I started the following piece prior to the Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to President Obama. As to whether or not he was deserving of the award, I have my opinions. But, as an American who respects the office of the President, I am glad our guy won it rather than some reincarnate of Yasser Arafat. The looney partisans will beat this to death but I think we should just move on to more substantive matters.
With that, please read my latest thoughts:
"What the Hell's going on out there?" For those of you who are sports fans over the age of 30 the words will immediately conjure up a quite famous video of Vince Lombardi. For those of you who are not fans the video is one of the Green Bay Packers' great but hot-tempered football coach standing on the sidelines during the heat of a game incredulously admonishing his team for performing poorly on the field of play. You see, what the team was doing on the field was far from what Coach Lombardi was expecting. He was being unpleasantly surprised and he was expressing his agitation as only he could. Oh, that scowl!
What made me think of the video is my wondering what it will take for Coach Lombardi's emotionally charged question to angrily cross the lips of the majority of American voters. "What the Hell's going on out there?" Indeed.
Our ship of state is not sailing on smooth waters and one would think that the ship's crew should be having more than fleeting thoughts of questioning the captain's aptitude for leadership and navigation. The fact is that the dissent of which I am reading and hearing is coming from those on the extreme political Right. No surprise there. But what is most disturbing is the unsettling sound of silence from the majority of the crew, and if you will allow me to leave the metaphor, the populace that is either hopelessly, blindly devoted to the President or those who are quite simply remarkably ignorant about what it is that is going on in the world around them.
Sure, I'm aware of the polls that describe the approximately thirty percent drop in the President's popularity as well as in a variety of his policies from Afghanistan, to Cap and Trade, to Stimulus, to Universal Health care, etc. As we are all aware, the media has their daily, weekly and monthly polls but when you ask typical voters if they are angry about a specific issue, generally they'll react and give the pollster what they want to hear. The questions are worded in a way that will elicit a particular response from the ignorant, which is the majority. As for the adoring Obama supporters (can you say Sean Penn?), they will regurgitate the daily or weekly Democrat talk points or, in the case of those with the ability to actually think, give as positive an answer as possible because they are probably too embarrassed to admit their disappointment in the President's thus far surprising (to them) performance. But, in a private moment, most of you who voted for President Obama have got to admit you are not getting what you expected. (You are excused for being seduced by Obama because I admit that during last year's campaign his charisma was practically irresistible especially when he blew us all away with his speech on 'race'.)
But lets return to the reality that the overwhelming majority of poll respondents haven't read a newspaper or watched a newscast in forever. If you want to question my remark fine, but first look at newspaper circulation and TV news ratings. They are a fraction of what they were--pick a time frame--10, 15, 20 years ago. My thirty-four year career was in management in the media/advertising/TV station/TV programming industry so I have some expertise in this area and have witnessed the continual demise of the news industry audience.
So, you might ask, what's the point of all this? Well, I thought now might be a good time to unveil a list I have been compiling since the then Senator Obama was campaigning for the Democrat nomination for President. I was going to wait until January 2010 to spill the beans, but in the past few days, as unbelievable as it might seem, the overwhelmingly Liberal media has begun to take the President's nine month record to task, culminating in Saturday Night, Live's remarkably funny but spot-on spoof of the obvious, that the Prez has accomplished practically nothing of value! So, I couldn't contain myself any longer at the risk of waiting too long and rendering my blog untimely.
"What the Hell's going on out there?" Well, there will never be another Coach Lombardi; but in your honor Coach, here's an objective explanation of what's been going on .
1-Close Gitmo- During his campaign Obama promised to close the prison camp and give the terrorist prisoners due process. His first Executive order was to close Gitmo by January 2010. As of this writing, Obama's promise to close the camp will not be kept because the difficulty in prosecuting cases in civil courts was underestimated by the President. He has as much as admitted that the legal system operates more slowly than he anticipated. Of course the political opposition to his policy, for the most part, believes that terrorists should be tried in a military court. Disputes over this issue were an additional obstacle that slowed down the process. But the most uncomfortable embarrassment to the President was his inability to find prisons in the US or in foreign countries to house terrorist prisoners. It became more than evident when the possibility of retribution by terrorist sympathizers frightened citizens of US cities and foreign countries who passionately demonstrated against accepting terrorists in their nearby prisons. An just to rub some lemon on the wound, Obama obtusely, and perhaps arrogantly, refuses to refer to the inmates as terrorists. He prefers political prisoners. What is up with that? Actually, he is cornered by the Liberal rule book. In this case the rule is that the ACLU has determined that these terrorist monsters, no matter how heinous their crimes, apparently have more rights than those than those they have victimized. Case closed, not Gitmo. Promise broken.
