‘No greater task faces this country or this administration,” he said. “No other challenge is more deserving of our every effort and energy.” Addressing a botched CIA raid into Cuba, Pres. John F. Kennedy turned a complete failure — one that symbolized an ineffective, declining America — into a bold aspiration, declaring his belief in America’s mandate to protect freedom at home and abroad.
President Obama must be tired of being told he could learn a thing or two from his predecessors, but he wears on as if he hasn’t learned a thing. Monday’s speech, in which he addressed the downgrade, had the ring of denial about it. America’s credit, dropping from AAA to AA+, was diminished. The moment called for frankness about what could — and should — be done.
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Instead, we got a dodge. The president scheduled a press conference, and then he showed up late for it. (It is a maddening tendency of politicians, especially this one, to ask for our full attention while they divide theirs.) And when he finally had finished smoothing over his remarks, what he wound up saying didn’t sound smoothed over at all. America will always have a AAA rating, he said, regardless of what Standard & Poor’s thinks.
Which is novel. Obama’s party up until this point warned of the imminent catastrophe of a downgrade. (Republicans for the most part agreed, but were beholden to those who claimed otherwise.) Now we’re downgraded, and it suddenly doesn’t matter anymore. America has the Obama AAA rating, and that should be plenty for us, right?
Except it isn’t. S&P’s analysts arrived at their conclusion, and now markets will take it into account, no matter what the president says. Prices don’t ebb and flow according to the Obama rating agency, just as the oceans don’t. False optimism made Don Quixote a great novel — with a tragic hero.
If this year’s State of the Union defined our “Sputnik moment” — a call for Americans to read the writing on the wall — then this is Obama’s Bay of Pigs. A total disaster on the very issue defining his campaign — the economy, the subject that candidate John McCain, with his “erratic behavior,” couldn’t be trusted to mend.
The buck stops with Obama. No one else could sign into law the stimulus spending, the expanded bailouts, the tax hikes, the tax cuts, and the expensive quasi-nationalization of the health-care industry (the crowning achievement that he won’t even discuss these days). Pres. George W. Bush, for all his faults, never shied away from taking responsibility for his failures — when asked by Fox News about his own hand in the bailouts, Bush replied that he had to abandon his free-market principles to save the economy. He didn’t flinch.
Obama, on the other hand, looked like a man who woke up shuddering.
Au contraire, Dr Pangloss does not 'shudder'. He is in the 'Bay' shall I dare to suggest the 'pen', with the other three pigs, Reid, Shumer and Durbin. yet to see pigs fly.
J.P. Freire: Obama could act like a JFK by going back to Congress to reduce spending more than in the debt-ceiling agreement, but he won't. It conflicts with his intention to continue spending like a drunken sailor. As for his passivity, is anyone surprised? He is acting just like he did in the Illinois legislature: He's voting, present, and he's acting just like he does in world politics: "Leading from behind," i.e., following.
Finally, it should be observed that but for the Tea Party, we might now have a BBB rating. See Tom Blumer on PJM at:http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/dumping-on-the-tea-party/
I estimate Obama has ten months left to turn around three years worth of failure.
With sixty percent of the stimulus going overseas to nations whose ideological track is out of step with Americas intended structure; this president will have to shift his loyalties away from the unrealistic ideals of progressives and rededicate himself to these truths we hold to be self evident.
I do not believe Obama is man enough to admit to himself that he was wrong.
After the Bay of Pigs, JFK was desperate to play tough guy somewhere, anywhere. A bit like Obama in Afghanistan.
So he grabbed at Viet Nam. Infantry war in the jungles of Asia. McArthur, and Ike had warned him against it. Our ally Diem was himself lukewarm, so JFK got him bumped off.
Here is my simple question for you Conservatives, When 'Your' guy gets to be President in say 2020, and He/She doesn't walk on water or turn the US Economy into a MONSTER, what than? Will You say:
A. He/She wasn't a REAL Conservative
B. It takes a long time to clean up Democratic Marxist damage?
C. There isn't a 'Super' Majority in BOTH Houses so the great President is stymied?
Or some NEW novel excuse?
Conservatives generally don't expect their candidates to walk on water, nor to command the waves to cease beating at the ocean shore.
Presidents don't "turn the economy into a monster." If they are wise they keep taxes low, the regulatory environment predictable and the investment climate hospitable. Private individuals motivated by self-interest do the rest.
And if he or she does turn it around will you "progressives/statists/communists" claim:
a) it was only a matter of time before it turned itself around
b) Progressivism is not a failed policy. We just didn't elect the right person.
It really doesn't matter who wins the Presidency or who controls congress. The public has repeatedly made the same statement. The want the powers to be to increase taxes on the rich, hands off of entitlements and cut domestic spending.
