. . . he would not have issued that blistering, dishonest attack on the Republican budget which the House passed March 29 with a very strong majority (as he defines such majorities*). Instead, he would have called on the Democratic Senate to pass a similar fiscal blueprint and then bring representatives of both legislative chambers together and show his leadership qualities by bridging the differences.
But, instead when reporters question administration officials about the failure of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to hold a vote on his budget, the White House, Allapundit quips, “gets awfully fidgety“. Note the failure of White Hose Press Secretary Jay Carney to even answer Bret Baier’s question about Reid’s failure:
All the president’s spokesman can offer is attacks and bromides. To get to a balanced approach in a bicameral legislature, each chamber needs first to spell out its position. The Republican House has done just that. The Democratic Senate has not.
“The Democrats,” John Hinderaker reminds us, “love to castigate the House Republican budget; fine. But why won’t they propose, and pass, their own?”
Instead of encouraging that the legislature chamber controlled by his party vote on the budget he proposes, he derides the Republican budget as “Social Darwinism.” By contrast, a pragmatist, that is, “a person who takes a practical approach to problems and is concerned primarily with the success or failure of her actions“, being practical would, facing a divided legislature, attempt to work with each branch to reach a consensus, deriding neither one nor the other, requesting that each act in a timely manner.
As one woman who voted for him because she believed was “independent, moderate, and pragmatic“, lamented, offering advice to the president:
It’s Moderate Obama that American voters find so appealing. You don’t need all that left-wing economics and race-and-gender demagoguery. I think what people like about you — you, who are famously, sublimely likeable — is the normal person who seems to be in harmony with everyone. We — many of us — voted for you because you seemed to offer to bring us together, to end the rancor.
The Democrat certainly hasn’t shown himself to be in harmony with House Republicans as they attempt to grapple with our nation’s fiscal problems. And instead of ending the rancor, with his speech yesterday, Obama has only made it more intense.
*If he contends 219-212 is a strong majority, then 228-191 (the count on the vote for the Ryan budget–a margin 5 times the size of the House vote on Obamacare) must needs be described as something more than strong.
It’s so weird that Althouse fell for Obama in 2008. She’s so sensible, in most other matters.
Althouse has it completely backwards. Obama isn’t a moderate that sometimes poses as a left wing radical. He is a radical that knows he has to pose as a moderate. Once in while he lets the mask slip.
She gets too much of her news from the NYT rather than conservative blogs.
The only difference between, Obama, and the rest of the radical left “silver tails” is that, so far as we know, Obama hasn’t tried to kill the “pigs”.
Anyone ever get the feeling that Jay Carney was that nerdy kid in high school who was locked in his locker during gym class and continually given wedgies by the football team?
And that he really hasn’t grown past it after all these years?
Just a thought.
Regards,
Peter H.