2-No Earmarks-During the campaigning for the nomination and even after his election, as late as Jan 9, 2009, the President promised he wouldn't sign a bill if it contained earmarks, "We are going to ban the process by which individual members insert pet projects without review." Yes, those are the president's words. Well, political reality hit the President. On Feb 17, 2009 Obama SIGNED an earmark laden Stimulus Bill into law that included an estimated 9,000 EARMARKS! Do the math, there are only 535 members in the Congress! Promise broken doesn't come close to describing the president's performance on this campaign promise.
3-Troops home from Iraq by March 2009-As of this writing there are still 140,000 soldiers in Iraq. Once again, President Obama made a promise he couldn't keep. The outlook for a specific date for the troops return is undetermined. The anti-war faction that overwhelmingly supported the President's election are apoplectic! And I would be remiss not to mention the currently ineffective strategy in Afghanistan, which is about to be modified to include (sorry) a Bush-like "surge" of an additional 40,000 troops. Once again, reality has hit the Obama White House. Bottom line, Promise broken.
4-Gay Marriage-On the campaign trail the President indicated he would toe the Liberal line and support same sex marriages. However, after securing the Democrat nomination for President, he walked a more centrist line and said that his belief is that a marriage is between a man and a woman, so as not to offend conservative Democrat and Independent voters in the general election. In a recent vote in Maine, a measure previously passed by the electorate, was repealed! Many in the gay community felt betrayed by the President and were blaming him for his lack of support. And to further compound the betrayal, the gay community is still impatiently waiting for the President to keep another campaign promise to address the issue of gays in the military/"don't ask, don't tell." Promise broken.
5-No increased taxes on incomes under $250,000-Yet on April 1, 2009, the largest increase ever in tobacco taxes took effect despite Obama's promise not to raise taxes of any kind on families earning under $250,000 or individuals under $200,000. This is one tax that disproportionately affects the poor, who are more likely to smoke than the rich. Only 13% of smokers earn over $90,000.
"I can make a firm pledge," Obama said in Dover, N.H., on Sept. 12, 2008. "Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes."
He repeatedly vowed "you will not see any of your taxes increase one single dime."And does anyone who is conscious really believe that a health care bill costing a trillion $ annually will be "revenue neutral" and will not require an additional tax on incomes under $250,000?
6-Transparent Administration-On Nov. 12, 2008 Barack Obama promised his would be the most transparent White House in history disclosing donations, shunning lobbyists, and broadcasting important meetings on C-SPAN. The C-SPAN idea was also for the purpose of letting the citizens see who in the Congress was for or against bills being reviewed. Thus far, this transparency promise has been a joke. Currently, the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi plans to bring to a vote a 1900 page healthcare bill but will not provide the Republican members of the House a copy of the bill to read in advance of the vote! Are you kidding me? And even worse, President Obama has exhibited zero spine regarding this travesty of his proposed policy.
The President-elect also promised that bills would be on-line for five days so that there would be time for members of the Congress and citizens at large to read the bills before the President signed them into law. Can you say "stimulus package?" Not only was the bill not on-line, but the $787 billion bill, the most expensive in American history was passed and signed by the Prez--and practically the entire Congress didn't get a chance to read it !! That's not transparent, that's vacuous ! Can I get a mid-blog "What the Hell's going on out there? Another Broken promise.
7-Bi-partisan bills -The President promised to unite the divided Congress in a way that would produce bills written cooperatively. Nine months later and it hasn't happened, in fact the divide between the parties has worsened to a level possibly never seen in recent political history. As of this writing, it is a fact that the Republican minority leaders of the House and Senate have never been invited to the White House to discuss the HealthCare bill! It's difficult to imagine that a leader could be as divisive as Bush, but in this instance Obama might have achieved that pathetic distinction. Broken promise.
