Posted on 04/07/2011 7:24:59 AM PDT by freespirited
For much of President Obama's term, White House aides were convinced the main barrier to his reelection was the worrisome unemployment rate. But even as the economy bounces back, a new political obstacle has emerged: rising gas prices.
Trying to defuse the issue, the White House has arranged a slew of speeches and public events to reassure Americans that Obama has a plan for cutting gas prices.
On Wednesday, Obama flew to Pennsylvania — for a town-hall-style meeting devoted to energy. He travels Friday to Indiana, another important state on the election calendar, where he will appear at an event in Indianapolis also focused on high oil prices.
"It's on the minds of a lot of people right now because you're paying more at the pump. Anybody notice that?" Obama told workers at a wind turbine plant outside Philadelphia. "For a lot of people, money was already tight before gas prices started climbing."
Obama's attention to the issue comes amid new polling that has implications for the presidential race. With the economic recovery gaining momentum, fewer people say they are jittery about losing their job. But a growing percentage cites rising gas prices as a chief concern.
The Pew Research Center is coming out with a report this week showing a majority of Americans say gas prices have a "substantial impact" on their household financial condition.
"The bottom line is, unless gas prices go down, it puts the president in mortal peril," said Douglas Schoen, a former consultant to President Clinton. "Every American faces higher gas prices every day, so in a certain sense, it has the likelihood of being a more serious problem than the unemployment rate, because 9% are unemployed but 100% of the American people have to deal with the impact of rising fuel prices."
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Energy is a major cost component in the production of food. It’s no different than any industrial product. Why does this concept seem so trivial to the idiot? The miles per gallon on your 2003 Ford Taurus versus trading it in for a Chevy Volt have very little to nothing to do with overall energy costs for our economy and it’s total industrial output.
“Trying to defuse the issue, the White House has arranged a slew of speeches and public events to reassure Americans that Obama has a plan for cutting gas prices.”
If I remember correctly, just yesterday in a speech for a Spanish company in Pennsylvania, “Pitching the promise of energy independence, President Barack Obama cautioned Wednesday that it’s going to be tough to transition from America’s oil-dependent economy and acknowledged there’s little he can do to lower gas prices over the short term.”
So was he lying yesterday or is he lying today?
So was he lying yesterday or is he lying today?
He is lying when it supports his agenda.....all the time.
During the Dubya years, the MSM relentlessly pounded on the notion that the president can control gasoline prices, and now they’re worried that voters might still believe that nonsense ahd hold it against Dear Leader. By attacking Bush, the MSM sold the public a major bill of goods that will blow back on them if we don’t let people forget.
Gas prices are only a very small part of Obama’s energy policy, which is in complete disarray.
Obama has Richard Trumka, the former head of the United Mine Workers, heading the AFL-CIO, trying to keep the coal workers in line for Obama, while Salazar was promising to open coal leases in Wyoming, which Buffet would ship by train to WA state where SSA and the Longshoremen would ship it to China.
It turns out that the leases were exaggerated by 10 fold.
Then, there was the trip to Brazil, where Obama touted Brazil as doing everything right in relation to energy, getting themselves 100% independent of foreign oil. The problem is that Brazil gained it’s independence by drilling at home, something Obama refuses to do.
Gas prices are simply the most visible result of Obama’s failed energy policy, that the average voters can understand. In reality the problems go much deeper and involve segments of his own base, splitting the so-called Blue-Green alliance.
LOL. Obama has his work cut out trying to explain how he has a plan to reverse the effects of 50 years of Dem efforts to destroy the energy industry in this country while promoting it abroad. Good luck with that.
Is that you, Mittens?
“...even as the economy bounces back....”
Well, it IS the LA Times, and they probably smoke only the best stuff......
Milk’s gone from $2 to $2.75 / gal at our local stores in 4 mos. Those Baraqqi food stamps and WICs aren’t going as far these days either.
These ludicrously out of touch, "let 'em eat cake", recommendations should be treated at least as harshly as G Bush senior's supermarket scanner episode was. Bush snr was defeated because of the public's perception that he was out of touch, even though the signal event purporting to demonstrate that never happened.
Gas prices will be gamed in time for the election. Everyone here should prepare themselves for the inevitability of Obama's 2nd term.
Hey! with gas at $5 a gallon I can’t afford to drive to work! That is The Bad news.
Rhe good news is that, due to Obama’s non energy program, you don’t have a job to drive to.
This is the problem - speeches don't work. The presidency requires work; it's not a land of unicorns crapping Skittles.
In 2008 Congress and Democrat pundits pilloried “big oil” for rising gas prices when they approached $4. Today with prices sure to hit $4 per gallon and likely higher not a word. Could it be that Obama’s energy policies could all too easily be seen as the cause? Somehow drill in Brazil and windmills don’t cut it when thousands of oil workers in the Gulf lost their jobs as a result of his moratorium, oil drilling by US companies in the US is being stymied by government regulation and Obama’s snubbing of another pipeline to bring Canadian oil to the US.
The economy is bouncing back??
Who knew??
The exact same economy sure wouldn't be "bouncing back" if George Bush were still president.
All we'd be hearing from the Liberal propagandists like this tool is how it's the worst things have been since the Great Depression.
Thinking, "I guess that will have to wait for the second term."
He is lying when it supports his agenda.....all the time."
Appropriate 2012 bumper sticker:
OBAMA LIED
FREEDOM DIED
It puts the Progressive philosophy in a nutshell.
The thing that irks me most about the pseudo-enlightened Left is that they're not content to cut off their noses to spite their faces...they insist that everyone must do so...while claiming poor little victim status.
It has to be the most schizophrenic mindset in history...an inner conflict of self-adoration/narcissism and self-destructive loathing.
The historians have their work cut out for them looking back on this period in Western civilization and trying to make sense of it.
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