Tuesday, August 3, 2010

900 More Days of Obama's Demolition Derby


By Alan Caruba

Since taking the oath of office in January 2009, President Barack Obama’s popularity and approval has steadily declined. As of August 4, he has 900 more days to go in his first and, likely, his last term in office.

When Robert Reich, Clinton’s former Secretary of Labor, writes as he did in the August 3 Wall Street Journal, “Whatever the outcome of the upcoming midterm elections, the activist stage of the Obama administration has likely come to a close”, the proverbial “fat lady” has sung. The opera is over, but not the time remaining for Obama to do more damage.

Rather than a laundry list of legislation that Americans want repealed, suffice it to say that his major legislative initiatives are widely regarded as weakening the economy while growing the government. In this he has been abetted by the Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader, along with brain-dead Democrats in Congress who clearly did not bother to read the bills before voting on them.

The business and investor community, along with consumers, have reacted predictably. Trillions of dollars are sitting in corporate accounts as business leaders wait to determine the impact of Obamacare and other legislation. The banks, too, are hold off making loans for fear of inflation or deflation. Anyone paying attention knows that the Federal Reserve has been printing money day and night since the 2008 housing mortgage meltdown occurred.

A year and a half into Obama’s term, he “owns” the economy and with it the widespread view that his Stimulus Act did nothing to create any new jobs and only “saved” the jobs of teachers, police and firefighters in cash-strapped states.

Whether the government takeover of General Motors and Chrysler was a good thing or not remains to be answered. The Cash-for-Clunkers program did little to address the problems endemic to both companies. My guess is that Chrysler will likely go out of business in the none-too-distant future.

The auto union killed the goose that laid the golden egg. The government unions are sucking federal and state government budgets dry with excessive health and pension benefits.

Though it will surprise some, I think downsizing our military commitments in both Afghanistan and Iraq is a good thing. The former is strictly a counter-insurgency operation best handled by CIA operatives and Special Forces. In Iraq, about 50,000 forces will be maintained to deter overt Iranian aggression and to tamp down any internal militia movements.

Obama’s expressed intention of “transforming” America has so far manifested itself in ways that Americans are rejecting in ever-growing numbers. Thus, the fear understandably remains that he will use the power of the office to continue his goal of a socialist America. Already, Obamacare is being challenged in Virginia and likely to be found unconstitutional.

There is some fear regarding his possible use of executive orders, but he has used this device fairly sparingly at this point. Tradition requires that executive orders have some basis in existing legislation. Still the power can be substantial. President Truman integrated the armed forces with an executive order and President Eisenhower desegregated public schools with one. The courts have overturned only two executive orders.

Obama’s demolition derby will mostly likely to shift to environmental and energy regulation, specifically the imposition of “greenhouse gas” emission limits through EPA regulation. The impact this would have on energy costs would be catastrophic. Affordable energy and economic recovery are closely linked.

That leaves foreign affairs, always the domain of whoever is president. The world leaders have long since taken his measure and he has little real influence in this area as other nations, friendly or not, will largely ignore any of his initiatives.

After the midterm elections he will likely be the lamest of lame duck presidents. Blaming Bush or blaming the Republicans will fall on deaf ears as he has long since expended this option to the point of its having become a joke.

History teaches, however, that the damage a president can inflict often has long lasting effects, so the remaining 900 days require continued close attention and a constant effort to thwart this first and last Marxist president.

© Alan Caruba, 2010

6 comments:

AD said...

"Rejecting in ever-growing numbers"?

Opposition for health-care reform has fallen steadily since its enactment, going from 41% to 35%, while approval has risen slightly. The signature policy achievement of the administration is getting MORE popular, not less.

I notice that when you feel like glossing over something, it always "suffices to say" without any evidence.

Alan Caruba said...

@AD: Not according to a series of surveys by Rasmussen Reports. All the results point to growing dissatisfaction with Obamacare and a strong desire to repeal it.

LarryOldtimer said...

The vast majority of the greatly deleterious effects of the Obamacare legislation passed will not come to be even in the near future.

Very few people can foresee the pinching effects of a pair of shoes without trying the shoes on and then wearing them for a bit of time.

What looks at first to be to be a handsome and comfortable pair of shoes to wear often turns out to be a pair which will cripple the wearer and ruin the wearer's feet. Still, many will go on wearing that pair of shoes for the sake of appearances, or afraid to be shown to have been a fool for buying it.

Ronbo said...

I've said from the beginning of Obama's quest for a United Socialist States of America that he and his Progressive cabal had went "A Bridge Too Far" and one way or another Patriots would counter attack.

Today I think we see a determined counter offensive growing daily against the Obama Regime - Resistance becoming so intense I question if Obama will remain in office these last 30 months of his term.

I see this next stage as the "Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg" when Obama and company must throw everything into the center of the line hoping for a break out.

However, the opposition is well dug in with lots of artillery and infantry and has high morale.

I hope the OBOTS listen to that old song by ABBA - "The Winner Takes It All" - because a loss in this decisive battle will end American socialism and the Democrat Party for at least a generation.

AD said...

The Rasmussen Reports survey is an English-only landline phone poll of 1,000 likely voters over the course of a day, then heavily weighted with formulas designed to try to compensate for these deficiencies.

A Kaiser poll, on the other hand, was conducted with 50% more participants in English and Spanish on landlines and cell-phones over a week. Plus they actually release their methodology in full and the details of their questions and results: http://www.kff.org/kaiserpolls/8084.cfm

Alan Caruba said...

@AD:
You're one of those people who has a rebuttal for everything because you are always right and everyone else, including myself, is always wrong.

Well, here's my rebuttal. This is MY blog, not yours. Any further comments will be rejected.

Go away.