Fire up the teleprompter and alert the state-run media, because Obama’s headed back to TV!
In a desperate attempt to shore up his disintigrating agenda (not to mention his approval ratings) President Obama has scheduled a rose garden press conference for 12:30 today. Issues he’s expected to discuss include health care reform, jobs, and the situation in Iran. So, we thought we’d put together a little run down on those issues.
Health Care
Health care reform is coming apart at the seams. Polls show only 41% of the people want it, and that number drops when you start factoring in questions about how to pay for it. So far, Obama and the Dems have proposed at least seven different tax hikes, five of which break his promise not to raise taxes on the middle class. They are:
- Higher alcohol taxes
- Increases to the Medicare Payroll tax
- A national sales, or Value Added Tax
- A 10 cent soda tax
- A 2% tax hike on those making over $200,000 a year
- A new employee payroll tax
- Taxing employer-provided health care benefits
Last week, Obama’s private physician of 22 years publicly slammed the President’s plan, saying that Obama’s advisers have no grasp of the issues involved with on-the-ground patient care.
Jobs
Since his inauguration, the US has lost roughly 2 million jobs. The stimulus package has, so far, failed miserably, unless you happen to be a turtle. In Florida, 3.4 million stimulus dollars are being spent on a tunnel, so the adorable little shellbacks can get across the street.
Obama claims the stimulus has saved 150,000 jobs. Of course, he has no way to prove this, since it’s impossible to calculate what “might have been.” Even if he’s right, that still puts him a whopping One Million Eight Hundred Fifty Thousand jobs in the hole. With roughly 600,000 new jobs being lost each month, saving a measly 150,000 is nothing to brag about.
Meanwhile, his handling of the auto industry has closed factories and confiscated privately owned dealerships. The move has cost individuals and entire communities their livelihoods. Welfare claims are up almost 30% from a year ago, largely due to plant closures.
IRAN
Talk about being late to the party. When the recent uprisings in Iran started, Obama was unimpressed, saying that when things died down he’d still be willing to sit down and negotiate with Ahmadinejad. After that, he fell silent while the rest of the world weighed in, mostly supporting the rioting protesters. Then the Iranian military started killing 16 year-old girls in the street, forcing the President to speak.
Obama claims that he doesn’t want to see the Iranian regime using the United States as an issue in the uprising. This is, frankly, ridiculous. Whether it succeeds or fails, Ahmadinejad and his cronies will always scapegoat the US, just as they always have. Did Obama really believe that his silence would buy respect from the ayatollah? According to the New York Times, even Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton were dissatisfied with his sheepish attitude. By the time he realized he was standing on the wrong side of history, and found the strength to issue a mookish, carefully-worded condemnation of the violence, his moment had passed him by.
TODAY
So now, Obama’s headed for TV again. The media will, no doubt, wrap itself around the President like a safety blanket, asking only the easiest of questions. They will allow him to claim some sort of retroactive moral clarity regarding the situation in Iran. Obama may admit that there have been mistakes – not that he made them, mind you, but simply that they exist.
The process of change, he will remind us, is a long one. There will be many ups and downs.
The overall message will be “Stick with me. I’m still trying to undo the laundry list of problems handed to me by George Bush. Remember George Bush? You don’t like him. You like me. Please, just ignore the facts and that nagging feeling that I’m making things worse. We’ll get through it together. I promise.”
People are getting tired of the excuses, Mr. President.
-Robert Laurie
