Rebecca Walsh

Washington, May 2, 2009 – The first 100 days is an artificial journalistic deadline -- a "Hallmark Holiday," as press secretary Robert Gibbs puts it.

We started judging America's presidents this way with FDR in 1933. The Great Depression didn't allow dawdling: Nearly 25 percent of the American work force was unemployed. Four out of 10 homeowners couldn't make their house payments. And half the country's farms faced foreclosure.

One hundred days seemed like plenty of time.

And Roosevelt didn't disappoint, plowing 15 pieces of legislation through Congress -- banking regulations and social welfare and public works programs -- and starting his "fireside chats." The 100-day water mark stuck.

President Barack Obama's circumstances are not yet so dire -- but they're close.

"Whether you agree with him or not -- whether you think he is too ambitious or just plain wrong -- his is as serious and challenging a presidency as we have had in quite some time," says Time magazine columnist Joe Klein.

No other president since Roosevelt has faced these odds: two wars bleeding the treasury, unemployment inching toward double digits, an anemic housing market, corruption on Wall Street and with one of the Big Three automakers declaring bankruptcy.

"I'm proud of what we've achieved, but I'm not content," the president said at his 100-day press conference last week. "I'm pleased with our progress, but I'm not satisfied."

So comparisons to FDR flow fast and thick from historians.

Like Roosevelt, Obama's first three months have been consumed by the economy, from ferrying a $786 billion stimulus package through Congress to forcing the CEO of General Motors out. Somehow, the AIG bonuses slipped through. And the scrupulous Obama vetting team cut its losses in the cabinet: Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner survived his belatedly revised tax return. But Health and Human Services nominee Tom Daschle was cut loose when his free limo started to look too much like Wall Street's excesses.

The president and first lady whisked through Europe on a triumphant tour, charming the continent and holding their own in a political and fashion standoff with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and first lady Carla Bruni. Outrage over Michelle Obama's hand on the queen's back dissipated as so much stuffy British hot air.

Finally getting to his campaign promises, Obama has started the process of shutting down Guantanamo Bay. He put the conscience rule on hold and repealed the global gag rule, allowing U.S. funds once again to be used for real family planning worldwide. Obama cut taxes for 95 percent of American workers. And two weeks ago, he released four Justice Department memos that formed the framework for Bush Administration torture policies.

"It's impossible to do too much in 100 days," says Donald Dunn, who joined the Clinton White House at the beginning of the second year. "With eight years of the Bush Administration, it takes a long time to change the course of where the country needs to go."

For those who wanted the new president to erase all traces of Rove/Cheney/Rumsfeld, Obama's cautious pace has been too slow.

Still, Republicans aren't happy either, organizing modern-day tea parties and fabricating outrage about a bow to the King of Saudi Arabia.

It doesn't seem to matter much. Even in Utah, where a slim majority of those polled approve of the job President Obama is doing, Grand Old Party angst has settled in. A KSL-TV/Deseret News poll found 53 percent of Utahns give the president good marks.

"I think the numbers show they like him personally, more than they like his policies," State Republican Vice Chairman Todd Weiler told KSL.

Never underestimate popularity and the mandate of calamity. With it, presidents can do almost anything -- like launching pre-emptive wars and suspending the Bill of Rights.

"There is one way in which the resemblance between Roosevelt and Mr. Obama is striking:," wrote Marshall University professor Jean Edward Smith in The New York Times . "In their ability to change the nation's mindset and usher in a new set of assumptions."

And this president still has 1,360 days to go.

walsh@sltrib.com

Source: The Salt Lake Tribune

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