Since I highlighted President Obama’s lowlights for both
2009
and
2010, why should 2011 be any different? There is, of course,
plenty to write about and I shall only scratch the surface. If I
have omitted anything, I have no doubt that readers will draw it to
my attention. Rather than list examples one by one, I shall group
them together in three categories — disagreeable, out of touch,
and vain.
Disagreeable
In January, following the shooting of Arizona Congresswoman
Gabrielle Giffords, President Obama won high praise for a speech
he delivered at the University of Arizona in Tucson. He was praised
for this
passage in particular:
But at a time when our discourse has become so sharply
polarized — at a time when we are far too eager to lay the blame
for all that ails the world at the feet of those who happen to
think differently than we do — it’s important for us to pause for
a moment and make sure that we’re talking with each other in a way
that heals, not in a way that wounds.
Well, it’s a shame that President Obama has made little
effort to follow his own advice this year. Three months after the
Tucson speech, Obama delivered another speech at George Washington
University concerning fiscal policy. House Budget Committee
Chairman Paul Ryan was invited to sit in the front row. Although
not mentioning his name, Obama
blasted Ryan’s fiscal plan in a setting where he could not
publicly defend himself:
The vision is less about reducing the deficit than it is
about changing the basic social compact in America. Ronald Reagan’s
own budget director said there’s nothing “serious” or “courageous”
about this plan. There’s nothing serious about a plan that claims
to reduce the deficit by spending a trillion dollars on tax cuts
for millionaires and billionaires. And I don’t think there’s
anything courageous about asking for sacrifice from those who can
least afford it and don’t have any clout on Capitol Hill. That’s
not a vision of America I know.
While it is true that David Stockman criticized the Ryan
Plan, he
also said Obama’s attempt to reduce the deficit entirely on the
top 2% of the population wouldn’t work either. Yet President Obama
managed to omit that small but crucial detail. But why let
demagoguery be impeded by fact?
During the debt ceiling debate this summer, Obama
told House Majority Leader Eric Cantor not to call his bluff,
said he couldn’t guarantee that Social Security checks would be
mailed out, and
railed against tax breaks for purchase of corporate jets
despite the fact they were in the Stimulus Bill that he signed into
law. By October, Obama
was telling Americans that the Republican fiscal plan consisted
of “dirtier air, dirtier water, less people with health
insurance.”
President Obama hardly confined his demagoguery to
domestic matters. When Congress demanded to be consulted about
American involvement in Libya, he questioned their patriotism. At
the very same press conference where Obama ranted about corporate
jets he also
asserted that “no one should want to defend” Muammar Qaddafi
and that Qaddafi had become a “cause célèbre” for some members of
Congress. This from a man who
said during the 2008 campaign he would never question the
patriotism of others. It would seem that President Obama believes
he is exempt from his own edicts. In other words, do as I say not
as I do.
Out of Touch
President
Obama has also been out of touch with the American people and in
one instance was out of touch as to whether he was on American
soil. During the APEC Summit last November, Obama
spoke of meeting with world leaders “here in Asia.” Except he
was in Hawaii at the time. You would think Obama would remember he
was in the state in which he was born.
Then there times when he seemed to be trying out his best
Jimmy Carter impersonation whether he was telling the nation to
“eat
its peas” or asserting that America had gone “soft”
and had become “lazy.”
All that was missing was the cardigan sweater.
Now in the case of the “soft” and “lazy” remarks, it could
be said that Obama was commenting on America’s competitive edge and
its pursuit of foreign investment rather than the diligence of
Americans. Yet it is difficult to take Obama’s critique seriously
when he made a point of postponing
a decision on approving the Keystone XL Pipeline from Canada until
after the 2012 election to appease environmentalists. Republicans
have since
forced Obama to make a decision about Keystone’s fate within 60
days as part of the payroll tax cut extension.
Vain
There were also times when President Obama could have used a
touch of modesty. It might have spared him the embarrassment of
talking
through “God Save The Queen” at Buckingham Palace. But as long
as Obama can
tell his supporters with a straight face, “If you love me, you
got to help me pass this bill,”
pats himself on the back for doing more for Israel’s security
than any other administration in history
while claiming he’s accomplished more in the first two years of
his Presidency than anyone “with the possible exceptions of
Johnson, F.D.R., and Lincoln,” then one can only conclude that
modesty just isn’t in the man’s repertoire.
Hopefully at this time one year from now we will await
someone else to be sworn in as President of the United States, if
for no other reason than I won’t have to write out this damn list
every year.
