Obama: Micro-Manager-in-Chief

Patriot Room ^ | 6-30-09 | Scott Martin

[Scott Martin]

No aspect of the American economy is so insignificant that Barack Obama won't try to control it. This became even more apparent today, when Obama announced that he will tell you what type of light bulb you can have, and what type of light bulb American businesses are allowed to make.

Can anyone really continue to deny that Obama is a socialist? It should be abundantly clear by now that Obama lusts to socialize health care. While I believe great danger lies in government control of industry, it is at least understandable that many Americans think that the federal government should play a greater role in things that are truly important. Misguided, but understandable. But who would ever have guessed that an American president would actually encourage a greater government role in single-digit dollar decisions?

-- The new rule, scheduled to take effect in 2012, will cut the amount of electricity used by affected lamps by 15 to 25 percent and save $1 billion to $4 billion a year for consumers, the White House said.

“Now I know light bulbs may not seem sexy,” Mr. Obama said, “but this simple action holds enormous promise because 7 percent of all the energy consumed in America is used to light our homes and our businesses.”--

There you have it. Barack Obama believes he knows better than American businesses and consumers when it comes to running their companies and their lives. And if he can justify some sort of net benefit to society, he believes that benefit is more important than your freedom to exercise your right to choose.

Looking at the new rule, we see that some people will be adversely affected by the President's decision....

[gigster]

As much as I despise B. Hussein, it must be stressed that the bone-head G.W. signed that into law.
He only got it half-right,half the time.

[ChinaGotTheGoodsOnClinton]

Reminds me of Carter again.

Only worse.

[Plumberman27]

Finally i will be able to stop yelling at my kid for leaving the basement lights on all night long while nobody is down there.

I take it all this saved money will shortly be used to clean up all the mercury that will end up in the landfills due to the content of the compact florescent light bulbs?

Once again this Hussein guy proves he will be a one term flop.

[Jess Kitting]

How many socialist pigs does it take to change a light bulb?

Just one, and he is the King!

[river rat]

Small minds with minimal expertise - focus on small matters.

Obama is INCAPABLE of anything else.....

[jonrick46]

This light bulb thing is what Carter tried to do. Lights were turned off that needed to stay on. The turning off of lights was supposed to reduce the use of oil. When one looks at the fact that only 7% of our electrical use goes to lighting, the entire fuss becomes an exercise in insanity. I ask, how much of that 7% are we going to save? Let's say we change out all of our household lights to LED lights. Currently a high efficiency LED light costs $11.00. If everyone were to replace all of their light bulbs with LED, the cost would be huge. I can see about $200 per household. The cost for businesses would be astronomical. Look up at the lighting for your typical grocery store. What will it take to replace that lighting? Go outside. Look at the parking lot lights. What kind of costs to replace those? Some may even require replacing the fixtures which will mean the costs of electricians. All of these costs to save less than 7% of our electrical use? I say that is BS.

[CitizenUSA]

Good points, jonrick46. Consider this. Even if it saves 7% of our electricity, how does that impact the use of oil? I haven’t looked at the figures lately, but I doubt there are very many oil-driven generators left. I’m pretty sure the vast majority of our electricity comes from coal, gas, and nuclear. From the perspective of American energy independence, I believe this 7% is not even relevant.

[NoControllingLegalAuthority]

This crackpot liar and lunatic in the White House has never even run a hot dog stand and he is telling us how to run our lives in every detail.

This country has gone crazy...CERTIFIED!

Send this foreign student back to the country in which he has actual citizenship and let us Americans live our lives without his dictating how we live.

[BuffaloJack]

A recent discovery makes the incandescent bulb as efficient or more efficient than the compact fluorescents. By taking a clear bulb incandescent lightbulb and treating the filament with a laser to turn the surface of the filament black, they have been able to convert the lightbulb into a longer lasting source of light with 6 to 8 times the brightness that it had before the treatment.
I believe that this was actually discussed a couple of months ago here on Free Republic.

[autumnraine]

““Now I know light bulbs may not seem sexy,” Mr. Obama said, “but this simple action holds enormous promise because 7 percent of all the energy consumed in America is used to light our homes and our businesses.””

I know this country is going through hard economic hard times, but do we really need the President dictating what we purchase for ‘our own good’?

This isn’t “SOCIALIST” as the article states, this is communist.