Obama as Confidence Man
Signing the Recovery and Reinvestment Act today, the President will be asking Americans to take a leap of faith into a future that is darkening rapidly.
Today’s bad news is that California is going broke, Kansas is following suit and even Donald Trump’s casino empire is filing for bankruptcy. Yet Barack Obama will try to reassure us that the biggest financial gamble in American history is our best choice for saving the economy.
His inspirational skills are facing the supreme test. Before taking office, he told us “the very fact that this crisis is largely of our own making means that it is not beyond our ability to solve. Our problems are rooted in past mistakes, not our capacity for future greatness. It will take time, perhaps many years, but we can rebuild that lost trust and confidence.”
Confidence is the key, but it is a word that cuts two ways, meaning trust and also deception, as in “confidence game.” From all sides, politicians, economists and unaffiliated naysayers are attacking the stimulus bill as too large or too small, with too much spending or too many tax cuts, too slow or too scattered–too scary in every conceivable way.
We are back to a time when FDR’s warning that “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself” is becoming a main element of our dilemma–consumer fear of spending, banks’ fear of lending, politicians’ fear of making mistakes.
It may help to recall what the then President-Elect said about the origins of this mess:
opinions powered by SendLove.to
2 Responses to “Obama as Confidence Man”
As he signs the new bill, however imperfect, the politicians and pundits may want to take time out from their yapping and join the American people in giving the President a vote of confidence.
The problem is that this is NOT the Bill Obama wanted but is being forced on him by the same greedy politicians he railed about when he said…………. Politicians spent taxpayer money without wisdom or discipline, and too often focused on scoring political points instead of the problems they were sent here to solve.
Obama is not the problem. Nanny Pelosi and Harry Reid and the democrats are. The problem is Nanny and Harry are in charge. Not Obama.
“Nanny Pelosi and Harry Reid and the democrats are. The problem is Nanny and Harry are in charge. Not Obama.”
That's still the issue — this was Congress's bill (it's sad that “confidence man” means smiles and sound bites here, as in the campaign, to get the more gullible or desperate among the public to feel good about _any_ bill being passed and signed, which was Obama's as well as the Dems' goal in addition to demonstrating which of the two major political parties has the obvious power in Washington now). Obama remains in a power struggle against the Congress.
Congress won this battle, insofar as the meaning of what's actually in the bill is concerned.
Even the Congressional Dems (and Obama and liberal interest groups) will mostly face or acknowledge eventually when there is no new additional money to be had (tax increases cripple and diminish the economy; we even could face a debt trap sooner than conceived). Will they become sensible then, at least constrain their overreach to some extent, some of the time? That in addition to Obama vs. Congress merits watching.