(Non) Governing Style

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President Barack Obama’s idea of governing is: He provides the “vision” and his appointed experts and czars, and his political allies in Congress, the unions, etc., make it happen.

To get the economy moving, he urged a “stimulus” of $800 billion. Results? Nothing much. When a lot of attention became focused on unemployment as it reached near 10%, he called a “summit” to brainstorm ways to reduce unemployment. Results? None to speak of. When Iran refused to interrupt their nuclear program, he tried to get sanctions. Result? No change.

When Israel began construction of an apartment house in Jerusalem, Obama blew the incident into an international crisis of sorts. Palestinian leaders called on him to “impose” a peace agreement, something he still may be considering. Anyway, to him, Israel is nothing special, and he may view that nation as simply a problem. If so, it’s big mistake.

When he can’t figure out how to deal with international terrorism or international finance, he calls for a “new international order.” Maybe other world leaders can solve our problems. When his unwillingness to secure the Mexican border results in trouble for border states, he plays the race card and condemns Arizona’s reasonable attempt to defend themselves from the flood of people entering their state illegally, some to smuggle drugs and people. He wants the borders as porous as possible so he can arrange for more Democratic votes by promising the illegals government benefits and eventual amnesty.

When Tea Party protesters became too vocal at last summer’s town hall meetings on health care, Obama called out SEIU thugs to assault and intimidate people, although there had been no violence until these union members created it. Obama didn’t know, nor did his congressional friends know, how to explain the health care bill, because no one knew what would eventually be in it. Now that it’s passed, 65% of Americans want it repealed. Congressmen and Obama himself still don’t know what’s in it.

The point is, we’re seeing the results of electing as president a man of no executive experience who is now demonstrating his inability to govern effectively. How can he run a country when he has never run anything? The great voter rejection of his spending, health care and tax policies has been taken by some as a sign that America is becoming “ungovernable.” The problem is not ungovernability, the problem is poor leadership. The elitist “decision makers” are socialists, ’60’s hippies, and even some avowed communists who, along with the president, wish to force their “Progressive,” i.e. radical left-wing, views upon a nation that is fundamentally conservative.

They have awakened the silent majority. People who normally have little interest in the day to day workings of government and politics, now find that they must take an interest in it simply because their freedom is in danger. Now the government wants to control not only health care and the auto and banking industries, they want to control our daily diet and our energy usage as well. Enter restrictions on salt and bacon, not to mention the already approved rules making incandescent standard light bulbs illegal soon.

Dave Barry once wrote something to the effect that a government agency that has taken to regulating the size of toilet tanks is not needed and ought to be put to work at some kind of real job. (These regulations could possibly be blamed on G.W. Bush, or would it be Clinton?) Barry even made the satiric suggestion that the U.S. go to war against Canada over the issue of toilet smuggling. I would say that a government agency (such as Congress) that has taken to regulating light bulb use should forget such foolishness and simply take an extended vacation. The less they do, the better. And we’ve yet to see the Obama Administration’s new EPA and HHS regulations on CO-2.

The congressional majority is mostly there to enact and rubber-stamp Obama’s fascist-socialist agenda, which takes priority over all else with this administration. After the November elections, they’ll probably wonder why they didn’t do so well, and will probably say it’s because they didn’t get their message out. The truth will be that they didn’t do so well because they did get their message out. It’s just harder to disguise it these days.

Obama and his allies are willing to compromise American security (open borders) and sovereignty (“new international order”) to achieve their goals. The president seems to recognize few if any allies (Israel and the U.K., for instance), yet treats our actual adversaries as friends, e.g. Hugo Chavez.

These things illustrate the expert leadership that has been brought to bear on the BP Gulf oil spill: Reject international offers of assistance, claim to have been on the job there since day one, albeit silently for weeks, and look for the some asses to kick. Inspirational, eh? Oh, and don’t forget to put more thousands out of work by a moratorium on all offshore drilling.

With leadership like this, we are in some trouble. Looks like it will be the Tea Party, libertarians, and non-RINO Republicans to the rescue in November. One can hope.


Photo: Obama cabinet

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After the Big Spill

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Leftist environmentalists have been given a valuable gift in their struggle to stop offshore oil drilling: The BP-TransOcean oil spill. The timing is fortuitous for them, soon after President Obama’s proposal to expand offshore oil exploration. The oil spill is disastrous and tragic. People have died, businesses are threatened with extinction, and BP itself, on the hook for great expense, now with government’s “boot on its neck,” possibly faces its own end.

