Tag Archives: Barack Obama

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Critics fabricate anger over Gettysburg absence

President Obama today decided against attending ceremonies marking the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln’s brief but poignant speech in Gettysburg, Pa.

So what?

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/190733-website-woes-force-obama-to-skip-gettysburg-ceremony

The White House said the president took a pass on the ceremony because of on-going problems with the healthcare.gov website, which the administration is seeking to fix by the end of the month.

Still, critics on the right have found reason to criticize Obama for not attending the event. There was this, for example: “His dismissal of the request shows a man so detached from the duty of history, from the men who served in the White House before him, that it is unspeakable in its audacity,” wrote Salena Zito of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. “Ask almost any person in this historic town; even his most ardent supporters here are stunned.”

Well, I hasten to point out that President Reagan did not attend the 125th anniversary of the speech, which occurred when he occupied the White House. I do not recall much hissy-fit pitching over that. Indeed, the Gipper never even visited Gettysburg while he was president. It’s also been noted that of all the presidents who have served since Lincoln, only one of them — William Howard Taft — attended ceremonies on the site of the famed Civil War battlefield.

The criticism, of course, demonstrates the state of play these days. Barack Obama is having a difficult time at the moment. The Affordable Care Act is proving to be much more problematic than he envisioned. World hot spots keep setting off sparks. The economy is still a bit sluggish.

Does he deserve criticism? Sure he does. It goes with the territory.

He doesn’t deserve to be beaten up over being absent from ceremonies marking the sesquicentennial of the Gettysburg Address. Hey, he took the oath of office twice while placing his hand on President Lincoln’s Bible; he routinely cites the wisdom of the 16th president as one of his guiding lights.

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Obama lacks a Bobby Kennedy

Texas Monthly blogger/editor Paul Burka is a smart guy whose blog I read regularly.

He says in the post linked here that Barack Obama is “on the verge” of becoming a failed president.

http://www.texasmonthly.com/burka-blog/obamas-collapse

He talks about the still-new president developing a cult of personality, which has contributed, according to Burka, the failure of the Affordable Care Act rollout and the accompanying headaches.

I agree to a point. I’m not sure Obama is yet at the brink of a failed presidency.

What I think he lacks is someone in his inner circle who’ll tell him the truth. My favorite example of that kind of individual is worth noting this week in particular as the nation marks the 50th year since the shocking murder of President John F. Kennedy.

JFK had a truth-teller in his inner circle. His name was Robert Francis Kennedy, the president’s brother, the nation’s attorney general and someone who grew enormously into a powerful political presence in his own right — until his own death at the hand of an assassin in June 1968.

Bobby Kennedy could tell the president the truth. He could tell his brother when he messed up. He could give him unvarnished counsel, speak to him in blunt terms and help steer him toward a more prudent course.

Bobby had managed his brother’s winning 1960 presidential campaign. He could play rough and tough. RFK had his enemies, chief among them were Vice President Lyndon Johnson and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. LBJ hated RFK and the feeling was quite mutual. Hoover made a parlor game out of digging up dirt on powerful politicians and the Kennedys were not exempted from his prying eyes and ears.

Barack Obama has professed great admiration for the 35th president. He’ll do so again this week in ceremonies marking the half-century since his predecessor’s death in Dallas. One of the things that made Kennedy an effective president was his ability to listen to the harsh truth when he needed to hear it.

Robert Kennedy gave it to him. Barack Obama needs someone like that now.

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LBJ would have none of this

Barack Obama’s difficulty in calming the fears of fellow Democrats reminds me of something I heard from a prominent Texas Panhandle educator.

He declared that President Obama is no President Lyndon Johnson, the stalwart Texan who rose from Senate majority leader to the vice presidency and then to the presidency amid a stark national tragedy.

Obama cannot seem to find it within him, my friend said, to develop the kind of relationships he needs with lawmakers in his own Democratic Party, let alone with those on the other side.

Obama fails to calm jittery Dems

I’m trying to imagine President Johnson being bullied by Congress. I cannot frame that image in my mind.

Johnson had this way of getting in the faces — quite literally — of senators and House members. He would threaten them, cajole them, put the squeeze on them by embracing them in a massive embrace. The threats would come in the form of promises to cut off funding for pet projects if they didn’t see things his way. The cajoling would arrive in the form of promises to do right by them if they lined up behind his legislative agenda.

President Obama’s health care plan is in trouble with Republicans and Democrats. Republicans dislike the Affordable Care Act because, well, I guess it’s because Barack Obama pitched it, sold it and got it enacted into law. Democrats are running from it because they fear for their political lives with the 2014 mid-term elections coming up.

The president is quite good at selling the big idea. He’s quite bad at bringing others along.

Ol’ Lyndon is spinning in his Hill Country grave while one of his descendants struggles with getting Congress to follow his lead.

