Putting Barack Obama in Focus

In 2008, many voters were disillusioned. Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan dragged on and our economic future was in doubt.

In 2008, we did not have a clear picture of Barack Obama, a candidate who offered hope and change but little in the way of a specific agenda. A key factor in the campaign was Obama's appeal as the first Black American to have a good chance to be elected president. The fact that he was not well known, lacked meaningful experience and accomplishment was overlooked. That left it to the voters to fill in the blanks.

Fast forward to 2012: We now know what Barack Obama means by change. He has revealed his vision of government as the primary driver of the economy, responsible for its growth and direction and including a right to insure a "fair" distribution of wealth.

Barack Obama's views are rooted in his background. Those views were influenced by the historical injustices suffered by countries subjugated to colonial rule and by the hardships endured by Blacks in the United States. (See the movie "2016: Obama's America" narrated by Dinesh D'Souza).

I submit that Obama's views led him to be a community organizer and ultimately to seek the presidency.    His views in large measure explain his "apology tour" in his first year as president, his persistent drumbeat for the rich to pay their "fair" share and other actions that he has taken.

Efforts to remedy past injustices are not new. In the last 100 years, the United States and other democracies have suffered many battles to liberate those countries where freedom was oppressed. In this country, we have made significant strides to insure civil rights and equal opportunity.

We have not yet completed the process; there is more to be done. But President Obama, acting in large part contrary to America's values, has not served us well. He was wrong to stress what divides us and not what unites us---wrong to instill an atmosphere of "us vs. them"---wrong to seek top down government solutions and not rely on the industriousness and ingenuity of the American people and wrong to sideline Constitutional principles and freedoms in his attempt to reach questionable ends.

By any measure, both domestic and foreign, we are in a worse position now then when Barack Obama first took office. If he is elected to a second term we can expect more of the same and very possibly worse.

Comments on Last Night's Debate

The strategies used by both parties in last night's debate were a continuation of those in the vice-presidential debate last week.

The Romney campaign continued its presentation of their plans to right the economy. The Obama campaign sought to regain some of the ground lost in the first debate by going on the attack, by obfuscating the facts and diverting the discourse from a pathetic record.

That record includes:

     An increase of Americans out of work from 21.5 million to 23.1 million; 
     An increase of those in poverty from 39.3 million to 46.2 million;
     An increase in our debt from $10.6 trillion to $16 trillion;
     Persistent unemployment and a sluggish economy.

As president, Obama has not used his legitimate powers to fix our very real problems. He has used those powers to redirect the economy and "transform" America.  If reelected, he plans more of the same--to go "forward".

His record and policies are not consistent with who we are as a country or with the cherished principles and freedoms cited in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan offer a better alternative. It is an alternative based on constitutional principles. It is also an alternative that provides hope for the future, not despair. 

The Biden Smirk and What it Reveals

If you watched the Vice-Presidential debate last night (Oct. 11), what is your first recollection when reminded of it? To me, it is the Biden smirk.

What are we to make of the Vice-President's outlandish and insulting behavior? Outlandish because it is not what we should expect from a prominent government official; insulting not only to his political opponents but to the American public as well.

There has always been an undercurrent of arrogance in the Obama message. His communicative style resembles that of a preacher declaring the unalterable truth to all of us who should be grateful to be its recipients. There is no give and take; there is no compromise--why bend when you encompass the truth?

Indicative of his attitude are his numerous executive decrees, his waivers to requirements of established law and his unconstitutional mandates under the Affordable Care Act.

The Obama governing rationale and his policies have led to monumental failures. No amount of spin can turn these failures into successes. And they know it. As Obama himself said some four years ago, when someone has a record of failure, he/she turns to small things and seeks to demean the opposition.

This is what we saw in last night's vice-presidential debate. You bluster, you interrupt, you bend the truth, you feign a child's tantrum and you smirk. Or you do as the President did, you are unresponsive and not engaged, above the fray. All in an effort to avoid the real issues.

We should not tolerate this kind of behavior in our elected officials. Neither should we support those who encourage it especially those in the media. It sullies the political process and undermines the truth.

Except for the Vice-President's revealing behavior. the debate last night was effectively a non-event. In this important election, we need a clear understanding of the issues, not smoke and mirrors. For the remainder of the campaign and in the last two debates, we deserve an honest discussion of issues based on facts. We should expect no less.

A Nation of Laws or of Men?

Mitt Romney made several important points in the first presidential debate last night. As you may surmise from the blog's title, I was pleased with his references to the Declaration of Independence and to the Constitution.

As president, Barack Obama has issued numerous executive orders, many of which are of dubious constitutionality. Some examples:

     *He has told defense contractors that they need not issue notices of impending lay-offs in disregard of the provisions of the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notice (WARN) Act.

     *He issued waivers for work requirements in the welfare reform act passed in the Clinton administration.

     *He promulgated new rules to resolve the status of illegal immigrants without congressional approval.

     *He issued regulations mandating religious organizations to include in their insurance policies coverage for contraceptives and abortifacient drugs contrary to their beliefs and in violation of the first amendment's guarantee of religious liberty.

     *He announced that his administration would not enforce the Defense of Marriage Act, an act duly enacted by Congress,

This President avoids participation in the legislative process, an area where presidential leadership is important. He seems to have an aversion to the give and take of the political arena, projecting an aloofness and dislike of the process of governing.

An example of this was his handling of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) which was rammed through Congress in secret with special deals reminiscent of the politics in authoritarian countries and not of a democratic republic.

The Declaration of Independence declares in part: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Since ancient times, the prevailing philosophy has been that all men are not created equal, that each person only had those rights assigned to whatever class in which they were born. The Declaration's pronouncement of equality for all turned that concept on its head. We as Americans have struggled to perfect that ideal since our founding. It is an ideal worth defending. It is an ideal which makes America an exceptional nation--"a city on a hill".

The ideals proclaimed in the Declaration are the basis for the freedoms enshrined in the Constitution, its Bill of Rights and subsequent amendments. Attempts to circumscribe these basic precepts, to manipulate and stretch their meaning beyond the original intent, is an affront to constitutional government and a threat to our liberty.