Llewellyn Rockwell at Mises Institute writes:

It is not as if BP profits by oil leaks, or that anyone reveled in the chance to dump its precious oil all over the ocean. BP gains nothing from this. Its own CEO has worked for years to try to prevent precisely this kind of accident from occurring, and done so not out of the desire to comply with regulations, but just because it is good business practice.

In contrast to those who are weeping, we might ask who is happy about the disaster:

1. the environmentalists, with their fear mongering and hatred of modern life, and
2. the government, which treats every capitalist producer as a bird to be plucked. [1]

As unfortunate as this accident is, it is not a sufficient reason to give up on offshore drilling, or the significant expansion of offshore drilling. That would be like giving up automobiles because of the Toyota acceleration problem, or giving up airliners because of a major crash. The Exxon Valdez oil spill did not result in a ban on oil tankers.

Among those backing continued offshore oil drilling and production are Texas Governor Rick Perry and Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson:

Speaking at a jobs summit in Washington, D.C., Perry repeatedly suggested that the spill was "an act of God." He said he hoped the massive spill would not lead to a "knee jerk" reaction to stop new or existing offshore drilling….

Patterson, who like Perry, has a long history of touting the safety of offshore drilling, said the accident was isolated and had not changed his views.

“Keep in mind that the last spill of this magnitude was in 1979, and that's 31 years ago,” said Patterson, whose office is responsible for oil spill cleanups in Texas. Patterson was referring to a June 1979 oil platform blowout that spewed millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, causing extensive damage along the Texas coast. [2]

CNS News reported that “Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said halting plans for offshore drilling because of the spill would be like stopping the space exploration program because of the 1986 Challenger explosion.” [3]

When one considers the large amount of offshore oil activity, and the rarity of serious accidents, this incident is not sufficient to justify stopping or refusing to allow additional offshore drilling and production.

CNS News carried an AP article on April 29 reporting that “[White House Press Secretary Robert] Gibbs and other officials said President Barack Obama remains committed to plans to expand offshore drilling to areas that are now off limits….” [4]

But this plan appears to be on hold as the president awaits a report from Interior Secretary Ken Salazar:

“The president was specific in ordering Secretary Salazar to look at all the possible aspects of what could and did go wrong in this instance, to report back to him in that 30-day period,” Gibbs said. “This is an administration that is going to take whatever information it gets from that and have it dictate our decision in going forward.” [5]

In addition to the concerns over the loss of life and economic damage, environmental cleanup is going to be costly and time-consuming. But the importance of pressing ahead with offshore oil activity overrides concerns about the environment, as serious as they may be. The environment will recover, as it did after other spills. The risk of further spills of this type in the near future is very low. Offshore oil production is indispensable. There are hundreds of offshore oil rigs and thousands of miles of pipelines, and tens of thousands of workers, who normally operate effectively and safely.

Rockwell emphasizes their importance over the “ecosystem”:

The abstraction called the “ecosystem” — which never seems to include mankind or civilization — has done far less for us than the oil industry, and the factories, planes, trains, and automobiles it fuels. The greatest tragedy here belongs to BP and its subsidiaries, and the private enterprises affected by the losses that no one intended. [5]

The accident needs to be investigated and the spill cleaned up. BP must be held to account for the damage. Democrats want to increase the environmental cleanup liability limit from $75 million to $10 billion. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he supports the proposal, but downplays its chances for Senate approval. [6] While BP says they will pay all appropriate damages, and they should, the proposed bill smacks of an ex post facto law. The government should have changed the limit before, if it was too low. It seems like political manipulation to try to change it now. If there are problems with BP’s compensation for damage, deal with them as they arise. They’re already likely to go out of business as a result of this spill.

[1] Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., “Feel Sorry for BP?” Ludwig von Mises Institute.

[2]Aman Batheja and Maria Recio, “Perry backs offshore drilling, says spill may be act of God,” Star-Telegram.com.

[3] Fred Lucas, “After Oil Spill, Obama Uncertain on Offshore Drilling Policy,” CNS News.


[4] Matthew Daly, Associated Press, “White House: Oil Spill Could Affect Drilling Plan,” at CNS News.


[5] Lucas, see [3].

[6] Meredith Shiner, “Harry Reid backs BP liability bill,” Politico.


Photo illustrates workers using high pressure hot water washing to clean an oiled shoreline after Exxon Valdez oil spill.

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Obama’s Agenda vs. Problems and Promises

President Barack Obama is experiencing some of the trials of the presidency that cannot be smoothed over by teleprompter eloquence or diplomatic initiative. An AP article by Tom Raum describes several major situations the President is dealing with, after his battle on health care: high unemployment, financial crisis, Gulf of Mexico oil spill, Times Square bombing attempt, Middle East “peace process,” and a Supreme Court vacancy [1]. Also, we suppose, flooding in Tennessee.

