Obama shouldn’t bash Bush; he should fire Rahm Emanuel
So far Barack Obama has shown himself to be as clueless as President as he was brilliant running for office. He seemed to hit all the notes on the campaign trail, but since his inauguration he hasn’t been able to hit one. He races around like the proverbial chicken with his head cut off, trying to solve the worlds problems without taking even five minutes to figure out how to do it. He doesn’t even get the obvious – everyone wants him to slow down and think things through. You don’t have to solve health care, the economy and global warming (assuming that’s even a problem) in a week, let alone the Palestinian-Israeli crisis. If you come close to solving even one of them in an administration, you’ve done well. So far the most representative image of this administration is thousand-page legislation that no one has had the time – or possibly the inclination – to read, including, admittedly, the President himself.
One of Obama’s worst mistakes was putting the White House in the hands of Rahm Emanuel, the big mouth who publicly opined “Never waste a good crisis” practically the moment he got in office. Talk about clueless. If that’s what you really think – and you shouldn’t – at least keep your mouth shut. It’s hard to believe he’s the brother of an agent. In any case, Obama seems to be returning to his security blanket – Bush bashing. Meanwhile, Hillary is keeping her eye on the prize. No surprise there, considering what’s going on. My question: will we see a public break between Hillary and Obama? Not likely, but they don’t seem to be working from the same playbook on foreign policy.
Obama already thinks he knows what has to be done because he is a Marxist. He wants to put into place the Red Fascist Program before his time runs out.
He might do it. Obama has been known to throw his associates under a bus. You have to wonder at Obama’s gall regarding the deficit that he ‘inherited.’ Does he think no one knows that he voted for the bank bailout?
Tactless, rudderless, and pathetic. This administration and its supporters will use the Blame Bush crutch until Obama’s last days in office.
In June, 2004, when the Clinton portraits were unveiled at a White House ceremony, President Bush was gracious and diplomatic – even complimentray – in honoring his predecessor. This was the decent thing to do. Say what you will about W. (and the subsequent trolls on this thread will be happy to), he understood and respected protocol. I do not anticipate the same treatment from President Obama. He wouldn’t even be gracious if the portraits were of the Clintons again — let alone his favorite cowboy boogeyman.
One of the few things that Bush and Clinton had in common was that they were both warm and engaging on a personal level — able to express genuine interest in the lives and concerns of ordinary people. President Obama is the coldest fish we’ve had in the White House in quite some time (probably ever). As his numbers continue to erode, Rahm and co. would do well to dig down and find some basic humanity in their robotic, clinical boss. They could start by telling him to smile on occasion.
“My question: will we see a public break between Hillary and Obama?”
Yup, we will most likely see a public break between Hillary and Obama. He is increasingly becoming a marginalized individual. She is risking very little. Joe Biden might become president before the end of the year. Obama is simply out of his league. Well meaning white people desperately wanted to prove that they were not racists. They gave Obama every break in the book to the point of utter absurdity. A few days ago, I finally saw his speech to the 2004 Democratic Party national convention. Obama merely uttered some fairly ho-hum, feel good phrases. Nothing more than that. And yet, a large number of gullible people compared that speech to those of Lincoln and Reagan.
This may be the number one point that must not be ignored: Obama doesn’t want to do the everyday stuff associated with the president. He is bored out of his mind. That’s why he will probably resign. Obama may be the the only president in our country’s entire history who lacks serious executive experience. This is especially true of the last one hundred years.
David you may be right in all you predict, however, as Steve has stated, Obama will throw all those he finds as distructive to his ideas under the bus or deep in the ocean, but never resign his power or his wife’s goals while in power. We are
where we are because of three little words with big meaning, “If,Greed,Guilt”, and Obama has put all three to use for his climb to power and it worked for him. If
you combine what Pres. Bush did over 8 years compared to our picture of Pres.
Obama in the past 7 months, the present picture of what time he is being given
to run this country under the bus, no matter who you are, is staring all of us directly in the pupil of our eyes and with a blink our Freedom will be out of sight.
On Sunday, Hillary stated restated her allegence to Pres. Obama, but with a twinkle in her eye, so David, you hit a valid possibility. Unfortunately we have many months ahead to hope for a political correction.
