ShareThisLong-time Washington hands conclude the public honeymoon is over for President Obama, and I guess so -- look at the "tea parties" as angry citizens protest his policies, carrying signs that says such things as, "Honk if I am paying your mortgage."
Poor, benighted souls. They still think self-responsibility matters, not just allusions to it in Obama speeches, but the real thing. That would entail squashing policies in which the government robs hard-working, frugal Peter to pay slothful, reckless Paul while excusing the crime as social justice.
The demonstrations, scattered all over the nation, are patterned after the anti-tax Boston tea party of the 18th century, and just may grow in the face of anger over $165 million in bonuses given to the executives of an insurance company sucking up taxpayer billions in a rescue package.
As obnoxiously avaricious as these AIG contractual bonuses were, it is authoritarian, unconstitutional overreach for the government to try to block them at this point. Obama does not care. He shares the blame for anger at the executives, having railed repeatedly and demagogically against economically insignificant CEO salaries, and now that this public fury is turning in his direction, his administration is making it clear it is perfectly happy to throw the rule of law overboard.
For all his articulateness and gift for oratory, this president seems to be spending his time in the Oval Office walking into walls. He has botched up more things in two months in office than most presidents manage over two terms, amply illustrating the campaign charge that his inexperience equipped him for next to nothing.
I was particularly shocked at how he engaged in fear mongering as he won rush-job passage of a sloppily constructed, do-little stimulus package that reversed the welfare reforms widely considered the most important achievement of the Clinton years. Now he whistles an optimistic tune. Did he finally get it that the more you talk down the economy, the further down it goes?
The likelier truth is that, after fear did its designated job, he turned booster as a way of justifying what could be the biggest, most costly budget that has ever come our way. Given that we have tens of trillions of dollars of unfunded liabilities from Social Security and Medicare and will spend incredible amounts to lift the economy, a very real possibility with such a budget is hyperinflation destroying the savings of everyone.
And don't forget that Obama has already nodded his head yes as the Democratic Congress passed a bloated, dishonest, pork-ridden 2009 supplemental budget bill, as if he had never pledged to make up for astonishing expenditures through heroic waste reduction.
Though he wants to raise taxes on the so-called rich at the risk of curbing needed entrepreneurship and investment, Obama also signed a measure providing health insurance benefits for some of America's best-off families. He intends to pay for this unneeded extravagance through tobacco taxes that will mostly afflict lower-income groups which constitute the overwhelming majority of smokers today.
He also wants a bureaucratically impossible cap-and-trade carbon tax that will boost everyone's energy costs by an enormous amount and just might throw us back into an economic crisis, if we are already out of it before any such foolhardiness comes to pass.
In a bow to further inanity, this president has taken steps to turn auto emissions policy over to California, meaning that the nation's most politically wacky state could end up killing the already wounded auto industry by dictating what kinds of new cars Americans can buy -- much more costly ones than now.
There's more, far more, but you get the idea, and so have others, as declining approval ratings show, and as we find in the tea parties. I can remember nothing like them so early in any administration in my lifetime.
Let's hope they slow this president down some.
(Jay Ambrose, formerly Washington director of editorial policy for Scripps Howard newspapers and the editor of dailies in El Paso, Texas, and Denver, is a columnist living in Colorado. He can be reached at SpeaktoJay(at)aol.com.)
COLUMN
how come you don't mention...
that Barack and Dodd and Hillary and Biden were all in the top 10 recipients of AIG donation largesse. If they are arguing for the individuals to return their bonuses, shouldn't they return the contributions to we the people since it is our money, not AIG's to bribe them with?
Slowing down the President
With the attitude that the President, the Democrat Congress, and their "lamestream media" lackeys are projecting - "We won - SHUT UP!" - it's going to take more than these somewhat lame "tea parties" to slow them down (right now, I'm almost certain that anything short of garlic, wolfsbane, holy water and sharp oaken stakes would stop these people). We may need some SERIOUS civil disobedience movements as seen in the Orange Revolution in Ukraine and the Rose Revolution in Georgia. You won't see movements like this until a lot of people in the US experience some REAL pain due to this administration's policies.
Ambrose = Hack
Ambrose has always been a garden variety wingnut welfare-slurping hack, issuing out the usual hamfisted defenses of gas-guzzling this and law-breaking that by citing either his own noggin or the discredited think tanks (AEI, Cato, Heritage). In that form, he serves absolutely no purpose. It's a fitting career end for a man who originally helped speed the decline of the Rocky Mountain News- the money paid to syndicate Jay's tired ramblings could be used for, say, actual reporting and the like.
