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Sol Sanders -- Follow the Money No. 62 The 2012 electoral pageant begins
Here's the latest from Sol Sanders on the illusion called Barack Obama. A version of this column is scheduled to be published Monday, April17, 2011, in The Washington Times. -- Chris
Follow the Money No. 62 The 2012 electoral pageant begins
By Sol Sanders <solsanders@cox.net>
It looks like next year’s presidential election will be a beauty contest.
Electors aren’t likely to get a Lincoln-Douglas debate. Voters might reasonably have hoped for something approaching that given the domestic financial crisis, young Americans dying in three wars overseas, a host of other difficult domestic and foreign crises, all against a general conflict over traditional ethical values.
But by launching his campaign with outrageous demagoguery, Pres. Barack Obama “made it clear” he will avoid fundamentals. He counts on emotional appeals to self interest – private and corporate welfare recipients, elderly who make old age a profession out of human tragedy, all interests vying for favor at the public trough. Mr. Obama obviously counts on adulation rather than cognition – from naïve youth addicted to “change-whatever”, the gold-laden Hollywood glitterati, guilt ridden intellectuals obsessed with race, Washington’s enormous public and private lobbies, and minority voters blindly following media created leadership.
That, in turn, will make it difficult for his opponents to respond with a candidate and a campaign based on issues.
Mr. Obama’s opening speech, supposedly presenting a new economic program, was the tip-off. Clichéd ridden, it was rhetorically a u-turn on his own free-spending budget proposals announced just weeks earlier. Without so much as an apology, he “welcomed” the trimmed 2011 budget – halfway through a fiscal year during which Democrats had held all the three Washington power centers and as though his Democrats had not opposed every cut only days before.
The verbal turnabout permitted Mr. Obama to jump aboard what his counselors obviously see as the Republican Party/Tea Party/conservatives’ bandwagon appeal for renewed fiscal discipline. As an old friend often warned me, never underestimate the role of fads in American life: “deficit reduction” is now “in”, whether understood or not by recently acquired advocates.
Mr. Obama’s teleprompter readings were as golden as ever – a “gift” he once said -- even if one tires of a speechwriter obsessed with “xxx let me make clear xxx”, always prelude to another muddled concept. But there were no specific proposals for reining in government spending. In fact, expanding the liberals’ hallowed welfare state would solve problems of debt and unemployment, he reassured us, not surgical systemic reform as his own investigating panel suggested.
But the program to spend the country’s way into new prosperity had crashed, however slow he and his advisers were to acknowledge until the voters told them so first in November 2010, and now with sagging opinion polls. Scarce jobs and rising food and fuel prices are the reality masked by his cooked statistics.
As always it is likely to be the unintended consequences, partially resulting from his own habitual indecision, and unanticipated events dictating the November 2012 outcome.
But some critical facts on the ground are going to be all too obvious.
Mr. Obama’s intent to give the Libyan situation a hit and a miss and bow out to our allies is doomed, as any military observer worth his salt could have predicted. His stand-in, “NATO”, relies overwhelmingly on U.S. initiative as well as hardware and alone cannot dislodge or even modify Qadfaffi’s regime. Despite Sec. of Defense Robert Gates’ repeated pronouncements, American fighterplanes – the only ones capable of doing the job –continue as close air combat support for Libya’s incompetent and suspect rebels. And they will eventually need ground assistance if Mr. Obama’s announced aim of ridding the world of Qadaffi is to be achieved.
As Mr. Obama uses presidential fiat to cancel another pipeline from Canada, the energy fiasco escalates – in all fairness only partly due to his misbegotten policies. But if gas is at $5 a gallon or more Labor Day 2012, as seems likely, voters will look to their credit cards again before entering the polling booth.
There is no dearth of Republican candidates. But with the emphasis on bling-bling rather than legislative and executive experience, the spotlight is all too likely to fall on those matching the incumbent’s “glamour”. That apparently explains the boomlet for Donald Trump, surely the unlikeliest candidate for the presidency in decades.
That’s a sad thought as we enter the electoral season. One can only hope the good sense of the American people which has held us in good stead for so long will reassert itself and demand more substance and less glitz.
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Let the mass brainswishing begin.
We are all so thoroughly screwed...
Nathan Bedford Forrest was ahead of his time in his views.
Thank God George Bush never gave hand outs at the public trough. Like, say for example, a Medicare Drug Payment Plan, 2 unfunded wars, Corporate tax cuts galore. This after he failed at several businesses his daddy handed him on a silver platter to go fuck-up with. This after being an admitted boozer at Yale who was said to be found passed out at parties after most everyone else had gone home. Strange I don't remember Republicans like Mr. Whalen being so upset about it when a Republican "W" Bush inhabited the White House---but when the welfare is for Whalen's buddies in the banking industry courtesy of COC's John C. Dolan, Senator Dick Shelby, former Senator Phil Gramm, former Representative Jim Leach, and former Rep Thomas Bliley Mr. Whalen was amazingly quiet. Oh yeah, I forgot when the welfare is for his economic class then it's "ok".
It's nice Chris Whalen spews Mr. Sanders blather for him, 'cuz nobody reads the rag called Washington Times anymore. If they want right-wing crap they can read the Washington Post. At least the Post presents their propaganda like they're halfway literate.
I've never read a better rationale. Lets all point at bad behavior to excuse its continuation. How helpful this all is!
the .gov is so full of empty promices change and tea partys my bet is more people will vote for the black guy... thats the most real thing thats gunna end up on the ballot
.
skin color
Screw the issues, The american people want a candidate that can Dance!
