By Manifesto Joe
I hope he's not LBJ, either, with the two foreign quagmires he inherited from Il Doofus. But he seems to have put the Republicans on well-deserved notice. He genuinely tried to work with them, and they are quite determined not to let it happen.
So, Obama decided to use the current congressional recess to put through 15 stalled appointments that are holding up the wheels of government. Here's the story from Yahoo! News.
The Republicans are, ironically, braying like jackasses about this, even after they have threatened the filibuster in many unprecedented ways to hold up routine nominations. I think they need to reconsider their choice of animal mascots. The elephant is a noble creature, famous for its memory. Nothing could be further from the current Republican reality.
Jimmy Carter is arguably the best former U.S. president -- a man unquestionably ethical, and of very high intelligence. Unfortunately, he wasn't prepared for the kind of partisan games he encountered in Washington, perhaps because of his lack of experience in the Beltway. He will always wear the albatross of "ineffectual" in retrospectives on his presidency. I think Obama, after a sincere period of bipartisan efforts, has concluded that this is not going to be the way to get things done in the current climate.
I worried about Obama at first, and confess that I voted for Hillary Clinton in the March 2008 Democratic primary here largely because of concern about Obama's relative inexperience. It would appear though, that a few years in the Senate, plus the expert background in constitutional law, prepared him much better than widely expected.
He hasn't delivered entirely on the promise, but something is better than nothing. I'll take something.
Hit 'em again, Barry.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
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4 comments:
I applaud, and am greatly encouraged, by the President's recent hands-on approach to governing. The obstructionist GOP has held up the progress of this duly-elected government long enough, and they deserve to be steamrolled as often as necessary. Perhaps once they again start to negotiate in good faith, such tactics as recess appointments will no longer be used.
Obama's predecessor used recess appointments, too. But of course the crybaby Republicans conveniently choose to ignore or forget this. In Bush's case, two of these appointments were unsuitable far-right ideologues or big campaign donors; the first being the notorious neocon Jon Bolton as ambassador to the UN, and the other being named ambassador to Belgium. At least Obama's appointments are qualified people who deserve to be there and will actually contribute something of value to their positions.
Obama tried to work with the GOP on health care and it blew up in his face. After months of delay, not a single GOP politician supported him. Then came the August town hall AstroTurf "protest" movement and associated PR fiasco and then the loss of Kennedy's seat and the Dems' supermajority and the near-death of the whole health care effort.
Reaching out to the GOP has only left Obama with a bloody stump where his hand used to be.
I'm still trying to recall a single instance where Bush ever reached out to the Dems on any issue during his eight years in office.
Like Obama, Clinton often bent over backwards in a desperate effort to reach out to and accomodate the GOP. And what did he get in return? The GOP launched its vicious witchhunt against him and impeached him----apparently oblivious to the fact that many presidents have had mistresses, going back to Jefferson, who had a child by his slave mistress.
I think the President's experience in the nightmarish/Goldbergian Chicago political machine gave him more than a clue about the dickishness and spite that rules the beltway. Gotta give him credit, he inherited economic, diplomatic, and political scorched earth. It's a wonder he even passed any healthcare reform, lord knows I wish it had more teeth than it did. He'll only be a one-term president, but he'll be that way for the right reason, actually trying to accomplish something in his tenure. I still wish he could summon Teddy Roosevelt to crush corporate financing and lobbying and Franklin Roosevelt for getting programs implemented, though.
-WageslaveZ-
Yeah, WageslaveZ, I would agree that the Chicago political experience probably did much to prepare Obama as well.
Whether he's going to be a one-term president depends, I think, on what the Party of Satan, er, Republicans do in 2012. If they put up a yahoo like Palin, they will probably lose. Mitt Romney would probably have a good chance of pulling it off.
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