Report Card To Obama......By Jamil Shawwa

Leaders shine in conflicts and they shine when their countries or companies or whatever they lead are in crises. Crises sometimes bring the best in leaders and bring the worst in pretenders. In America, in the mid 90s, the economy was in recession and in crises, and this brought Bill Clinton to be reelected for a second term and brought down the republican revolution led by Newt Gringrich. Couple of years earlier, Bill Clinton defeated the victorious George Bush, just coming out of liberating an oil oasis called Kuwait. Today, we have a conflict or two, we are in crisis or two, we are at war or two and we are in that context leading the world in combating the modern day terrorism. It is no longer state-to-state wars, but it is state to groups that decided on their own for whatever reason to create an atmosphere of fear and terror against everything that sounds normal in life. Some people like to resemble Barack Obama to both Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter; both are considered as losers in American politics. Both Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter came to power when America was not itself, was in crisis or just came out of crisis. Ford after Nixon resigned, after the Watergate scandal, and he just completed Nixon second term and then lost a bid to be elected on his own; he lost it to Jimmy Carter, what an irony. Ford was unlucky, it was not only Watergate that brought him down by proxy but also Vietnam, America in his era, signed the agreement to withdrew it's forces from South Vietnam, basically signed an agreement that stated that America was defeated to the Vietcong. The whole world saw and witnessed the humiliating withdrawal and the helicopter on top of the US embassy in Saigon with the southern Vietnamese trying to flee, women, children, everybody. That was a deep, deep scar in America's pride. America elected Jimmy Carter, who brought the Egyptians and the Israelis together, and chaperoned a historic peace treaty but did not handle the Iranian clerics' revolution well, and America again, after Vietnam witnessed the humiliation of its embassy members in Tehran being hijacked and kidnapped by the new and rising power in the Middle East, Iran. Carter did not survive it, or maybe it was the curse of the ailing Shah of Iran-Muhammad Reza Pahlavi- that Carter ordered to leave the country for the fanatics and the pretenders, the clerics that are running Iran right now. Carter lost to Reagan who- arguably- restored America's pride, ended the cold war, and established America as the only supreme and super power on earth. I prefer though, after this long introduction to resemble Barack Obama to Bill Clinton and not to Gerry Ford or Jimmy Carter. Both Clinton and Obama came in similar economic situations, both came after presidents who won wars but lost the economy. Today, now, Congress is divided, the republicans won the House of Representatives and the Democrats maintained control over the Senate. In 1994, Newt Gingrich led what was called then, the republican revolution with the slogan of "take the country back", as it is now, but instead of the republican revolution, we now have the Tea Party movement that is trying to put life in the dead veins of the Republican Party. Clinton in 1996 managed to secure a second term and this is the same legacy that Obama is trying hard to do, to secure a legacy, to be included in this unique club and very exclusive club of American presidents that managed to have two terms in office. This is Obama's goal or it should be at least. When he won in 2008, his next day item should have been how to prepare for the 2012 elections, besides of course securing and implanting an agenda that he promised the voters to implement. His team should have looked that far, maybe they did; we still need to see. He, Obama, made history as the first African American president to America, and just being president, he is making it every day. But this is not enough or no longer enough to secure a second term; he needs to show a genuine leadership, skills and tact that he already has shown during the 2008 elections. He cannot rest or resolute- if he wants to win- until he wins in 2012. Obama has a golden opportunity right now to shine, he did not lose both houses, he still control the money making and the power house, the senate but he must work hard not to appease the republicans- smart politics-; if he does, he will not be reelected. He needs again to work hard to show genuine leadership in pursuing his agenda, and not shying away from it, and in the same time work with whatever and whoever he needs to at least show the American people that he is doing his best and if that does not work, then the people, and they are smart enough, will see who did what and who obscured what. Obama has just secured a second mortgage on his political life, let us see if he can pay it off by 2012, or at least, being qualified to refinance by 2012. Either way, it means that he would get a second term.