Obama's Modern Day Reconstruction

As our country now has a new president, there are many new decisions that are bound to come. As Obama tries to rebuild our nation many columnists have been making connections between Obama and past historical era, such as Roosevelt and the Depression, Ronald Reagan and Communists, and Harry Truman and the Fair Deal Program. One theme that has arouse throughout all these historical eras is that fact that polictics has to be separate from the decisions of our presidents actions.

The countries has been fighting for years to have a government that conducts itself in ways the benefit the majority of the nation and does not make distinctions based on a tagged identification of liberal or conservative ideas. A New York Times article entitled, One Side to Every Story, caught my eye as a browsed the web page and I thought what is the one side of the story to our governments decisions. The article explored the idea that our government for centuries has faced the separation of political groups inside our nations decisions. The overall thesis of the article is that Obama must try to break this distinctions to truly repair our nation. As Obama picked his cabinet he showed signs of trying to break these distinctions by appointing Republican of New Hampshire, Senator Gregg to commerce secretary. "President Obama looked generous in reaching out to Senator Gregg. But in the end, Mr. Gregg has it right: kind words and good intentions cannot build a bridge between competing political philosophies. History, not to mention the Republican rejection of his stimulus package, offers Mr. Obama a clear guide: Pay less attention to the other party and spend more time — much more — persuading America to embrace what you believe." Republicans yet are still reluctant to embrace the efforts of Obama to unify our nation. They are separating themselves along with those Americans that only believe in their ideals.

This situation reminds me of our discussions in class about Reconstruction. After the Civil War the nation was up in arms on how to proceed with slavery and freeing blacks and confederate states. This same unity that Obama is currently trying to obtain has been boiling throughout our nations history.