President Obama came into the Oval Office with a huge weight on his back: living up to the unrealistic expectations produced by the media … and the crappy economy of course. A month later, Americans probably view Obama more realistically because, though he has experienced some notable successes, it hasn’t all been smooth sailing.
Successes

Closing Guantanamo Bay (sort of): On Jan. 21, Obama signed an executive order that called for the suspension of prosecutions and the review of the cases of the suspected terrorists currently being held in the detention center. The order also stated the intention of the administration to shut down Guantanamo within one year.

Closing Guantanamo indicated Obama’s desire to separate himself from Bush and company and is a crucial step in rectifying wrongs committed by the American government. However, until Guantanamo actually closes, we can only see this maneuver as a symbolic rather than a concrete step.

The Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act: This bill, which became a law on Jan. 29, abolished the 180-day limit previously placed on anyone seeking compensation to make up for discriminatory pay. Now, the 180-day time period to bring charges of discrimination against an employer renews with each discriminatory paycheck.

In a country where women were only making 77 cents on the dollar in 2005, the new policy paves the way to guaranteeing equal pay for equal work for women facing discrimination in the workplace because it has now become more costly for employers not to pay men and women equally for equal work. While we are far from eradicating sex discrimination, the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act puts the U.S. on the right track.
Failures

The economic stimulus: Some people may feel “failure” is a misnomer for the economic stimulus plan, which Obama actually signed into law on Feb. 17. However, calling it a failure stems from the way in which the package came about rather than its contents.
During the campaign, Obama indicated his intent to foster bipartisanship in Congress. Sure, every presidential candidate might promise this, but with all of the hype surrounding Obama, I think the American people really wanted to believe it. This tenet was not realized in the vote for the stimulus bill: only three Republican senators voted for it, and every single House republican voted against it. While we can’t directly attribute this result to Obama, he probably could have done more to attract Republicans to the bill — or at least he should have tried to get congressional democrats to be more responsive to republicans’ suggestions (though Republicans did seem rather determined to stop the bill from passing regardless).

Cabinet’s Inability to Pay Taxes: Three of Obama’s original cabinet picks, Tim Geithner, Bill Richardson and Tom Daschle, have a tendency to not pay their taxes. The Senate confirmed Geithner as Treasury Secretary, but both Richardson and Daschle withdrew their nominations. Granted, tax evasion isn’t exactly the same as murder, but it still does bring up issues of trustworthiness.

Again, it’s not directly Obama’s fault that the issue of tax evasion managed to slip through the cracks of the nomination process; he probably wasn’t heavily involved in vetting the candidates. The oversight does add a slight hint of scandal to the administration’s doings, though.

So was Obama’s first month in office a success or a failure? I’ll let people decide for themselves based on the evidence provided above, but personally, I feel like he did the best he could under the current circumstances. It seems probable that his inability to magically fix every little problem demoralized the obamaniacs, but hopefully, people now have more realistic expectations for the most powerful man in the free world.

Aimee Sobhani is a sophomore in the College of Arts and Science.  She can be reached at aimee.f.sobhani@vanderbilt.edu.