If you think our cultural climate has been grossly, politically charged this year so far, get ready because after this Labor Day weekend, the pols are going to be strapping on the battery booster packs for the run up to Nov. 2nd, and let's face it, President Obama is getting hammered from every side and the key overarching questions for today's program were, Is the President an asset or liability for Democrats leading up to that date and is what his administration doing right for this country. With regard to the latter, for the Republicans the answer will always be no so we have to try and give some perspective.
Every Republican politician you see on television these days has to practically stop him/herself from salivating on camera when discussing the November midterms. Collectively, they are supremely confident that they will take control and the Congress. The mainstream Republicans are embracing the Tea Party Republicans to capture that majority and according to every pundit, it is a certainty. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), today's first guest, was no exception in his confidence.
The Senator's tactical logic for both topics of discussion, Iraq and the economy, was that it didn't matter at this point what initial actions were responsible for the state of both, but now that we're here, it is President Obama that bares the burden of history for both.
We, at The Opinion, are not at all excited by this Administration's messaging since the election, where they had done so well with communication, and in the town of spin the Administration is dizzy and confused. They are unable to make people understand the chain of events and they aren't being honest about timing.
Usually, any Administration's policy choices are felt by the people years down the line, and when we say years we mean if something is passed in the months after a President's first term, you will not see the effect until perhaps half way through his second term. Maybe even after he's out of office. This is the exact dynamic you had with the Bush Administration, but he was no exception and neither willl be Obama. The point is, that the United States is a huge ship that takes years to turn just 90 degrees (forget about 180 degrees), and people simply don't have the patience to wait for the full turn.
So when Lindsey Graham says on today's Meet The Press, that right now the government taxes and spends too much you have to wonder about his judgement. By extending the Bush tax cuts for the top 2% of Americans, in terms of wealth, as he advocated today, the debit will rise even more, hence we're spending more money we don't have.
With regard to the Healthcare Bill, he saying that we headed for government run healthcare and the we should replace the just-passed bill with something the puts control into the private sector. This is just another way of saying that the insurance companies should continue to dictate the terms of coverage. The result: everyone's premiums will continue to climb and the government will continue to put even more money adding, again, to the debt and spending more money we don't have. He also said that the Democrats used every parliamentary trick to pass the bill, which is simply political posturing and not true. The bill ended up being compromised to the point where the base of the Democratic Party was dissatisfied, and no Republican was voting for it any way.
MSNBC's Erin Burnett, pointed out twice (during the today's roundtable) that from her reporting and researching she has found that the recovery from this particular recession is the fastest of any in the past 25 years, hence turning the ship faster than normal.
The Washington Post's E.J. Dionne advised to pick a fight over the Bush tax cuts but that could be a losing proposition because tax cuts are an easy sell, the wrong thing to do, but an easy sell. Additionally, when asked if the President was an asset or a liability, he said 'both.' Well, if the President can get his message across to the people, you'll definitely see a vote of no confidence.
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