Obama supporter Colin Powell offers an insightful critique of the president’s economic missteps:
“The president also has to, I think, shift the way in which he has been doing things,” Powell said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “I think the American people feel that too many programs have come down. There are so many rocks in our knapsack now that we’re having trouble carrying it.”
Powell said the president needed to focus “like a razor blade” on employment, giving the same level of attention to jobs as he did to passing bills overhauling health care and education.
(H/t: Reader ILoveCapitalism.)
I agree. If the president had devoted as much attention to the jobs situation as he has to health care, I think people would view him more favorably than they do now — even if said focus prevented a strong recovery, that is, if the economic situation looked as bleak as it does. It’s almost as if he assumed that passing the “stimulus” would be enough, then he could move on to those projects really near and dear to his heart.
Powell, Noonan, Buckley and others in the GOP need to take some accountability for helping to elect Obama in the first place.
*I’m done with the whole lot*
Obama had to throw everything into the mix at one time because he knew he’d only have about 15 months to get it done. His backers seemed to have known how unpopular his programs would be with Americans and that Pelosi/Reid etc would have a short time in power. Regardless of the outcome in November, the time has gone to go through his agenda. He paid off his Wall Street/banker friends with TARP and shoved through an economically dangerous health care reform package who’s chickens will be coming home to roost for years to come. Those were his primary agenda items. Thankfully, crap and trade and the card check schemes are dead.
As for Powell…there are no words to describe my disappointment in a man I thought was smarter than he has shown to be. Rocks in their knapsacks indeed…rocks in their heads is a better description.
Yo, Colin: the Obama Administration is the rocks in the knapsack.
But don’t you GET IT???? GOVERNMENT is the source of jobs. GOVERNMENT is the only source of happiness and contentment. Those hicks and hayseeds, cleaning to their guns and religion just don’t GET IT!
Colin, are you having buyer’s remorse? Serves you right! This is what you get for voting for a man just because of the color of his skin. The really bad part, though, is that the rest of the country has to pay for your and too many other Blacks’ devotion to race over country and principle. And yes, I can say that because I’m a Black person who chose country and principle over race.
“I think the American people feel that too many programs have come down.”
———————————
I take something else from this statement. Does government really think it can calculate its way to the perfect society?
Are all of our problems the result of ‘not enough government’?
.
Doesn’t Colin know that we are endowed by our Government with whatever rights it chooses to give us. Just look at Obama giving his speech to the Hispanic Conference, and omitting the words (from TOTUS) of the Declaration of Independence (“by our Creator”) and giving such a sour look to that omitted phrase that it told us all we need to know of Mr. Obama’s true religious and political beliefs.
Colin Powell is looking to save face as the USS Barack Hussein Obama goes down in the murky, icy waters below. I also love all these folks–including MSM folks such as Politico & others–giving Obama free advice. This is what happens when someone who is incapable of leading anything is President of the United States.
“I take something else from this statement. Does government really think it can calculate its way to the perfect society?
Are all of our problems the result of ‘not enough government’?”
Gastor that is EXACTLY their point. They are so enamored of their own beliefs that to question their beliefs is to question their God. When your God is sacrificed to on the altar of the taxpayers dollar you cannot fathom an amount to large for government to spend. There is no problem that will not be solved by making government the solution. To paraphrase Maggie Thatcher though, ‘The only problem with socialism is that you soon run out of other people’s money.’ As long as their God is other people’s money they will continue to believe that government is the ONLY answer.
Powell has gotten a lot of things wrong. Powell will continue to get a lot of things wrong.
What’s cool about his criticism, though – the reason I e-mailed Dan about it – is that now it’s a respected, famous, Obama-supporting, Person of Color telling the Obama White House that the Tea Party is understandable. He is telling Obama, in effect, “It’s the economy, stupid.” It is a subtle, but (I believe) fatal puncture in the lefties’ whole conceit of “Raaaaycist! You just hate Obama because of his race!!1!!1!”
I see where Powell was on the telly lamenting his party’s “rightward drift” and babbling on about how immigrants fix his house and are “what’s keeping this country’s lifeblood moving forward.”
