrorist known
to authorities boarded an airliner bound for Detroit from overseas carrying
explosives in his clothes. Disaster was averted when he botched an attempt
to ignite the bomb.
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HEALTH CARE
During his political run, Obama said he would increase the number of people
covered by health insurance and pay for it by raising taxes on families
making more than $250,000 a year and by taxing companies that do not offer
coverage to employees.
Although lawmakers have taken steps toward the broad outline Obama promised,
it remains unfinished. The House and Senate have passed versions of the
plan, but major differences remain. And Obama's left flank is none too
pleased with the compromises to this point, which have all but eliminated a
government-run insurance option, something he called for in the campaign.
Even the process has violated one campaign pledge.
"We'll have the negotiations televised on C-SPAN, so that people can see who
is making arguments on behalf of their constituents, and who are making
arguments on behalf of the drug companies or the insurance companies," Obama
said.
That hasn't happened. Instead, Democrats in Congress and the White House
have made multibillion-dollar deals with hospitals and pharmaceutical
companies in private. C-SPAN asked to televise the negotiations between the
House and Senate versions; the White House insists it hasn't seen the
request.
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OTHER ISSUES
On other domestic promises, from energy to education, Obama has been faced
with a tight budget, a struggling economy and a deficit-conscious public
that he will need to court if he seeks another term in 2012.
Early on, he had to recant his pledge not to sign legislation that includes
lawmakers' pet projects. "When I'm president, I will go line by line to make
sure that we are not spending money unwisely," Obama had said in September.
But Congress controls spending, and Obama hasn't been willing to veto bills
approved by his Democratic allies on Capitol Hill. For example, he signed
what he called an "imperfect" $410 billion spending bill that included 7,991
so-called "earmarks" totaling $5.5 billion. He had little choice. The
measure, a holdover from the Bush presidency, was needed to keep government
from shutting down.
Obama also promised to require lawmakers seeking money for earmarks to
justify their requests in writing 72 hours before they're voted on in
Congress.
That hasn't happened yet. Nor has his pledge to post legislation online for
five days before acting; he broke that pledge with his first bill, a
non-emergency measure giving workers more time to bring pay discrimination
lawsuits. A promised ban on lobbyists serving in his administration hasn't
been absolute; a few former lobbyists were granted exemptions.
White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs explained that by saying:
"Even the toughest rules require reasonable exceptions."