But, see, Jay really turned up the crazy during the election. His ravings against Obama, culminating in his final anti-Obama pre-election column that cited approvingly from Joe the Freaking Plumber, weren't even as bad as the gunk he would e-mail to you. It was there where he spewed Ayers, Wright, and most laughably, the Obama-is-Muslim smears. I'm not sure whether Jay's editor kept him from getting this stuff to print, or if he just chickened out. Either way, it was nice to see some of his real rancid wingnuttery and hatred make the Op/Ed pages for no other reason than sunlight being our best disinfectant. Ambrose isn't merely a boring hack, he's a hate-mongering extremist. It's nice to know we can judge him for what he truly is.
Even now, as he attempts to go back to Jay-writes-exactly-what-you-think-he'll-write mode, he's still infecting his words with Glenn Beck-style fear ravings. Obama's scaaaary! He's diiiiifferent! Socialism! And on and on. Glad to see he can't hide the true Jay anymore.
Attacking the Messenger
Nice attempt at attacking the messenger, but not all Americans are fooled by your approach. You haven't refuted anything in this article, and are left only with attacking the author's credibility.
Even if you were correct in your attack of the author, the cliché "of a stopped clock is right twice per day" would apply. You're still expected to attack the argument, not the person.
Is Ambrose wrong? If so, then provide evidence. Attacking him personally just demonstrates to the rest of us that you have no facts or contrary evidence.
SEAMUS---Once again, your
SEAMUS---Once again, your comment is just another example of a lib attacking the messenger instead of addressing the message. This type of tactic is really getting old. You and Robert Gibbs are using the same tactic, it must be the only one currently approved by Mr. Soros?
Seamus
Wow man, you really are an idiot! You have no basis for what you say and just ramble like a little kid. Grow the fuck up!
Isn't this bribery and not political contributions?
"that Barack and Dodd and Hillary and Biden were all in the top 10 recipients of AIG donation largesse"
All together they took less than $2 million dollars but by doing so put in train the ruin of the United States. AIG's paying out $160 million dollars in bonus's is nothing compared to the over $80 Billion that AIG has given to foreign banks and countries and AIG is asking for more.
They sold out the United States for less than $2 million dollars and that along with the melt down of the financial markets caused by Fanny and Freddy caused by political correctness engendered by Barney Frank/Chris Dodd did our country in financially. These people took bribes and caused our ruin. They worked in behalf of organizations that turned criminal and didn't care as long as the contributions/payoffs continued. This was quid pro quo for peanuts but it caused disaster.
Proof times two...
that Obama is as bad as we suspected and his supporters are devoid of facts to refute the revelations.
Tea Parties
Does anyone seriously believe that the federal government has the wisdom to make better economic decisions with our money than individuals could on their own? Congress doesn't appear to be composed of saintly Mensa menbers. I bet that 535 citizens selected at random would do a better job than the politicians we have now. On top of their incompetent flailing, congress insults the taxpayer by stuffing the "stimulus" bill with lots of pet projects that can't be justified as economic stimulus.
Instead of a binge of spending, where is the regulatory reform to try to avoid this economic mess in the future? Where is the equivalent to the RTC? Reforms to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
Found a database that has
Found a database that has the professions of congress members before they got elected. Just for grins, I tried the following terms.
Engineer - 4 Representatives.
Doctor - 1 Senator, 6 Representatives
Lawyer/Attorney - 43 Senators, 145 Representatives
I'm wondering if that isn't part of our problems right there. Lawyers early-on learn that words don't really mean anything - they're malleable and subject to all sorts of interpetations. (IS and SEX come to mind on that - and what was Bill Clinton again? Oh, right, A lawyer... fancy that!)
I believe this is going to get much worse - and there's going to be tar and feathers before its all over. Getting a majority AND the Presidency might have been the worst possible thing to happen to the Democratic Party in the last century.
Tea Party Tax Tips
Pass it on...
You and Robert Gibbs are
You and Robert Gibbs are using the same tactic, it must be the only one currently approved by Mr.
The wingnut mind on display.
Simply stunning.
More of the same.
Jay, Jay, Jay -- more of the same old right wingnut tripe. I wonder -- Did you have anything to do with putting the Rocky Mountain News out of business?
Playing Hard Ball with Obama
Mr. Obama has been playing hard ball with our Constitution, the economy, and every other part of our nation he can get his hands on. Isn't it about time the People played hard ball with him?
The evidence of his Kenyan birth is out there if and only if it can be pried loose from those who protect Mr. Obama. For example, there is a published report of a retired INS agent who has seen Obama's FS-1 Visa he used to enter Columbia University. Obama has this file under seal. Is there any way this file can be made public? There is also the matter of statements made by his paternal grandmother who was present at his birth in Mombasa.
The evidence is out there, but, the People must move quickly before Obama and his minions have cleaned up the evidence.
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