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Foxnews...
Obama as Dad -- A
National Treasure and Role Model
By Juan Williams
Published June 19, 2011
Last week the First Husband and First Daddy, better known as President
Obama, was asked if losing next year’s election would devastate
him.
“I’m sure there are days when I say one term is enough,” he told The
Today Show. “Michelle and the kids are wonderful in that if I said ‘You
know what guys I want to do something different,’ they would be fine.
They are not invested in Daddy being president or my husband being
president.”
He also indicated that he believes there is a bigger job than being
President – one job that has to be done before he can be a good leader
for America.
“If family is doing well and Michelle is still putting up with me then
I’ve got enough energy to keep doing the work I’m doing,” said the
president.
Whatever one’s political disagreements with President Obama may be,
Republicans, Independents and Democrats -- all Americans -- can take
pride in the fact that they have a President who is a devoted husband
and loving father. As a dad he is a national treasure, a visual icon to
remind us of the importance of fatherhood and family.
This President stands as a defiant daily contrast to the pop culture
message that wealthy, strong, successful men are unattached to
families. He is also a father who puts the lie to the image of fathers
as dummies -- the bumbling, barely tolerated dads all over TV from
Peter Griffin in ‘Family Guy’ to Homer Simpson.
Even if you can’t stand his policies, President Obama has consistently
offered the nation the image of an intelligent, successful man who puts
being a good husband and father first.
And the fact that he is a good father who leads a black family is even
more important because the rate of absentee fathers in the black and
Hispanic community amounts to a national crisis.
According to the latest figures from the U.S. Census Bureau, almost 25
million children live without their biological father at home. That is
one out of every three children in America in 2011. The number rises
dramatically in the black community with nearly two out of every three
children living in absent-father homes.
According to the National Fatherhood Initiative, a critically important
civic organization for modern America run by the passionate Roland
Warren, the absence of fathers has a devastating effect on children
later in life.
“Research shows that kids with absent fathers are two to three times
more likely to be poor, to fail in school, to be teen parents and
become involved with the criminal justice system,” said Warren.
As I pointed out in my 2006 book, “Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End
Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America --
and What We Can Do About It,” men abandoning pregnant women has become
acceptable in much of black America. Bill Cosby told me that when he
was a young man a man who got a woman pregnant without first marrying
her felt he had to leave town or join the military. A man who neglected
his wife and children was treated as a low-life. Now hip-hop culture
affirms the “Baby Daddy” as proof of manhood.
The absence of a father creates a psychological pain for so many young
Americans, a burden that leads them to break rules and defy authority
even as they are desperate for a strong male role model.
President Obama made the importance of fatherhood a continuous theme of
his 2008 presidential campaign that culminated in his election as the
first black President of the United States.
It is very much to his credit that Obama has not abandoned his
commitment to fatherhood as President -- both in his own life and in
setting policy for the nation.
Three years ago, Barack Obama spoke before a packed congregation at
Chicago’s Apostolic Church of God, one of the largest black churches in
the city. Then a candidate for president, he issued a clarion call
about the need for black men to meet their responsibilities as husbands
and fathers.
“We need fathers to realize that responsibility does not end at
conception,” he declared. “Too many fathers are M.I.A., too many
fathers are AWOL, missing from too many lives and too many homes. They
have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men.
And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it.”
Obama has spoken poignantly about the effect the absence of his own
father had on him when he was a child. “I resolved many years ago that
it was my obligation to break the cycle -- that if I could be anything
in life, I would be a good father to my girls” he said with his wife
Michele and their daughters Malia and Sasha in the audience.
“They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead
of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it.”
For his painfully true comments, Obama drew criticism from some leaders
in the black community for -- as Jesse Jackson put it -- “talking down
to black people.”
In 2009, President Obama created the Task Force for Responsible
Fatherhood and Healthy Families. Based on their report, the president
has pledged to enact policies that would promote and foster responsible
fatherhood.
He has supported the “Strong Fathers, Strong Families” campaign, which
encourages businesses to offer free and discounted rates for dads and
their children to spend quality time at museums, sporting events and
other attractions.
Obama’s Department of Health and Human Services has continued a program
from the Bush administration which provides grants to faith and
community based organizations to teach classes on parenting, job
development and financial management.
Under Obama, the Department of Justice has invested in a pilot program
in Washington D.C. -- the “Father Re-Entry Program” -- which helps
fathers who have been released from jail find jobs so they can help
support their children. Attorney General Eric Holder has said that the
program could be applied throughout the nation.
On this Father’s Day, we can celebrate the president’s example and his
wise words about fatherhood. America’s churches, schools and civic
organizations all need to join in meaningful action to increase the
number of good fathers. The problem will only get worse if it is not
addressed and the time to address it is now.
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