I guess he looks around and sees a country that’s not completely kaput; he sees that there are Americans that still have jobs (not working for the gubmint)… and that just won’t do at all.
In politics, Colin Powell is no leader; he is no better than David Gergen or Hillary Clinton.
Re: #10
I disagree, ILC. I think all that Powell’s criticism will mean to those who really, truly need to hear it is that Colin Powell is white again.
Colin Powell gets fifteen minutes of fame four times a year. Recently, he has given ample evidence that five minutes of fame once every other year is generous.
Had George W. Bush talked about focusing “like a razor blade” he would have been on the front page of the Washington Post as the eternal idiot President who doesn’t know his razor from his laser.
But Colin Powell gets a pass because he has a pigment distinction and you must never imply that a person of color is less than super sharp.
Wesley – I can see your point. We will have some lefties repudiating Powell, where before they claimed to like him.
So, the Tea Party “looking for people who are advocates of our tea party principles” of fiscal responsibility, accountability to voters and transparency?”
You mean, people like former President George W. Dunce and the Republican Party principles and accomplishments like:
– losing more jobs during eight years of Republican rule than at any time since the Great Depression, when another Republican President named Herbert Hoover ruled the roost?
– creating the largest federal budget deficit in American history under eight years of Republican rule?
– creating the largest national debt in the history of the Republic under Republican rule?
– deregulating the banks and mortgage companies and the laws that govern them, bringing the nation to its economic knees, nearly destroying the U.S. banking system, and devastating the housing industry, all under Republican rule?
– under Republican rule, ignoring presidential daily briefings warning that terrorists were planning on flying commercial jets into U.S. skyscrapers?
– under Republican rule, starting a war in Iraq when the terrorists who attacked us were trained and funded by terrorist groups in Afghanistan?
– under Republican rule, holding secret White House meetings with oil, coal and mining industry lobbyists, followed by the largest spike in American gasonline prices ever, the scuttling of regulations that aimed to minimize the toxics emanating from poisonous coal, and revamping regulations to encourage the use of poisons like mercury in strip-mining for gold in our national forests?
Oh, and that mantra about keep government out of health care. Smeone ought to tell the Tea Party whack jobs that Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security ARE all forms of government health care!
Did you know that under Al Gore that the US was forced to adopt Compact Florescent Light bulbs as a dirty electricity marking system to help guide hijacked commercial jets into U.S. skyscrapers and that John Kerry, with the help of Michael Moore and Melvin LeRoy’s illegitimate grand nephew, developed a series of duplicate war medals that tuned in ESPN?
Don’t panic steve! It was all just a terrible dream.
There is no such thing as ‘The Tea Party’. Just go back to sleep and everything will work itself out.
.
We should be thankful Obama hasn’t concentrated on the economy as he did on healthcare, otherwise unemployment would be 25percent and the stock market would be at 1,000. Because Obama only knows socialist truth, and implementing more leftwing programs with the zeal of Obamacare, would have turned us into Zimbabwe by now.
creating the largest federal budget deficit in American history under eight years of Republican rule?
Actually, no, Steve.
The largest Federal budget deficit in American history was created in ONE year under Barack Obama.
And if we actually had a budget — which Barack Obama won’t do — this year it would be even larger.
And you fully endorsed and supported this enormous deficit, FOUR TIMES the size of the largest budget deficit during the Bush administration.
So you’re a liar, hypocrite, and coward, Steve. And that’s typical for racists like yourself.
#16: “- under Republican rule, ignoring presidential daily briefings warning that terrorists were planning on flying commercial jets into U.S. skyscrapers?”
Of course, this is a filthy, fu*king lie and steve knows it, but he’ll keep repeating it as fact regardless.
For what it’s worth, I just had to vent about the infuriating rhetorical tricks the Dems are trying to pull about taxes now:
http://colorfulconservative.blogspot.com/2010/09/from-huffington-post-classic-example-of.html
I don’t know how they sleep at night, constantly shifting their story and then trying to make it seem like conservatives are the ones forcing them to lie.
