Presidential elections always seem more consequential than they really are. A loss feels so final, so fatal. A victory feels so much like hope. But, in the end, luckily, presidents aren\u2019t all that powerful.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t get me wrong. Elections have consequences. That seventeen trillion dollar national debt we now have is real. The loss of liberty Americans will suffer under Obama\u2019s healthcare mandate, and the corresponding debt burden our children will carry\u2014it\u2019s real.<\/p>\n
The national security threats we face abroad and at home, exacerbated by bad decisions in the White House\u2014very real. Let\u2019s hope Obama can handle a nuclear-armed Iran better than he did the rabble riot in Benghazi. He may get the chance to try before his second term is out.<\/p>\n
The consequences of election 2012 are real, but the differences are on the margins. Look at the Bush years. We had a huge increase in entitlement spending with the Medicare prescription drug plan. Republicans hardly batted and eye as they voted for it. A few years later, Obama took things a step closer to a European style healthcare system. Subtly, slowly, but oh so surely, we are trading quality, choice and innovation for the illusions of security. And boy, what a price tag.<\/p>\n
Democrats, Republicans\u2014the direction is the same, only the pace of change differs.<\/p>\n
In recent decades, even a large Republican-appointed majority on the Supreme Court could not achieve basic protections for the unborn in this country. And our abortion laws remain even more liberal than those in Europe. The court appointments are consequential\u2014yes–but only, it seems, on the margins.<\/p>\n
Real Leadership<\/strong><\/p>\n Except, sometimes, there is something different. Every once in a while someone comes along who actually changes hearts, and changes the course of history. It\u2019s called leadership. Not the leadership of the boardroom variety, not leadership of the committee.<\/p>\n I\u2019m speaking of a different kind of leader\u2014one who speaks to the soul of a nation. A Churchill or a Lincoln comes along, usually when he\u2019s most needed, in a critical hour, in a moment of danger, when everything\u2019s on the line.<\/p>\n That hour, in all likelihood, will come sooner to America than any of us would like. National calamity strikes once every three or four generations. It\u2019s inevitable. Big wars. Viral epidemics. Economic collapse. Nuclear winter. Trials that could make 9\/11 or Hurricane Sandy look like the easy times. Our hard days will come.<\/p>\n Cormac McCarthy gave us one possible view of the future in his novel, The Road<\/em>. It\u2019s a horror story more terrible than anything Hollywood ever dreamed up, mostly because it seems so plausible. Food supply, civilization, law and order\u2014it\u2019s all very fragile. The lesson: We\u2019ve been very lucky so far.<\/p>\n The man from Massachusetts, for all his talents, was never cut out to be a game-changing leader. He\u2019s a talented, decent man. But Romney was never going to do more than manage America\u2019s decline. He is gifted with the ability to manage people, not to change hearts. One never got the feeling that Romney really knew what he wanted to do when he got to the White House.<\/p>\n I get the same feeling about the guy from Chicago. For him too, being president feels like an end unto itself. For all the hyped rhetoric we heard four years ago, all the talk of hope and change, this year Obama articulated no reason for a second term, no vision. Ask a Democrat what they want to see happen in the next four years. All you\u2019ll hear is, \u201cWe want Obama.\u201d It was about holding onto power, warming a chair in the oval office for four more years.<\/p>\n Democratic voters didn\u2019t show up at the rallies this year. For them, it was about keeping the other guy out, not keeping their guy in. It was, as Obama said, the year of \u201crevenge.\u201d The president is out of ideas, and his followers feel the difference.<\/p>\n Obama\u2019s Legacy<\/strong><\/p>\n Obama\u2019s legacy is more about symbolism than politics. He\u2019s the antidote to the poisons of racism and slavery. Obama is the leader of a personality cult that, almost coincidentally, led to political consequences. Letting him ride free on Air Force One for eight years will be the price of washing our hands of the sins of our fathers.<\/p>\n Almost certainly, Obama will accomplish next to nothing for the next four years. Filibusters in the Senate, and the Republican majority in the House, will make sure of it. And even if Obama had super-majorities in Congress, I\u2019m not sure he really knows what he\u2019d do with it. Ultimately, that\u2019s a good thing. His lack of vision limits the damage he\u2019ll do.<\/p>\n Once in my lifetime, I\u2019d like to see a president step down after his first term, to decline to stand for reelection, to admit, openly, that he has nothing left to contribute of any importance.<\/p>\n For now, inconsequence reigns supreme on Pennsylvania Avenue. My plea for Obama is this: enjoy your power, but please, do no more harm. Leave the Marxist platitudes on your bookshelf. I have numerous family members and friends who can’t find jobs and are losing their homes.<\/p>\n My best hope for the next four years is that Obama will play a couple hundred more rounds of golf. Out there on the fairways and greens, he’s done his best work as president.<\/p>\n Before long, the reign of inconsequential men will collide with some dreadful turn in human history. I\u2019m not being pessimistic, just realistic. And when that day comes we won\u2019t be able to afford the kinds of leaders we have now. We\u2019ll have to find another Lincoln.<\/p>\n Nathan Harden\u2019s new book,<\/em> Sex & God at Yale: Porn, Political Correctness, and a Good Education Gone Bad<\/a> (St. Martin\u2019s, 2012), was recently named a New York Times Editor\u2019s Choice Pick<\/a>. He is Editor of <\/em>The College Fix<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n (Cross-posted from the International Business Times<\/em>)<\/a><\/p>\n