The purges . . . um, resignations will begin when Mr. Obama needs someone else to blame for his failures. He will then surround himself with sycophants, I mean loyalists, who won’t be able to tell him the truth for fear of losing his favor. The Obama administration spirals out of control and ends in a flaming wreck.
The obstacles Obama creates for himself with so much abandon will only confirm his convictions that the world is as mean as his wife says it is, and will drive him to the conclusion that he was the target of all this hate. This is how paranoid individuals come to feel once the disease reaches its advanced stage, years after the lesser known original condition: A deep conviction of one’s superiority and invincibility, sort of like like the mind of a teenager in what looks like the body of a grown man on the outside.
Such individuals can become very charming, because that’s the only way to advance in spite of their miscalibrated perspective. We just stupidly elected an invalid, a particularly dangerous one. His potential domestic contenders (Hillary, etc…) will refrain from open confrontation because they understand the folly of harassing a wounded tiger.
For his foreign contenders, it’s different. His domestic vulnerability is their strategic opportunity. Our existencial challenge will then be to throw our support behind the man who abused our good will. Tough going!
Roger as ususal substitutes name calling for analysis. The problem is that every time you come here you get the same warmed over tripe. You would think he would at least come up with some new insutls. But that might take firing up his limited brain.
Maybe not clueless,simply well scripted. Like coach Bill Walsh,Alinsky scripts his opening plays, and BHussyO follows the script….religiously!
“Roger as ususal substitutes name calling for analysis. The problem is that every time you come here you get the same warmed over tripe.”
Feel free to enlighten everyone with your own analysis then, please. Perhasps in some depth, maybe a full paragraph or two. Seriously.
By the way, do you realize how ridiculous you sound complaining about “name calling” only to engage in it a few beats later? Project much?
Obama can’t fire Rahm because the same non-threatening personality that allowed him to beat Hillary in the primaries and McCain in the general election makes him incapable of playing hardball with his party’s special interest groups and factions. As long as the other Democrats are behind him, he has no problem going after Republicans, because they’ve got his back; but when it comes to saying ‘no’ to some of his own side, he doesn’t want the responsibility, because he wants everyone on his side to like him.
Dump Emanuel, and Obama would be the one who would have to play ‘bad cop’ to everyone from the leftist who want the U.S. military to all but disband, to the gay rights advocates who want gay marriage right now, to the Blue Dogs who don’t want to risk their own seats by going too far left on health care. Barack wants to be the show horse at the front of his party who gets all the credit and all the media adulation, but he doesn’t want to be the one who actually does the hard work and has to bash heads to get things to work. He’s not even willing to do that directly to the Blue Dogs (instead having the DNC run ads against them in their own districts on the health care battle), so there’s no way he can get rid of Rahm, unless he’s got another enforcer waiting in the background (and Sid Blumethal’s too loyal to Hillary to trust in that job).
Shadow, the quality of left-wing trolls on right-wing blogs has been going downhill steadily since the inauguration. Is it because Axelrod is cutting the stipends now that BO is safely in power, or is it getting harder to recruit as BO’s unfitness for the office becomes more apparent by the day?
3. Lightnin’ Hopkins writes:
“Tactless, rudderless, and pathetic..One of the few things that Bush and Clinton had in common was that they were both warm and engaging on a personal level — able to express genuine interest in the lives and concerns of ordinary people. President Obama is the coldest fish we’ve had in the White House..(probably ever).”
Lightnin’, a very thoughtful analysis — notably bereft of name-calling. (*chortle*)
I agree whole-heartedly and was thinking the other day how curious it is that I am coming, more and more, to have nostalgic thoughts of the “good old days” when Clinton was president..
..and I thoroughly despised that man (at the time).
Apparently none of the previous commenters are from Chicago (Roger I know you’re not). Obama won’t get rid of Emanuel, he’s afraid of him. We all should be.
LH just wanted to give him a tste of his own medicine
So you represent the new level of quality in government health care? What is your reimbursement rate for prescribing medicine?
One huge difference is that President Bush was very single-minded with with policy pursuits. Whether is was “war on terror”, Medicare Part D, tax cuts, he always stayed on message. He was very disciplined like that. By contrast, Obama flails about like a clueless amateur. He truly doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing.
I agree with 1. Kan. The reason what he’s doing doesn’t appear to make sense, is because his goals are no where near what we think they are.
