You may be right about the sequester, Mr. President, but this is crazy
Is this fiscal standoff (the fifth since Republicans took control of the House in 2011) just about scoring political points, or is it about governing?
If it’s all about politics, bully for Obama. A majority of voters will likely side with the president over Republicans in a budget dispute because of his popularity and the GOP’s pathetic approval ratings.
If it’s about governing, the story changes: In any enterprise, the chief executive is ultimately accountable for success and failure. Sure, blame Congress — castigate all 535 lawmakers, or the roughly half you hate. But there is only one president. Even if he’s right on the merits, Obama may be on the wrong side of history. …
“Americans are fed up with the jousting.… There is a lot of public posturing but apparently not much genuine conversation.”
White House officials and liberal commentators will push back: They say it is naïve if not outright stupid to think that Republicans want to talk to Obama, or that conversations would do any good. I contend it’s not any smarter to believe that the president’s agenda will be passed without breaking gridlock, or that Washington is the only place where two wrongs make you right. Somebody has to be the grownup here. Let it be the president.
Blowback
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If Obama is sooooo worried about food being taken from the mouth’s of children, autistic kids going without their medication, and the elderly having to eat catfood, then he should cut back on his vacays. The Obama family’s vacays and entertainment cost taxpayers $1.4 billion last year.
The US borrows 46 cents out of every dollar it spends. If we can’t cut $85 billion in the GROWTH of spending, then someone needs to turn out the lights because we will NOT be spending less next year.
Resist We Much on February 21, 2013 at 9:42 AM
Wish-casting.
hillsoftx on February 21, 2013 at 9:43 AM
As the media ignores whose idea it was.
NeoKong on February 21, 2013 at 9:45 AM
Dog Eaters can’t be the grownup, science has proven it.
Bishop on February 21, 2013 at 9:46 AM
He’s right about the very thing he proposed? Typical. Can’t see beyond the end of his nose and his ego. Let him be hoist on his own petard.
totherightofthem on February 21, 2013 at 9:46 AM
Dear leader has the edge (as usual)
-lsm
cmsinaz on February 21, 2013 at 9:48 AM
If after reading his own sentence, Ron Fornicate still can’t figure out that Obama is all about politics 24/7, then he’s either got his head up Barry’s backside or he’s a straight-up moron.
It is at least somewhat of a relief to see the drive-bys starting to talk about this openly more often. That under this regime, everything seems to be a crisis and we seem to move from one to the next with regularity. You can’t run a government that way. At least not without it ending up as dysfunctional and bankrupt as this one.
Doughboy on February 21, 2013 at 9:52 AM
How about the democrats following the rule of law and passing a budget….
…think that might eliminate some of these “fiscal standoff’s”????
….uh..yea right….because negotiating with this type of mindset is impossible:
..tell us genius…what good does it do to negotiate with people that are so irrational that they actually deny there is a debt problem????…..
These are the same people that are pushing gun bans that they readily admit won’t work…won’t stop the killing. It’s all about pushing the liberal agenda with democrats and not about what is best for the country.
“entitlements are off the table”…..yea that makes sense….since the biggest debt driver we have are entitlements.
You can’t successfully negotiate with stupid.
Baxter Greene on February 21, 2013 at 9:56 AM
Poor Ron Fournier. Bless his heart. Still thinks Obama is, or wants to be, like any other President.
He isn’t. And he doesn’t. “Governing” is not in his vocabulary. It’s not why he ran and not why he was reelected.
He is turning the Presidency into something the Old Media like Ron Fournier simply cannot understand or wrap their heads around. He wants to punish, literally punish, Republicans and the voters who voted to keep the Republicans in control of the House. He has NO interest in compromise, at all. First, because he doesn’t know how, that takes skill that he doesn not have. Second, because he wants a one-party socialist America. He thinks he can break the Republicans, make them so unpopular with the people that they will turn them all out in 2014, and THEN he can just sit back and sign the bills that will complete his “fundamental transformation” of America.
Obama has spent the last two years doing nothing but marking time after the Republicans took the House. He will spend the next two years doing the exact same thing – nothing but attack Republicans – until the 2014 elections.
This is so easy a caveman could do it. But apparently the goo-goos in the liberal political media just can’t figure out Obama. I don’t know whether to just laugh at them or cry.
rockmom on February 21, 2013 at 10:24 AM
Do not cave…. replace the cuts with only other cuts or let the sequester make the cuts for you GOP.
I don’t care if they trot out poll after poll claiming the GOP will be blamed. Whenever they poll approval of Congress it always gets a low number. But the numbers change when they ask about a persons’ own member. So in 2014 I expect the sequester to be a nonissue.
Bensonofben on February 21, 2013 at 10:48 AM
There must be some doubt as to who the grown up in the room is.
Good Lt on February 21, 2013 at 10:55 AM