By Arthur Piccolo
News Americas, NEW YORK, NY, Fri. Sept. 30. 2011: Question – Why is Barack Obama like the Red Sox??
First this ….
There is only one reason Barack and Michelle are not out scouring Washington for their palatial post Presidency digs and getting ready to make the Big Bucks. The Republicans are even more pathetic.
That is both a blessing and a curse. Or worse.
Obama’s mindless directionless Presidency offers no value for Americans who truly care about the future America’s, theirs and the Democratic Party. But at the same time the Republicans are even more clueless. They are living back in the Dark Ages.
While Obama’s poll numbers are so low his crew will point out “blue state math” to prove he can win in 2012. As has been pointed out by others reliable blue states that almost always vote Democratic that’s 18 states plus the District of Columbia have a combined 242 electoral votes or 90 percent of the votes in the Electoral College Obama needs to win that second term.
That does seem daunting for Republicans no matter the mood of the country. Are any of those reliably Democratic states going to vote Republican as is virtually necessary for a Republican victory. It might not seem so except for reality.
Individuals cast their votes for all kinds of reasons. You can make the case either that voters take their decision very seriously or you can argue voters often make very hasty voting decisions. Both views are correct. In other words it depends.
So here is Obama’s problem no matter how confident they think they are inside the wall of The White House. Obama is so disappointing to so many Democrats and independents as President for delivering a historically valuable message about change that got him elected then not delivering that the 2012 election may turn into payback time and damn it if a Republican wins voting.
There is the companion more thoughtful reason a significant number of Democrats and independents may vote against Obama because they are willing to call the Republicans bluff in the conviction that the Republicans don’t have any solutions for anything. Put one of them in The White House again and even give them a Republican Congress and the results will be so disappointing that a truly progressive Democratic candidate can go on to victory in 2016 and bring along a Democratic Congress.
Then there is the third factor weighing against Obama which must be factored in. Those who will not vote Republican but also will not vote at all because they are also unwilling to vote for Obama again. If you combine these three groups Obama’s conventional “wisdom” that his prospects look pretty good for 2012 falls apart.
There can be a less than impressive Republican candidate for President in fact there almost certainly will be but that Obama will look worse to disaffected Democrats and many independents. In other word two bad choices for President which does not necessarily augur well for Obama.
What it does do is add more logic to my so far lonely position that Obama should step aside and not run for a second term. That the best strategy of all for a Democratic Presidential victory in 2012 is a NEW candidate who can capture the public imagination and take progressive positions while pounding the Republicans from a position of believability which Obama lacks.
The more we experience the Obama Presidency the more of a mess it becomes. In a new book we learn that Obama’s own Treasury Secretary and the entire Treasury senior staff literally laughed in Obama’s face. He would take various positions, give instructions and Treasury would either delay or ignore policies they and their friends in the financial industry did not like.
Likewise the military brass have walked all over Obama selling him a bill of goods about Afghanistan while continuing to get support from Obama for the bloated outdated wasteful over the top military budget we all fund.
Continuing Obama has bought into the same terror fear mentality that Bush and Cheney used against us time and again. We just saw Obama doing the very same that the Bush Administration did Christmas after Christmas (and at other times ) in the years following the 9/11 attacks. Issuing phony terror alerts to scare us each Christmastime so that we did not forget that even at Christmas how well we were bring protracted (sic) by Bush and Cheney when nothing happened. The Obama Administration used the very same playbook in the days before the 10th anniversary of 9/11 issuing a dire warning of a terrorist plot without any factual information and the moment the 9/11 anniversary ended the story disappeared. No more action no more concerns.
How about health care?
What the highly touted Obama health care law is doing is making the so called health care industry richer than ever. Following the passage of the new law what are the insurance companies doing hiking their rates to record levels with huge increases in premiums for companies and individuals.
They just can’t wait until if Obama gets his way pretty soon you will be a “criminal” if you don’t purchase medical insurance from one of these huge, profit driven health insurance companies. But if you can’t afford it and you beg the gov’t to assist you then the tax payers will directly pay these insurance companies for you to insure their profits soar. Either way we all pay for their profits.
ObamaCare is the best thing that ever happened to the health care industry and the opposite for the American people. If upheld by the Supreme Court ObamaCare will become one of the all time boondoggles and an unsustainable program that will accelerate the bankruptcy of America. While not giving us the care we deserve.
What we needed at the least was a public option what we really need is what every other major country has a single payer system.
But our weak President was unwilling to fight for either. Rather he came up with a dream “plan” for the health industry, ‘insuring’ them millions of new customers forced to buy their product under the penalty of Federal law. They are jubilant. This extreme attempted misuse of our Constitution will be decided by the Supreme Court. Better hope they know what they or doing or who knows what else Obama may try to force us to do.
While this stuff is going on, the U.S. has an economy in crisis. A higher level of poverty than at any time in memory. More dissatisfied Americans who see no real hope for their future. A situation in Europe even more chaotic. And the overlords in China continuing to overwhelm the United States. So what is the point of this commentary?
Obama can rely on his Blue State strategy all he wants. He and his campaign can convince themselves it is virtually impossible for a Republicans especially anyone of this motley crew of Presidential candidates to beat him in the traditional Democratic states that will ensure Obama’s victory. It will not change the fact that as bad as they are and as good as the math looks to Obama what should concern him and us is that Barack Obama still has an “excellent” chance to lose.
I hesitate to turn to the sports analogies but why not? I promised above! Both the Boston Red Sox and the Atlanta Braves were certain to make the MLB playoffs this year. Except they didn’t. They both experienced historic collapses. Many are dumbfounded.
But they shouldn’t be if they watched these two teams play.
The hype during the season and especially pre-season was that Boston had it all the Red Sox may be the best team of all in 2012. Except they could not hit, could not pitch, they could not field, and they could not even run the bases well as was painfully proven by watching them play as they lost 20 of their last 27 games when it most counted in the critical last month of the season.
Likewise don’t kid yourself here.
President Obama is in trouble no matter who his opponent turns out to be. He can’t hit. He can’t field. And he should not run!
Arthur Piccolo is a professional writer and commentator and often writes about Latin America for New Americas.