This isn’t like watching the NFL and trying to figure out the strategy between offense and defense. He’s not even playing the same game.
He and his crowd have much grander ambitions in mind. So grand that everything going wrong now, is insignificant in comparison. Minor issues compared to the bigger picture.
And they aim to use the law to make the rest of us go along whether we agree or not.
EdSki – yes I agree. ObamaNation looks at the economic crisis as a wonderful opportunity to rush in to the rescue. A new “New Deal” where Obama completes the job FDR started. Their goal is nothing less then 50% control of GDP at the very least. Just like in Europe.
Obama’s made it pretty clear that he cares much more about getting a big energy bill and a big healtcare bill DONE than about the actual content of these bills. I think there are two things going on here:
1)the phenomenon that’s been called “deal heat” in business…where an executive ties his star to a particular acquisition or very large customer deal..and, even after it becomes pretty clear that the acqn or sale is much less desirable than it looked at first glance, pushes harder and harder to get it done, for reasons of personal glory.
2)much more sinister, his desire to restructure American society according to the principles he has unreflectingly learned.
You want to know when Hillary Clinton is seriously considering another run for political office? Just watch what she says about Israel–settlements, peace with the Palestinians, an attack upon Iran.
When she needs the Jewish vote in New York again, she’ll start talking differently than her recent comments.
#13, I probably wasn’t as anti-Clinton as you, but I’m not so sure I’d go as far as “warm and engaging”. What Clinton had going for him was more prosaic – he simply came from a very middle American background so when he got into political trouble (which was often :^)) he had an instinct for what resonates with the average American.
You don’t have to be a “birther” to recognize that Obama’s background and upbringing was completely alien to that of most Americans and he has no such understanding of them, hence the “bitterly clinging” and other statements that reveal the gulf between him and them. I don’t want to beat “Gatesgate” into the ground, but the “let’s have a beer” photo op is just laughable – forced, phony, and insincere. He has no clue.
I think Obama is going to bounce back. The mainstream media will never abandon him. No doubt they are already working behind the scenes, putting together special documentaries that will detail the urgent need for Obama Care and Cap and Trade legislation.
When kids return to universities in September their professors will begin massaging their medullas into supporting the Messiah’s initiatives.
Obama is far from toast. If the election was held today he’d still trounce any Republican candidate (again-thanks to the MSM).
I long since got tired of Obama’s constant lament that he “inherited” the economy. He inherited nothing – he campaigned ruthlessly for the job. An inheritance is an entitlement – which does show what Obama thinks of the White House.
Obama’s not going anywhere. He’s too much of a power freak. I mean, how many autobiographies can one write?
Cap-n-tax is dead. Nobody who voted for that is going to go home in Aug and speak about that vote. Even if it’s brought up in 2010 elections it will be too old and folks will say “yeah, I voted for it in committee but the actual bill would have been far different and I would have voted against it.” No harm, no foul.
He will sign a HC bill, even if it means just giving everyone free aspirin and hail it “revolutionary.” By agreeing to a vote in Sep, assuming slow news in Aug and no international incidents, every talk show will have every congressman talking about it. Of course, since no one knows what’s in it and these folks won’t be able to talk about it in wide platitudes and sound as good as Obama when he’s blowing smoke, more folks will be come more skeptical. You can only get people to support an “idea” for only so long before you have to put the rubber to the road. Generally, the biggest fear people have is going to the hospital. When your own congressman can’t tell you what’s going to happen even though he is going to vote to change whatever “it” is, that’s not going to sit well with the electorate.
Another important thing is that the more he pushes this people will tune him out. Every townhall meeting looks like a campaign event, and with special elections for governor in two states and he will appear as doing nothing but campaigning when he shows up there. Forget the “are you better off than you were a year ago” arguement. It should be “do you feel better than you were a year ago regarding (fill in the blank).” That will be a resounding NO. Combine this with his press conference TV ratings. His last one about HC, supposedly the most pressing need of the country and his ability to sell/explain it fell flat. That tells you right there that people are either ambivalent about it or really don’t care what he has to say about it. I suspect it is a little of both.