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Shall I take credit for gas price decline?

I am trying to decide whether to take credit for the decline in gasoline prices all across Amarillo.

My wife and I recently purchased a hybrid automobile, a Toyota Prius. It runs partially on gasoline and partially on electricity. It’s a nice little rig, a 2010 model with about 71,000 miles on it. A young sales rep at the auto dealership where I work told me the engine “won’t even get broken in until it hits 100,000 miles.” Good to know.

I filled up today. We went nearly two weeks since topping off the tank in the little bugger. The car consumed 3.6 gallons of gas during that time.

I’m not an economist, but I do understand a couple of basic principles. One of them is that when demand goes down, supply goes up. Another is that when suppliers have too much of something to sell, they tend to mark down the price to reduce their inventory.

President Obama touched on all of that Thursday when he toured a steel plant near Cleveland, Ohio. He talked about the decline in fossil fuel consumption and the decline in oil being imported into the United States, coupled with the increase in renewable energy and increases in fuel-efficient automobile production.

Do you see a pattern there? I do.

My wife and I believe we’re doing our part with the purchase of our hybrid car.

Look at the gasoline pump prices in Amarillo. I have read data that suggest the price could fall even farther, again as supplies increase because of reduced demand. My hope is that people don’t start driving a whole lot more as gasoline becomes more affordable.

OK. That settles it. I have decided to take some credit for the price decline.

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Obama: ‘That’s on us. That’s on me.’

A friend of mine posted something on Facebook yesterday that praised President Ronald Reagan’s taking responsibility for misleading the nation on the Iran-Contra scandal. “That’s how a leader” should do take the heat, the message said.

The implication, of course, is that President Barack Obama hasn’t taken personal responsibility for the mess-up involving the rollout of the Affordable Care Act and the ridiculous failure of the website healthcare.gov to handle applications for insurance.

Well, today the president said, “It’s on me,” meaning that he’s the man in charge and that he is responsible for the insurance policy cancellations that have scared the daylights out of Americans.

http://www.nbcnews.com/health/obama-gives-people-extra-year-keep-health-insurance-2D11591250

Obama has instituted a plan to give Americans an extra year to shop for insurance while keeping their current insurance plans.

He vowed to take action to stop the cancellations. Today, he announced the plan. Will it work? Well, like everything associated with the ACA, that remains to be seen.

Will the government computer geeks be able to repair what ails the website? That, too, is an open question.

However, I swear I heard the president say today that he’s at fault for this mess. I believe that’s what a leader is supposed to do.

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Obamacare rollout numbers put in perspective

I got to listen to a lot of yammering through most of my workday today about the rollout of the Affordable Care Act and the enrollment numbers released today by the White House.

The yapping came from Fox News commentators who — not surprisingly — were calling the rollout a disaster and the initial enrollment figures a testament to the incompetence of the Obama administration.

Then I read this article one of my dearest friends on the planet shared on social media. It tells a different story.

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/115586/obamacare-enrollment-october-was-106k-says-hhs

It says essentially two things: One, while the enrollment numbers aren’t great, they compare favorably with the initial enrollment of those in Massachusetts who became covered under what’s been called “Romneycare,” which is former Gov. Mitt Romney’s version of a mandated health insurance policy enacted in his state. Oh yes, and Romney campaigned unsuccessfully for the presidency in 2012 by running against the Affordable Care Act. The second thing the article notes is that despite the troubles with the healthcare.gov website and all the hoo-hah associated with it, the computer program stands a decent chance of getting fixed.

But that’s not what the conservative media are telling us. They’re insisting that the ACA is a disaster. They say it will never work. They insist that the computer problems are but a symptom of a failed policy.

President Obama made promises he couldn’t keep, to be sure. He said no one would be denied health insurance if they were happy with the policies they have. That’s turned out to be not the case. Is it his fault? Well, he is the president of the United States, the man in charge. It’s on his watch and he should take the heat — which he is doing.

I am unwilling, though, to give up on the Affordable Care Act. I feel the need to remind my friends on the right — and on the far right — that Medicare rolled out in 1965 with some significant glitches in it.

President Lyndon Johnson was in charge then and he managed to work with congressional leaders of both parties to fix the program. Does anyone want to scrap Medicare now? I didn’t think so.

The article attached to this blog analyzes the problem with a decided lack of passion.

I think that’s how we all should examine the ACA and look for ways to improve it.

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POTUS’s apology nothing new or unique

President Obama’s critics are making much hay — too much, if you ask me — of his recent apology to those who’ve had their insurance policies canceled as the Affordable Care Act kicks in.

He said he’s sorry. Big deal.

He’s not the first president to apologize to Americans. He won’t be the last.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_OBAMA_HEALTH_OVERHAUL?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-11-08-03-56-20

* Former President Richard Nixon apologized in 1977, three years after resigning his office in disgrace over the Watergate crisis. He said he was sorry for letting people down. He apologized to Americans across the land for the mistakes he made.