After years of lambasting George W. Bush for the response to Hurricane Katrina, liberals are seeing the model of correctness in Obama’s public response to (1) the oil spill and (2) the flooding: (1) Remark on how long it may take to correct the problem, and put pressure on the rig owner to clean it up, and (2) (fill in Obama’s flood response here).

Everything is politicized these days. Probably, the government and BP will do the things expected of them toward cleaning up the spill, and there will be declarations of disaster areas and federal help for flood victims. In both disasters, there will be substantial private relief efforts also. I don’t want to criticize Obama for things beyond his control. He will probably take the appropriate actions. But he may not have a lot better success than G. W. Bush did with Katrina.

Meanwhile, our hearts go out to the families of those lost, and all who have been injured or are otherwise suffering as a result of these disasters.

On things that are proper subjects for political comment:

The economy is beginning to recover, mainly because there is still something of the structure of a free market, despite the government’s persistent meddling and manipulation, and outrageous spending. We should be concerned about the economic (not to mention freedom) effects of the new health care law when the changes take effect. Two other big dangers: Cap and trade, which would deal a serious blow to the recovery, and VAT, which Obama will likely try to have enacted. It has been suggested that Obama’s deficit commission is there to give him cover for massive tax increases, specifically VAT. This would annihilate Obama’s promise of no tax increase for families making under $250,000, a promise already pretty well done for.

Cap and trade would leave America and Americans poorer from new taxes and regulations, and would do nothing for the environment. This should be a no-brainer, but for some reason it isn’t. Mainly, it’s just a device for expanding government power and control over citizens’ everyday lives, like the health care law. It will make people more dependent on government since they’ll have less freedom and less disposable income.

Mr. Obama’s job in dealing with the current tough situations is made more difficult by the fact that his priorities are, I believe, misplaced. He is determined to get his socialist-fascist program in place, at the expense of other needs, such as reduced unemployment, increased private sector economic activity, and building any kind of national unity. His agenda is polarizing and goes against the wishes of most of the American voters, but he knows better than they, he thinks, and is determined to get as much of this stuff done as he can before the elections put a stop to some of it.

Several of his major campaign promises have been casualties of his agenda, notably the aforementioned no-tax-on-below-$250K and some others mentioned below.

Describing Obama’s recent “Nuclear Security Summit,” Susan Dale, of Human Events Guns & Patriots notes the following:

This meeting, oddly enough, did not include the nuclear and soon to be nuclear nations of North Korea and Iran, both of which are led by lunatics and which are the two countries that are primarily responsible for current international fears of rogue nuclear activity. No worries, here, however, as our fearless leader, in an impressive display of courage, determination and diplomatic mastery of international affairs, faced down Canada, Chile and the Ukraine from implementing their nightmarish nuclear scenaria. We can now rest easy knowing that warheads will no longer be heading our way from Ottawa, Santiago or Kiev. [2]

Also, she notes that the meeting, from which the press was excluded, violated Obama’s promise of transparency [3], which had already been destroyed by the antics of the Administration and Congress in the health care and cap and trade bill processes.

Another broken promise:
“Barack Obama will eliminate all income taxation of seniors making less than $50,000 per year. This will eliminate taxes for 7 million seniors…” [4]

Politifact lists 110 promises Obama has kept, most of which have been beneficial to special interests but not the economy, plus 19 which have been broken, 34 compromised, 83 stalled and 255 “in the works.” [5] Some of the promises kept have been fortunate, such as “Expand access to places to hunt and fish,” but many unfortunate, such as “Raise fuel economy standards.” Many of the “kept” promises relate to the healthcare law and “green” energy topics.

The main reason the economy has not rebounded more quickly is the misguided government response: Massive spending and new entitlements, ballooning deficits and rumblings about getting the spending and deficit under control via new taxes. Private sector businesses find this a difficult environment for investing and hiring, with several possible new laws to make things worse.

Right now, the economic outlook is slightly improved, but the horizon remains clouded.


[1] Tom Raum, Associated Press, “Analysis: Obama beset at once by multiple crises,” 05/04/2010, at Yahoo! News.


[2] Susan Dale, “Out Neronian Leader,” 05/04/2010, Human Events Guns & Patriots.


[3] Ibid.

[4] “Barack Obama’s Comprehensive Tax Plan,” PDF linked from Politifact.com, at BarackObama.com.

[5] Politifact.

Photo : Dreamstime.com. Obama in Prague