8&9-Balance the Federal Budget/Reduce the Deficit-Another campaign promise, in fact two promises that never had a chance of succeeding. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the non-partisan group that puts an estimated price tag on any bill that is in review prior to being taken to a vote, has estimated the 2009 debt at $1.8 trillion, four times the previous high water mark! The national debt stood at $10.6 trillion the day Obama took office. It was projected to reach $12.7 trillion by the end of the fiscal year on Sept 30, 2009, only nine months into Obama's first year in office. Broken Promises.
And this from the AP(3-20-09)President Barack Obama's budget would generate deficits averaging almost $1 trillion a year over the next decade, according to the latest congressional estimates, significantly worse than predicted by the White House in February 2009. The Congressional Budget Office figures predict Obama's budget will produce $9.3 trillion worth of red ink over 2010-2019. That's $2.3 trillion worse than the White House predicted in its budget.
These unacceptable levels of performance lead me to the conclusion that Hillary and Biden correctly stated in the Democrat primary debates that Barack Obama did not have the experience to be president. They said, "The Presidency is no place for on-the-job-training." Apparently in the President's case, O J T is exactly what he is experiencing. His administration, as stated above, has been a mess with respect to fiscal policy.
First we were told that the Administration "misjudged" the economy. If that was the case I'd suggest the President didn't do his homework and was to coin a phrase, lip-shooting. Perhaps he needs to clean his fiscal house and get a new team of economic advisors because Geithner, Summers, Orszag and Romer failed him. Then the Prez told us that unemployment would top out at 8%. It's now at 9.8% and is expected to soon go above 10%. (note: on 11/6/02 it rose to a 26 year high of 10.2%) Then we were told the "stimulus" bill would create millions of new jobs. Since the President signed the bill over two and one-half million jobs have been lost. And the whining response from the President and his administration, 'We were handed or walked into severe problems from the previous administration.' No kidding, Mr President et al. Why do you think you won the election?
But is it really possible the President and his team didn't know that there were problems? I doubt it. It seems obvious that they were selling the American people a bill of goods as part of the Presidential campaign. Well, Barack, you won so act like the President, stop making excuses and get something positive accomplished. And let me remind you that during the primary and Presidential campaigns it was your mouth, not Bush's, that wrote the "checks" that are now bouncing. The bad news is that the voters are paying the price big time for your poor judgments. The President's fiscal mismanagement definitely deserves another "What the Hell's going on out there?
There are also some serious Obama "best of" gaffs.
"Highly objectionable" was Obama's reaction to the Locherbie Bomber being released by Scotland. Ostensibly he was being given a compassionate release because the murderer who bombed a plane from the sky killing 270 people including 190 Americans has terminal cancer. And the President's reaction was "Highly Objectionable." I found the Presidents reaction "Highly disgraceful!" What the hell's wrong with our President? How could he allow an ally to grant a release to one who perpetrated one of the most heinous acts of terrorism in history against the US? How insensitive can a man be?
"We won't go back to prosecute we will look forward." I guess the President forgot to mention his promise to Att. Gen. Holder who took it upon himself to begin an investigation of Bush's CIA.
"I would got to Copenhagen myself if I weren't so committed to Health Care." I guess Obama couldn't remember what he said because next thing you know the Prez is on his way to Denmark to unsuccessfully pitch for the Olympic Games, damn the Health Care full speed ahead!
This is just a smattering of the list I have been keeping but you get the point. The president has continually been shooting himself in the foot and it's only November 7th! It has been painful to witness. And I haven't even gotten into the foreign policy embarrassments e.g. the redeployment of the proposed missile defense system in Eastern Europe on the seventy year anniversary of the Russian invasion of our ally Poland, or the anger directed at Obama by President Szarcozy for what the French leader believed was President Obama's mishandling of the Iranian nuclear threats, or Obama on separate occasions throwing Israel under the bus to gain the favor of her hostile Palestinian, Arab and Persian neighbors, occasions that turned out to be more embarrassment for the President and the US.
Coach Lombardi is probably rolling over in his grave. "What the hell is going on out there?" Coach, the majority of Americans would like to have the answer to your prescient question.
Albiwan.. 11/7/2009
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