* President Ronald Reagan, while not actually apologizing, acknowledged he “misled” Americans about whether he was selling arms to Nicaraguan rebels, aka the Contras, in exchange for deals to secure the release of Americans held prisoner in Iran.

* President Bill Clinton expressed “deep regret” over his inappropriate relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. He didn’t actually apologize during that nationally broadcast mea culpa, but we got the point.

OK, so President Obama’s rollout of the ACA has gone badly. The website wasn’t prepared fully to handle the volume of Americans seeking to enroll. Then came the cancellations of insurance policies, which the president said wouldn’t happen. “You can keep your health insurance” if you’re happy with it, he told us. Remember?

My thought is this: The ACA is going to be tinkered, fine-tuned and improved as we move farther into its implementation. Do I understand all of it? No more than its ardent critics understand it. I’m not yet willing to toss it aside and declare it a disaster, as they have done.

As for the presidential apology, it’s been overblown.

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Persistent Perry keeps talking about jobs

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is nothing if not persistent.

He’s just authorized another national political ad that touts the job creation that’s occurred in Texas on his interminable watch as governor.

According to the Texas Tribune: “In a new ad for Americans for Economic Freedom, an organization aimed at helping Rick Perry champion Texas’ economic model, the governor and possible presidential contender talks about national job creation strategies.”

Interesting, eh?

Job growth in Texas has been largely a private-sector phenomenon. Gov. Perry has helped champion a business climate that is conducive to employers wanting to come here. I applaud that.

It fascinates me that Republicans such as Perry are quick to take credit for job creation while dismissing job growth that occurs on Democrats’ watch. I shall single out the dismissive attitudes the GOP has assumed regarding job growth during the Obama administration. The Labor Department this week announced that 204,000 jobs were created in October and it revised upward by 60,000 the number of jobs created during the previous two months.

Those jobs also are result of mostly private-sector activity.

Texas’s relatively good health is well-known around the world. Gov. Perry has reason to be proud of the state’s economic growth. Does he deserve the credit for jobs being created outside of government?

He thinks he does.

I’m wondering now if he’s ever going to give credit to the guys in the other party for the successes they, too, have enjoyed.

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Jobs report was supposed to be dismal

I saw the word “dismal” when reading a projection Thursday of today’s jobs report issued by the U.S. Department of Labor.

Then came the report: 204,000 jobs added to the national payroll in October.

It was far greater than the “experts” had predicted. They said in advance of the report that the government shutdown would have dissuaded employers from hiring folks they normally would be hiring, given that the Christmas shopping season is nearly upon us.

The naysayers out there will focus most certainly on the one-tenth of a percent uptick in the unemployment rate. I share their concern. We cannot seem to reduce significantly the jobless rate while we’re continuing to add tens of thousands of jobs each month.

Politics being what it is, the jobless rate increase will be President Obama’s fault, while credit for the significant boost in the job creation will go to someone else.

I’m quite certain congressional Republicans will find someone in their ranks willing to step up and take the credit.

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Two elections should send GOP a clear warning

Two gubernatorial elections occurred Tuesday that ought to serve as a serious wakeup call to the fractious Republican Party.

One GOP candidate won big; another one lost a nail-biter to a Democrat.

The big winner, Gov. Chris Christie in New Jersey, won huge in a Democratic-leaning state. The loser, Ken Cuccinelli, lost in Virginia, which has been leaning a bit Democratic in recent years. Christie — despite his claim of being a conservative — has governed as more of a centrist, mainstream Republican. Cuccinelli, the state attorney general in Virginia, is a tea party favorite who campaigned as a far-right conservative.

Christie’s win and Cuccinelli’s loss should tell the Republicans they’d be better served in 2016 if they nominate a candidate who can appeal to voters other than those who adhere to the right-wing fringe elements who comprise the party base.

Yes, Cuccinelli lost a narrower-than-expected race to Democrat Terry McAuliffe. He’d been down as much a 12 points, but ended up losing by just 2 percentage points. But … he still lost.

Christie, on the other hand, cruised to victory by a landslide margin in a state President Obama has won twice by impressive margins.

The GOP is fighting among itself. The tea party fringe is seeking to wrest control of the party from the so-called “establishment wing.” However, the establishment types have shown time and again they’re ability to work with Democrats to legislate effectively. The tea party wing has demonstrated equally well that it doesn’t care about working with Democrats or anyone else.

The lesson now for the Republicans is staring them in the face as they ponder the 2016 campaign for the White House. Will they nominate a candidate who represent all Republicans or will they march in lockstep behind someone who follows the narrow dictates of the dedicated zealots?

The clock is now ticking on the next presidential campaign.