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…to anything outside of their silo.  And, I don’t mean colorblind.  The left is anything but colorblind.

It has been said that the media, the pollsters, and the political left were shocked by the U.S. Presidential Election because they wear blinders.  It is said they only see what fits their worldview.  Of course, that can be said of almost anyone.   However, for the past eight years, the left has reinforced its own belief that anything that does not fit its view is stupid (remember the uneducated ‘deplorables’), or racist, or homophobic, or sexist, etc.,etc.

I received the cartoon below from a friend recently.  I wonder if, eight years ago, you were to have replaced the images of Mr. and Mrs. Obama in the cartoon with those of George and Laura Bush, what would have been the reaction.  My guess is that there would have been an amazing uproar about the racism of cartoonist Gustavo Viselner, by the same people who laugh at this and see it as a fairly benign political cartoon.

 

The 1992 Clinton Campaign for President made hay with the statement, “It’s the economy, stupid.”  It focussed attention on what the Democrats thought was Bush, Sr’s biggest failing.  It turned out to be a story that resonated, and won an election.

It may just be that the Republicans will use the same tactic in the 2012 Presidential Election Cycle.  Anyone who thinks that the Democrats and Mr. Obama have handled the economy well, in my view, is drinking the kool-aid.

There may, however, be a more resonant single issue that the Republicans will lever to push Mr. Obama and his team aside.  In my view, that may be the “Health Care bill.”  Nancy Pelosi famously commented, “But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it.”  If we are still discovering new things in the bill a year from now, I think the stage will be set for the Republicans to tell a very convincing story and one that will hurt the Democrats.  That story will be about lawmakers and a President with such a cavalier attitude about lawmaking (and spending other people’s money) that they should not hold public office.

This week will go a long way toward determining if this issue does resonate with the general public.  The Senate will likely vote on a measure that will repeal part of the ‘healthcare bill.’  It is the part that will require businesses to file a form 1099 on all transactions with other businesses with whom they do over $600 business in a year.  If, for example, you are the local fish store or real estate office or bookseller, you will have to save all purchase receipts, add them up, and then send a form 1099 to the office supply and the gas station and the grocer (where you get coffee for your customers), etc., etc.  The mountains of paperwork this will create will be enormous.  The number of new IRS agents that will be required to sort through all this will be huge.  It will be a burden on all businesses that will barely be worth the additional tax revenue it will generate.

And why is this even in the “health care bill”?  Mr. Obama and the Democrats in Congress wanted to show that the Health Care Bill would only cost us about $100 Billion over the next ten years.  By adding this new requirement and new tax, they could show offsetting revenue of almost $20 Billion.  Of course that is not a net $20 Billion.  In fact, many believe it is a net negative by many Billion dollars.  Think of the costs when you add the expense of the new force added to the IRS and the increased cost of goods and services to the government by increasing business overheads.

And, the White House is fighting hard to defeat this repeal of one small portion of the Health Care Bill.  They are very worried that if they lose one stone in the wall, it may all collapse.  Like the Administration’s lawsuit against Arizona for its attempt to enforce Federal and State immigration law, like the Administration’s attempts to allow taxes to increase in 2011, like Mr. Obama’s personal appeals to allow a Ground Zero Mosque, this Administration and this Congress are pushing policies that the vast majority of Americans are against.

Will new IRS requirements be the reason that Mr. Obama’s party will go down to defeat in the next election?   The 1099 issue will surely cause some people to understand the depths to which Mr. Obama and team will go to get their way.  But, my guess is that what will do them in will be the gross mishandling of the economy.  Congress and the President seem to have been politically clever in writing the Health Care Bill.   They wrote the bill such that all the parts that will hurt the most won’t take effect until after the 2012 elections.  They have been anything but clever in their attempts to ‘rescue’ the economy.

At some point I think the majority of voters will get tired of being told to ‘do as they say, not do as they do’ and Congress and the President will be voted out.  I hope that day is sooner rather than later.  I think that point will come when the majority of people have either seen pay or benefits cut or when they have lost their jobs.  Mr. Obama can blame the economy on Mr. Bush all day long, but Mr. Bush can’t change things now.  That is Mr. Obama’s job and I think most people are coming to the understanding that he is not up to the task.