Additionally, at some point this fall MSM will do shows marking the “one year anniversay” of his historic election and the gains the dems made. You can hear Chris Matthews now recalling election night when the tingle up his leg got so strong it caused his leg to swell to the point he couldn’t bend it. I think even some of the MSM will play his campaign speeches about what he promised (Gitmo, wire survelliance, etc.) which will only re-enforce that he hasn’t accomplished those things let alone other things. I think that’s the breaking point for Obama because his term will be 25% over and folks will say to themselves he’s had a year to “fix” it and all he will have to show for it is the stimulus and no job creation.
I think at that point people will start to get tired of hearing “it’s Bush’s fault” because anyone who has taken on a job typically knows you can only use that excuse for so long. Overexposing himself in the last 7 months along with the one year anniversay will make people thing he’s been around even longer with nothing to show after one year.(Yes, it less than a year but with “anniversay” week, people will ignore the timeline).
Rahmbo’s comment about a crises will/should be played over and over because it is the stupidest thing anyone could have ever said. With little to show, increasing unemployment and certainly numbers to be released in Aug from the WH mid-year budget review that will be very uncomplimentary, folks will look around and say WTF has he done for me and realize the “crises” actions appear to be helping just his friends.
You don’t hear anything about him golfing every week for the past 6-8 weeks (and I assume continuing while congress is at recess) but you know Bush would have been vilified as being out of touch had he done the same thing. A perfect campaign commercial would be a calendar followed by a voice over saying I tried to reach the president but his secretary/calendar said he was golfing while in the background the calendar continues to flip week by week noting the golfing days and with whom. And the most jarring part about this will be the calendar not flipping from week to week but the month to month flip with the “source” at the bottom listed as the offical presidential calendar.
If your best selling point is “yes it’s increasing (unemployment, negative growth, deficit, etc), but it’s increasing at a decreasing rate” only serves to amplify to most folks that things are not improving.
At the end of the day, he over promised and people jumped aboard that bandwagon because everyone wants to support a winner. As the trend continues down nobody wants to be associated with a loser. At some point it will come down to him making a decision to either support Nancy/Harry or blue dogs. He should be politically smart enough to go with the blue dogs (because his liberal base isn’t going to leave him) but with everything he promised it will demonstrate that 1. he lied; 2. said anything, any time, to anyone to get elected; and 3. how far apart his rhetoric vs. reality really is. Add into the fact the majorities he has and people will ask themselves at that one year anniversay “yeah, why didn’t this get done?” . . . as the calendar slowy turns in the commercial.
Obama does not want to own anything. In fact, he will blame everyone who voted for him.
Everyone talks about what Obama inherited, but he wanted this job..no one made him take it. It is not some great sacrifice he is making here.
Bush had to deal with a lot in his tenure. He had wars, attacks, natural disasters, economic problems…all that and yet he never blamed others.
He could have blamed Clinton for not dealing with Saddam and AlQaida. He could have blamed Clinton for promoting an easy loan policy that would eventually wreak havoc with the economy.
All presidents inherit problems. But Obama is not man enough to assume responsibility and Rahm is just a bully and a thug. This is going to be a long 4 years.
Good news, Terrye, is that we’re down to less than three and a half.
Yay.
I agree with two statements above: Obama is bored out of his mind, and he’s too egotistical to resign. Where will this leave us?
~Shadow #8,#15
Yes, indeed, as we all stand in awe of your opinion.
…. Obama is not man enough to assume responsibility and Rahm is just a bully and a thug.
Gotta love it!
“Liberals” have elected a cultural subversive who is going to introduce statist socialism in the States. And these “liberals” haven’t a clue as to what they have done! When they finally realize what they have done, the only excuse they will have will be that a Republican would have done the same thing – and they would be right on the money on that point! The only route that America can take without castrating its ruling elites there is statist socialism.
Rahm Emanuel is not the problem at all. He is a mere symptom of the problem. Obama is not the problem either. He is just a fool who wants to captain a country that is sinking like the Titanic. Your ruling elites are the problem, and they have led you to hit an iceberg with no life-boats.
Mazel tov!
Perhaps the President has shown us that the problems, the evils of our society, are not quite as raced based as we once thought.
Elite white males do not corner the market on crony-ism and corruption. Education and position does not override character and common courtesy(Gates). A top notch education does not automatically assure judgement. Our problems are less racial, more issue based. Kinda’ negates the ‘wise Latina’ thinking, too.
And the public may be a bit slow on the take-up, but we do catch up.