Please, please, please, don’t let me latest post on Rahm Emanuel obscure my criticism of this highly partisan Chicago political operative. With all the attention focused on the White House Chief of Staff and criticism of his tactics reaching a fever pitch and going to rhetorical extremes, Jim Geraghty observes that “no one in Washington jumped up to deny” certain accusations against Rahm, notably the one about him selling his mother to get a vote.
My point is not that Rahm is a good guy nor that he’s worth defending (though I grant that some of the recent criticism has been over the top and unwarranted–and yes, you can go too far in criticizing even a man who merits criticism), but that the problem isn’t so much Rahm as it is Obama’s agenda. He’s trying to sell policies the American people don’t want and is focusing on issues which are, at best, peripheral to the American people.
While I don’t agree with New York Times columnist Bob Herbert’s characterization of Republicans nor do I support the solutions he would offer, I do agree with his analysis of the causes for the Administration’s troubles:
The Obama administration and Democrats in general are in trouble because they are not urgently and effectively addressing the issue that most Americans want them to: the frightening economic insecurity that has put a chokehold on millions of American families. . . .
Instead of focusing with unwavering intensity on this increasingly tragic situation, making it their top domestic priority, President Obama and the Democrats on Capitol Hill have spent astonishing amounts of time and energy, and most of their political capital, on an obsessive quest to pass a health care bill. . . .
But while the nation is desperate for jobs, jobs, jobs, the Democrats have spent most of the Obama era chanting health care, health care, health care.
The president should remember that, during the 2008 campaign, the electoral tide (at least as measured in polls) began to turn in his favor when the scope of the financial meltdown became manifest. People trusted him more than they did John McCain to focus on fixing the economy. Save for his insistence at the outset of his Administration on swift passage of the legislation (AKA the “stimulus”) he claimed would do just that, the incumbent has spent the better part of his time in office addressing other matters.
Rahm’s only part of the problem. The real problem is the president’s failure to focus on the real concerns of the American people.
Herbert’s analysis of causes and solutions for our economic woes couldn’t be further off. But as someone else said this morning: When the Democrats lose even Bob Herbert… A useful indicator of how deep Obama’s political troubles are.
But, ILC, his analysis of the Administration’s woes is on point–focusing on health care when Americans want a focus on the economy.
Why would Mr. Obama want to listen to people who cling to guns, Bibles and go bowling. What that hell do they know? He is after all, the historic this and the first that.
He knows what is best. Right?
We are just unable to understand him and his plan. Right?
He just needs to explain things in simpler terms. Right?
Obama is perfectly happy with the media focusing it’s attention on Rahm in a negative way. It sets the stage to eventually through him under a bus while removing some attention from the latest health care tour Let Me “CON”vince America we know what’s best for you.
Unfortunately my local paper is owned by the NYtoiletpaperTimes. So, other than letters to the editor that page is good for…..!
Obama is working to get a government stranglehold on the health care portion of the economy. Furthermore, his Obamacare has huge tax revenue pouring in ahead of the 2014 beginning date. As insurance companies fail and withdraw from the market, the single payer government plan will take over. That will result in more huge infusions of money for the government.
There is ZERO relationship between the money an entitlement raises and how the government spends it. The Democrats are only interested in cash flow and the power it gives them. They have not figured out how to tax your breathing, but they would if they could.
This is not about health care or insurance reform. We are handing over to Obama and the Democrats the keys to a huge segment of the economy. Even if the Republicans take over, they will be reduced to trying to slow a runaway train of entitlement spending.
MORE global warming scandals.
This one on the accuracy of Obama’s claims touting green energy job creation. Turns out it’s a lie as well. But Obama and his administration are working to cover it up. The wind energy experiments in Spain are a debacle. Obama use to hold Spain up as a shining lite. No more.
http://washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/09/covering-up-the-wind-energy-failure/
Dan,
I must agree with ILC and not you. When Herbert wrote
he was all wet. Obama and his party did focus urgently — and in their opinion effectively — on the economy with their stimulus bill. They continue to defend the measure and even suggest doing more of the same.
Unfortunately for the Dems, most people know the stimulus was nonsense and that Obama’s policies are making the economy worse, not better.
If Obama and his fellow Democrats put health care aside and focused on the economy “with unwavering intensity” they wouldn’t be any better off because they make the economy even worse than they already have. The less they’re focused on the economy the better — and the people know it. This undoes Herbert’s analysis completely.
True-
The Democrats can not borrow our way to recovery or tax our way to prosperity. However …..
The Democrats must increase government power over our lives to feed their souls and to live to haunt us for yet another day. Grabbing the health care economy and mandating insurance will prove to be the greatest socialist theft of private sector money in the history of our country. To that extent –