In addition to lying, steve is engaging in a time-honored leftie tactic: Changing the subject. Wildly. In case anyone hasn’t seen it yet, Howard Dean gives a lecture on changing the subject: http://hotair.com/archives/2010/09/19/video-dean-offers-dems-advice-on-changing-the-subject/
It’s a hoot. In addition to Dean’s brazenness: he, like steve, appears to suffer from some pretty severe delusions. For example, you’ll see him talk about how Democrats should always be trying to switch the subject to “jobs”. 🙂
In fairness to Dean, it is an old lecture: pre-Obama’s failure with the economy. But even so, even in (say) 2006 or whenever the hell it was, “jobs” was already not a strong subject for Democrats; certainly not if you understand real economics and all that the Democrats have done, over many decades, to obstruct employment in America.
Yikes, I should read the link. Dean’s talk is from May 2010! Obama and Porkulus were already failures! ROFL 🙂
“Actually, no, Steve.”
—————————–
There was very little that steve said that made any sense.
Conservative Hoover? – Herbert Hoover was Republican, but also a self-proclaimed “Progressive and Reformer”
Eight years of job losses? – The massive job losses in the US began only in Jan. 2007…..shortly after Pelosi took her place as ‘Speaker of the House’. (http://www.agoyandhisblog.com/img/Employment-00-10.jpg)
Republican led economy? – Robert Novak was the first to question why in 2006 would GWB appoint the “Democrat fundraiser”, Henry Paulson, as treasury secretary? (see: Hank Paulson’s DNA)
No WMD’s? – Have we forgotten about Obama’s new spy chief? James Clapper still supports the belief that WMD’s left by convoy, before the Iraq war started. (ThinkProgress has the story: http://thinkprogress.org/2010/06/07/obama-nominates-clapper/)
RNC in bed with ‘Big Oil’? – How is that ‘BP Wind Power’ project working out in California, Colorado, Indiana, Texas……? Has congress approved funding yet? (http://www.bp.com/sectiongenericarticle.do?categoryId=9025014&contentId=7046507)
Socialism-lite? – Republicans don’t have to do anything to kill Social Security and Medicare. Those programs will collapse under their own weight.
If you don’t factor in the 1930s, 70s, 80s and ignore inflation and disposable income. 1935 was the highest and who was president then?
Could you please point out the specific warning you mentioned
http://tinyurl.com/2wrz7v9
And please elaborate on how, exactly, Bush “ignored” that specific warning?
I take it that Steve the troll has watched the Michael Moore disaster on the events of 9.11.01, and that he is one of the delusional troofers. Otherwise he would not go around repeating something that is not true.
I wonder who received the largest donation from BP in 2008. It was not John McCain… any guesses” Especially from the dills who have been posting their troll-like contributions here?
I would like to know if Powell paid a decent wage to those illegals or was too damn cheap then i want to know why in the hell he didn’t hire to work on his house. Then I would like to know if he will be arrested for hiring illegals in the first place. I have pretty much lost all respect for him at this point. Jackass!
Illegals working on Powell’s house must be confrusing to ASSpenaz. As far as he knows, it’s kids like Dora and Diego crossing the border each day. He doesn’t seem to be aware of Los Zetas.
Well, isn’t that nice? Apparently, GayPatriot is now gleefully hosting “troofers,” without so much as a peep from either Dan or Pat.
Look, I don’t own this site, but I do have the option of choosing not to participate here. I may vehemently disagree with Levi and Serenity, but at least those two individuals have never accused a president of killing 3,000 Americans as part of some international pissing contest.
If that’s where the leftist commentary here is headed, count me out. If I wanted to wallow in paranoid delusions, I’d row over to Kos or DU.
Sorry, I meant to say “Dan or Bruce.”
Also, I’m not so vainglorious as to believe that my occasional presence here would be missed here by anyone, or that my inbox should be flooded with pleas not to abandon this site. Rather, I’ve been commenting here since 2003 (formerly as HollywoodNeoCon), and am exceedingly disappointed that the level of discourse here has denigrated to the point where seemingly half of all comments posted are in response to classless, baseless, inflammatory crap.
Again, if this is what you as site owners want, so be it. I’ll take a pass, thank you.