If you are still defending every action of our new President, you need to ask yourself a few questions.  First and foremost is this:  Is Mr. Obama living up to his promises, and, to his promise?

If you answer yes to both his promises and his promise, I think you are deceiving yourself to keep from being embarrassed for having been sold a bill of goods.  I think you are burying your head in the sand.  If you don’t admit that he has lied and broken promises, you don’t have to face the embarassment of having been conned.   If you believe he is living up to his promises, you are acting like Bill Clinton when he said that your answer depends on what your definition of is is.  Mr. Obama has clearly broken at least seven of his campaign promises.  You need to ask yourself why he would make each of these promises and then not keep them.  Two of his broken promises involved actions over which Mr. Obama has complete control and for which he can blame absolutely no one for breaking his word.

He promised to sign no legislation (that was not an emergency) without first posting it on line for five days to give time for public comment.  On the Campaign Trail, he read from his teleprompter on many occassions, “When there is a bill that ends up on my desk as president, you the public will have five days to look online and find out what’s in it before I sign it, so that you know what your government’s doing.”  His campaign website stated, “Too often bills are rushed through Congress and to the president before the public has the opportunity to review them. As president, Obama will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days.”   Here, he is in complete control.  He said this or approved it for his website.  It took him just two weeks as President to break that promise when he signed the Children’s Health Insurance Bill the day it was passed by Congress.  To my knowledge he has not posted any bill for five days before signing it.  I am not even sure if he has posted ANY bill in its final form, for any period of time, to the White House Website prior to signing it.

Is this just a minor thing?  Is it really important?  Obama supporters will say it is not, that Mr. Obama has commented on all the bills before signing and that is the same thing.  Not so.  This is important.  This is like buying a product that says if you don’t like it, you can return it for full refund in five days but then when you return it they say, “Sorry, we told you all about it before you bought so we didn’t need to honor our promise of a return of funds.”  In short, Mr. Obama bought votes with this promise but his check has bounced.

Of a similar nature, Mr.Obama said on many occassions that one major change he would bring to Washington would be to have the most transparent government ever.  And, this was not just a campaign promise, about which the Obama supporters like to say, “Nobody keeps campaign promises.  Everyone knows they are just speeches to make people feel good.  No President in history has kept all his promises.”   He even signed an Executive Order to make it happen, sort of.  Mr. Obama even said that the debate about health care would be in the open and televised on C-SPAN.  The fact is that most of the debate is in Congress and almost all of it is behind closed doors, and, for Democrats only.  But that is Congress, not the President, you argue.  If Mr. Obama chose to honor his commitment, he need merely tell Congress (and Mr. Reid and Mrs. Pelosi in particular) that he will sign no bill that is not debated with full committees, in public.  Simple.  Why has he not done this?  Why has he not kept this promise?  Is it that he doesn’t want the debate in public?   Does he feel it would reveal all the conflicts of interest for all the players (from both sides of the aisle)?

If you are an Obama Supporter and you feel this is unfair to hold Mr. Obama to this standard (one he set, by the way), then please ask yourself the following questions:

Did you distrust Mr. Bush because “he lied” about WMD in Iraq?  In light of Mr. Obama’s “lies” why do you still trust him?

If you were a foreign government and Mr. Obama promised to protect you, would you believe him?  How would you feel about that promise if he chose to pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan?

If you believed his promise to post any legislation for five days before signing, why are you not pressing him to live up to his promise?  Why would you believe any other promise he has made?

If you believed that the healthcare debate would be broadcast on C-SPAN, are you not just a little disappointed in your President and Congress?  Why would you believe any other promise he has made?

If you believed that the Promise of Mr. Obama was great, based on his promises, how do you  feel now?  If he doesn’t stop breaking his promises, will he ever be able to live up to his Promise?

I was taught as a kid that it takes a lifetime to build a solid reputation for honesty and a single lie to tear it down.  If the people can’t trust what the President says and our Allies can’t trust what he says, what will be the result for our country’s reputation?

If you make excuses for someone who breaks promises, are you just as bad, or, just unwilling to face reality?

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