Posted on 06/16/2009 5:19:08 PM PDT by Sub-Driver
Obama Aspires to a 'Light Touch,' Not a Heavy Hand
By GERALD F. SEIB
As he prepares to release the most extensive proposals to change financial regulations since the 1930s, President Barack Obama is a bit anxious.
Anxious, that is, for people -- and specifically for his conservative critics -- to know he isn't the heavy-handed meddler some suspect.
"I think the irony is that I actually would like to see a relatively light touch when it comes to the government," he said Tuesday in a White House interview.
It is a counterintuitive argument to make when his government is a majority shareholder of General Motors, and when he will propose Wednesday new oversight of big financial institutions, new capital requirements for banks and a new consumer-protection agency for small investors.
Which is precisely why Mr. Obama went to great pains to explain that there is a philosophy behind the changes he is about to propose to the nation's financial plumbing. Indeed, he says, it is the same philosophy that applies to his broader view of the government's role in the economy:
"You set up some rules of the road, ensure transparency and openness, guard against huge systemic risk that will lead...government potentially having to step in to avoid a depression, and then let entrepreneurs and individual businesses compete and do what they do.
"And so it's puzzling to me sometimes to hear the standard conservative critique of what we're doing, when essentially every step we're taking involves cleaning up the mess that we found when we arrived here at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue."
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
BWAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHA!
He’s saving the “Heavy hand” for the repression of his opposition.
SAYIN’ ONE THING WHILE DOIN’ ANOTHER.
Typical Marxist ploy.
What a tool.
A kinder gentler fascism.
Impeach him NOW. If he doesn’t get impeached, vote him out in 2012!!!
A certain European leader, began with tentative ‘light’, unsure touches, and, unopposed, rose to become something of a challenge for the planet. Do not be assured by a light touch which moves to heavy petting and final assault. Political narcissism has a sexual component to it.
OMG........he really does think the American people on the whole are STUUUUUPPIIIIDDD....well, he may be right.
That's exactly what this tactic is meant to accomplish.
DON’T GIVE UP....that’s what they want you to do!
Wait until people start disappearing.....
Light Touch’? Oh, you mean how he treats his fellow Mooslum terrorists, right?
Horse crap, he has his Chicago mafia do the kneecapping.
“I think the irony is that I actually would like to see a relatively light touch when it comes to the government” equals “Nice little place you got here. Be a shame if something were to happen to it.”
Obama’s aspirations perhaps, a ‘Zen koan’. . .when is ‘light’ heavy; heavy ‘light’?
i think the saying goes “iron fist in a velvet glove”
Yes. . .only one hand - with brass knuckles. . .
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