Eric, don’t get worked up about steve. He’s just a dumb lower-case leftist troll whose presence is a daily reminder of how much smarter and better we right-wingers are compared to the alternative.
Steve:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_V92cqMgMAM
V, I’ve known you (in the online sense, not biblically 🙂 ) for over seven years, so I do thoroughly appreciate your viewpoint.
However, the most common refrain one hears in situations like this is something along the lines of “well, we need to keep them around in order to demonstrate how ridiculous their worldview is.”
I actually do agree with that, but in cases like the unapologetic asshole we’re discussing, there simply has to be a limit on what an intelligent person (be they left or right) chooses to deal with.
Sincerest thanks, however, for chiming in. You are a treasure.
Actually, Levi is a troofer as well, Eric.
But then he’s also a liar and embraces a policy that has left 100 million dead, so that’s not surprising.
In any event, stick around please, I appricate the discource.
As do I, Livewire, which is why this site has been at the top of my bookmarks for so long. I’m inclined to want to stick around, given that there aren’t very many sites as insightful and well-written as GayPatriot.
However, I really don’t think it’s too much to ask that while heated debate and the occasional over-indulgence in snark and bitchiness is to be expected, allowing “troofer” bullshit accomplishes absolutely nothing and contributes even less to the discussion.
Eric,
Regarding littleletterperson steve: “Vinegar” Joe Stillwell adopted this phrase as his motto during WWII:
Even a deranged “truther” is evidence that God has a plan. Tooth decay, mosquitoes and hemorrhoids are remarkable evidence that government is not the source of the ultimate elixir of nirvana. So, thus, is steve.
So, for the presence of ONE COMMENT, ‘this is where the left commentary is headed’ and you’re “wallowing” in paranoid delusions? Really? Are you that weak? Is your grip on truth and reality really that untenable?
Get down off the cross, put on your ruby slippers and click your heels three times, PLEASE.
For not the first time on here, GWB is blamed for 9-11-01, the Easter Bunny is exposed as a stunt double for the Energizer Bunny and LIES are being typed and posted. LIES! I tell you, it’s all LIES!
And for the last half-dozen posts, I’ve been wallowing in the shrill, skin-peeling, whiny screeches of personal bitching that’s supposed to pass for discourse.
But, ya know, I just filter it (this is where one uses discrimination, taste, education and understanding, in case you didn’t know) OR….
wait for it…
waaaaaaaait…
here it is…
I IGNORE IT.
It’s false, failed, futile and comes nowhere near my core intellect; nor do I allow it to affect my emotions or reasoning.
In short, I get over it.
Here’s a very tiny stepladder; may I suggest you do the same [A].
I’m sorry, did rodney post something?
I’m fighting a bit of gas, and they sounded similar.
I dunno. I don’t ordinarily pay attention to insufferable twats who feel the need to defend the indefensible.
Eric (from the Massiah’s home turf):
The expression of opinion, your own or another’s, regardless of veracity, propriety or content is never indefensible. In fact, as Americans, we’re called to do just that.
Or are you showing yourself to be a lefty scoundrel, only supporting ‘freedom of expression’ for those whose opinions and beliefs align with your own?
Rodney, you have a point. Seriously.
However, nine years after the fact, the notion that a sitting president was an accomplice in the murder of 3,000 American citizens is not only offensive, but demonstrative of a level of ignorance most are unaccustomed to having to tolerate.
Therefore, I resolve to do my best to tolerate the offensive, deliberately ignorant among us here at GayPatriot.
Thanks, Eric in Chicago.
It is actually a hearty challenge for me to stomach the idiocy and hypocrisy that leaks and is spewed from some people (and not just on here.)
I too, tolerate ignorance more than I should perhaps; but the particularly difficult exercise for me (and which may be the case here, despite my defense based on the First Amendment)…is the stupidity of those comments that began our discussion.
Ignorance, or the lack of knowledge, I can excuse and should tolerate, yes.
Stupidity, or having the knowledge and choosing or failing to properly apply and use it…drives me batshit crazy on a more often than daily basis. But even the stupid people are protected by the First Amendment.
I await the 28th Amendment that affords some protections to the rest of us, you and I, Eric…from stupid people. lol