Those who know something about the truth also know the following. Even if you increase taxes on the rich to the Clinton era level it will only generate about $50 to 70 billion resulting in about a 5% reduction in the deficit. Entitlements represent about 55% of the budget. Service on the debt represents about 6%. Defense represents about 20%. How is your math? Eliminating entitlements makes it virtually IMPOSSIBLE to significantly reduce the deficit/debt. Restricting cuts to 'domestic spending' really means 'gut the military'. Everyone follow me so far?
The ONLY tax increases that will generate enough revenue to reduce the deficit/debt will include ALL groups of taxpayers including the middle class. Still with me?
So the American people's fix for our debt/deficit problem is to gut the military and tax the living daylights out of everyone. Since our economy is 70% consumer based that should just about do the trick. Oh, yes, forget housing rebounding.
A real leader would help shape opinion by pointing out to the American people that they can't have their cake on the backs of the "rich" because there simply isn't enough money in the hands of the demographically small numbers of "rich".
A real leader would put forth a plan to deal with the debt issue based on his core governance principals.
What we have now is "the buck stops everywhere else" president. I'm waiting for him to say that his dog "Bo" ate his deficit plan.
Here's the problem. Due to decades of big government liberalism and big government conservatism, and especially the last 4 years, the US government is pledged to paying out to people substantially more wealth than is being produced. The politicians fear to reduce the payouts and the economy won't increase production because it is being hollowed out by politics. How will this play out? I think economist Gary North was right in saying, "The people want government goodies, but what they'll get is depreciated money."
The only reason I ask is because it seems like you Conservatives think there NEVER was a Republican President since Reagan. I mean Bill Clinton left the White House with a surplus, eight years later YOUR guy, left the White House with the US economy facing a depression, and Financial Markets nearly destroyed.This is the Economy President Obama 'Inherited' a short 2 1/2 years later. Yet every problem is HIS fault?
oneoff -- Yes, Bush spent too much, because we went to war, and because he ratcheted up the spending (Medicare Drug Plan, No Child Left Behind, etc.) In other words, Bush spent too much because he wasn't conservative enough.
Social Security reform would have been a lot less painful when Bush dared to propose it. Your people demagogued it to death. Bush tried to rein in Fannie and Freddie ... Barney Frank and the gang made sure it went nowhere. The spending spree accelerated dramatically in 07-08 when the Dems had the House.
The trainwreck of the housing markets had a number of causes. We need to own the fact that the brokers and bankers were in on the party (although more of them vote Dem than Republican these days). But you guys need to own Fannie, Freddie, the Community Reinvestment Act, and Acorn -- all of which destroyed the strict underwriting standards that kept the market honest.
If you can't grasp that, you can't grasp why the right answer to this mess is shrinking the government, because it has the opposite of the Midas touch. Nobody is smart enough to play God in the modern world, but you progressives keep insisting that with enough practice you'll eventually get it right.
Actually, it's hard to see the effect that the war(s) had on federal spending as a percent of GDP. During the Bush years, spending as percent of GDP was flat. Indeed, it is hard to see a difference between Bush's spending and Clinton's spending as a percent of GDP. The reason for the deficit (such as it was) was that revenues (which were also relatively flat as a percent of GDP) were several percent below expenditures. Of course, it can be argued that absent the war, expenditures would have been lower, and there would have been no deficit.
Where one sees expenditures as a percent of GDP take off is at the beginning 2001Q1 when that percent increase by about 300 basis point and revenues fall about a 100 basis points. That's when the deficits get really big; the Bush deficits by comparison are puny. Oh BTW - One thing proven by this experiment is that the Keynesian hypothesis must be rejected. (The hypotheis is that government spending can take the economy out of recession.)
Also, I should observe that Clinton was able to run a small surplus because the Republican Congress kept him in check. We see what happens when there is a Democrat in the White House and a Democrat Congress. The Federal government spends like a drunken sailor.
Clinton and his team cooked the books...took debt out off the budget, but worst of all...installed Raines, Johnson and Gorelick who aided and abetted by Dodd and Frank turned loose the bankrupt monsters now known as Freddie and Fannie.
Are you feeble-minded? The present leader, is anything but. This guy knows 1 thing...socialism. And he has 32 Czars that are helping him achieve the dreams of his father. I hope the American voters are now seeing him as the do nothing,not caring about this country president as he really is. Most of us are sick of his crybaby attitude, finger-pointing responses. Yes, he inherited some debt and what did he do? multiply it by trillions. How you can even think of defending his actions is way beyond the majority of readers here. Just type one word in your comments....present.
