These are painful times for the 60,000,000 Americans who voted for John McCain. In assessing the start of the Obama presidency, it is fair to ask "Is he doing what I expected?", and "Is he competent?"
For better or worse, Obama's policy direction is about what one would have expected - whether he was clear or obfuscated during the campaign.
-- Domestically, he is using the economic mess that he inherited to greatly expand the scope of the federal government. The $ 787 billion economic stimulus plan contains goodies for everybody - tens of billions for health care; tens of billions for education; tens of billions for the construction unions; tens of billions for state and local governments; enough earmarks to capture the vote of any wavering Senator or Representative. His budget plan increases the government debt to 82% of GDP in 10 years, an amount that even White House Budget Director Peter Orszag called "unsustainable". But we'll let our kids worry about tomorrow tomorrow. And in the meantime, we have not moved beyond the Paulson/Bernanke plan for the banking sector, and the basic problem of "toxic assets" has not been addressed. While I don't like the direct intervention of the federal government into the auto industry, I'd have to admit that from a management perspective, most of their moves have been good.
-- On energy, he will do the "cap and trade" version of a carbon tax, charging utilities and industry what the liberal Center for American Progress estimates to generate at least $50 billion annually in "profit for the government" - and cost to industry and consumers. To satisfy the Sierra Club and Harry Reid, he will not support nuclear energy, the only proven technology that could be both green and financially competitive.
-- On foreign policy, he is bending over backwards to apologize to Europe and Latin America for the behavior of President Bush, President Clinton, and their predecessors. He doesn't seem to have noticed that Iran and North Korea have passed milestones on their nuclear programs, that Castro has not boarded the Obama bandwagon, or that Pakistan, our primary ally in South Asia is on the ropes. As promised, he'll close Guantanamo without a clue as to what to do with the folks there. Whatever....the adulation continues.
One could expect rookie mistakes from someone with no executive experience - and we have received them.
-- The selection of appointees began as a disaster - Richardson; Daeschle; Nancy Killifer (OMB - withdrew); Geithner (taxes). The pace of non-controversial appointments picked up in January, but the Treasury Department went for an extra two months without senior leadership. Now, with the swine flu epidemic, we have no Secretary of Health and Human Services or Director of the Center for Disease Control. Among the best of the bunch are Bush carry-over Richard Gates at Defense, and Hillary Clinton at State. Questionable are Leon (no experience) Panetta at the CIA and Janet ("illegal entry is not a crime") Napolitano at the Department of Homeland Security.
-- The press has set a much lower standard for accuracy than was used in past administrations. See FactCheck.org for Obama's erroneous claims that his budget assumptions were reasonable, that 90% of the guns in Mexico came from the United States, that oil imports are up, that irresponsible borrowers would not be helped by his mortgage plan, that the high school dropout rate had tripled, and that he was reducing "non-defense discretionary spending." I like to ask how the press would have reacted if George Bush had said any of that.
-- Perhaps his biggest dilemma is what to do about the "torture" debate. On the one hand, he has never disappointed his liberal supporters, and they want blood. On the other, he is not too eager to adopt the Argentinian practice of prosecuting the past administration for policy disagreements. We'll see.
-- In fairness, Obama has gone everywhere and met with everybody - a good plan for someone with so much to learn.
And the public - in the most recent Rasmussen poll 35% strongly approve of Obama's performance while 31% strongly disapprove, with large majorities now viewing him as a liberal and expecting government spending to increase. CNN's "poll of polls" compares Obama's overall 64% approval at this point to those of George Bush (62%), Bill Clinton (55%), George HW Bush (58%), and Ronald Reagan (67%). Interpretations vary.
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This week's YouTube is a look back at Obama's Top Ten campaign promises - on David Letterman. Does anybody have an alligator?
Bill Bowen - 5/1/09
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