Obama - the reluctant partisan (Obama is "Spock-like")

BARACK OBAMA took office vowing to usher in a post-partisan era that would drain the toxic anger of the Bush years and focus the country on practical, long-overdue reforms. Like Bush, he was no doubt sincere in wanting to unite the country. Unlike Bush, he has governed in a manner largely consistent with that ideal. A lot of good it’s done him: Washington is more poisonous than ever. And as Congress courts disaster by threatening to default on the national debt, Obama must marvel at his plight. Practically a caricature of Spock-like rationality and sober caution, he’s presiding over a capital that has become completely unhinged...

In all this, Obama succeeded. He’s brought public opinion around to his side, not only on the question of whether to raise the debt ceiling but also on how to do so. A majority of Americans now say Congress should raise the ceiling. Two-thirds agree with Obama that any deal should balance spending cuts with tax increases. Only 21 percent favor the Republicans’ plan of cuts alone. Americans have chosen the stern parent over the squabbling kids: Obama’s approval rating, while only around 50 percent, towers over that of his opponents. A CBS poll found that 71 percent disapprove of how Republicans have conducted the negotiations, while an ABC/Washington Post poll revealed that even Republicans disapprove of how their leaders have negotiated. Small wonder that dissatisfaction with government is at a 19-year high.

By almost every measure, then, Obama has prevailed - except on the one that counts. He’s almost certain to lose the fight in Congress...

The irony is that, however reluctantly, Obama may decide he has no choice but to force a showdown...

Unlike Bush, he has governed in a manner largely consistent with that ideal. A lot of good it’s done him: Washington is more poisonous than ever.

You wonder if these people believe their BS or just making it up for propaganda purposes. Bush came out of the gates with a House majority and 50/50 senate and went bi-partisan issue after issue. He shared his signature issue in the campaign - no child left behind - with the liberal stalwart of the Senate Ted Kennedy.

With Obama, he tried to malign and stare down the opposition out of the gates, refusing to include one Republican idea in the stimulus, famously retorting "I won" when suggestions were made by House Minority Leaders. The media leftists are either stupid or delusional.

The Kenyan lizard mau mau’s the flack catchers...

* “If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun.” Barack Obama in July 2008

* “I want you to argue with them and get in their face!” Barack Obama, September 2008

* “Here’s the problem: It’s almost like they’ve got — they’ve got a bomb strapped to them and they’ve got their hand on the trigger. You don’t want them to blow up. But you’ve got to kind of talk them, ease that finger off the trigger.” Barack Obama on banks, March 2009

* “I don’t want to quell anger. I think people are right to be angry! I’m angry!” Barack Obama on ACORN Mobs, March 2010

* “We talk to these folks… so I know whose ass to kick.” Barack Obama on the private sector, June 2010

* “A Republican majority in Congress would mean ‘hand-to-hand combat’ on Capitol Hill for the next two years, threatening policies Democrats have enacted to stabilize the economy.” Barack Obama, October 6, 2010

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903461104576462142788961966.html?mod=djemBestOfTheWeb_h
“”Vulcan in Chief”

We thought the Boston Globe was a newspaper, but apparently it is a science-fiction fanzine. Get a load of this column by Joshua Green:

Come to think of it, there are major similarities between Obama and Spock. Both have oversize ears. Both were fathered by aliens, although Obama’s parents hailed from the same planet. Both are ill suited for command, although Spock was not ambitious enough to seek it.

It’s amok time in Washington.

And of course everyone remembers the episode in which Spock said: “Imagine Captain Kirk drivin’ the Enterprise into a wormhole”—Vulcans always drop their g’s when they’re trying to sound folksy—”and it’s a deep wormhole. It’s a big wormhole. And somehow he walked away from the accident, and we put on our boots and we transported down into the wormhole—me and Bones and Scotty and Hikaru and Nyota. We’ve been pushin’, pushin’, tryin’ to get that starship out of the wormhole. And meanwhile, Kirk is standin’ there, sippin’ on a Slurpee.”

OK, we exaggerated. He didn’t actually say “Nyota.” Lieutenant Uhura didn’t have a first name until the 2009 “Star Trek” movie.

Green’s entire account of Obama’s presidency is as removed from reality as “Star Trek.” By what conceivable standard can one claim that the president has “governed in a manner largely consistent” with the “ideal” of “a postpartisan era”—much less that he has been “unlike Bush” in doing so?

Consider the two most controversial legislative initiatives of George W. Bush’s first half-term: the 2001 tax cut and the 2002 authorization to use military force against Iraq. Both had substantial bipartisan support: The former passed with “yes” votes from 28 House Democrats and 12 Senate Democrats; the latter had the backing of 81 House Democrats and 29 Senate Democrats.

By contrast, Obama’s two biggest legislative initiatives, the so-called stimulus and ObamaCare, had the support of a grand total of three Republicans in both houses combined (all senators who voted in favor of the stimulus).

Now, Obama backers might argue that these were just “practical, long-term reforms,” which the Republicans were partisan for opposing. One’s own side, after all, is always principled where the other side is partisan. But the majority of voters did not seem to see it this way. The most modest interpretation of the 2010 election results is that Americans thought Obama had gone way too far and wished to restrain him from going further...”

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