Comming Fall 2012:
Dancing with the Presidential Candidates. The Audience chooses the next President
Better than "Hilter on Ice":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybuKQf9p5jg
Which ever candidate can dance around the issues wins!
That would be great show!
To much meat left on the taxpayers bones yet to scape off yet. Do not expect any reality to unsue on your behalf. Structual issues remain do they not? The pain is just ramping up and the focus is there short term survival not yours...
http://www.americancivicliteracy.org/2008/summary_summary.html
Officeholders typically have less civic knowledge than the general public. On average, they score 44%, five percentage points lower than non-officeholders. Thirty percent of elected officials do not know that “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” are the inalienable rights referred to in the Declaration of Independence.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41d-vFc76mY&feature=related
The story of Rip Van Winkle is set in the years before and after the American Revolutionary War
Rip Van Winkle, a villager of Dutch descent, lives in a nice village at the foot of New York's Catskill Mountains. An amiable man whose home and farm suffer from his lazy neglect, he is loved by all but his wife. One autumn day he escapes his nagging wife by wandering up the mountains. There he encounters strangely dressed men, rumored to be the ghosts of Henry Hudson. After drinking some of Feds Cool aid, he settles down under a shady tree and falls asleep. He wakes and returns to his village, where he finds twenty years have passed. He finds out that his wife has died and that his close friends have died in a war or gone somewhere else. He immediately gets into trouble when he proclaims himself a loyal subject of Ben Shalom Bernanke not knowing that the American Revolution has taken place.
Hang 'em high!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lvwZgq4ydc
...turnabout permitted Mr. Obama to jump aboard what his counselors obviously see as the Republican Party/Tea Party/conservatives’ bandwagon appeal for renewed fiscal discipline.
Fine. He can punk Them for the following 4 years. My keister is worn out.
I don't care from what party they come... put guys in there like Kuchinich, Grayson, Paul, (Sr.. It's time for him to tell his kid he is up, way past his bedtime) If we are forced to vote for Obama under the Known Evil Act, we want to send him back to DC as clearly our penance for voting for him in the first place.
Those guys should be able to embarrass him.
Grayson fantastic. I didn't think of him. He'd never win though.
As long as “ the boys” have control of the media we are in bad shape. I heard on NPR radio just now that the Dow was down due to a Standard and Poors--- report. NO mention of the down grade of the USA credit rating.
NPR is off the radio now. I can't take bias. I wrote to them too. But guess what? we are here. They don't have control of Zero Hedge. How many people read this site?
The left libs funded by Soros hate the alternative media such as Zero Hedge. They are going after any message which they cannot control using that windbag Huffington who is now controlling AOL's media spin. The left also has a new weapon patch.com whose sole purpose is to belittle, downplay any message that does not fit the left's agenda....they ae coming after the last real free press..
Soros is coming to get you, hide under your bed. Did you even vote last election. No probably no, I hear this crap from people who never voted, they too lazy to get involved.
Did windbag Huffington support Teaparty last election? No, and guess what, the teaparty won. Even if all of them who won as teaparty, weren't teaparty they won message and election.
The liberal/right argument is stale. We are fighting Big Corporate bully's who don't care about party. Come on Gimp, use your anger to get rid of ruling party.
I voted. After Georgi, the Nazi collaborator, declared his God complex, I can see him trying to take down the Great Satan. Lets see, Yes, Georgi said: “The main obstacle to a stable and just world order is the United States.” Well, I feel better, now. So Georgi has this phony Bretton Woods Conference and recent Media Conference stocked full of speakers from non-profits he funds, but that's not disclosed. This is really looking up and up. Didn't Soros steal his neighbors wealth as he sent them off to Auschwitz? Why yes, he has said so. And that's your master? This guy?
~ Georgi Soros
Obama came out of nowhere with his charm and charisma to convince the people he was different than previous politicans and he would work for the people and work to give them their government back. The people swallowed his rhetoric hook, line and sinker and elected the first black president. After he got the briefing he fell in line and continued with the destruction of our once just and free country. Our nation is controlled by a corporate oligarghy and our only hope in 2012 is if a leader with the potential of a BHO gets elected, rejects the briefing and attempts to follow the will of the majority of the people of this country by putting in place the ideals and goals of the founding politicans of this once great nation.
"...our only hope in 2012 is if a leader with the potential of a BHO gets elected..."
LOL! A delusional true believer. A lot of arseholes posting here voted for the lighter skinned Mugabe.
McCain was Soros backup puppet.
Yes, it was Democratic speech he gave before he even Senator, everyone loved him, it was good speech, they start talkng about him to be President early. If Trump finds something on Obama birth (sounds like he knows something), maybe Obama impeached, then Biden President.
What about the Gov. from Indiana? He agrees with most of Zero Hedge. I haven't studied it yet. I think he's short though? and previous statistics show most President tall with hair or easier win if hair and tall.
I vote Paul/Paul 2012. Think they could never win? Just wait till hyperinflation hits later this year, followed by riots and a brutal crackdown. Give the left a reason to hate Obama, give the right a reason to hate the police state, I can see it all coming together. Each party must brutally betray its base, so that the scales fall off people's eyes and they see their masters as the sociopathic manipulators they are. Sheeple of the left, right, and mushy middle all need a beat-down followed by hungry introspection in a FEMA camp with no TV. This is their punishment for helping the NWO destroy America, and it's the only way they will learn.
A tax revolt and general strike would be nice, but ultimately the way to break Federal power is for most states to secede, leaving Washington and New York alone against the barbarian hordes. I am guessing this will happen after the NWO blatantly steals the election for Obama rather than risk Ron Paul as president. The last decade was the perfect setup for this scenario. The whole system must go up in a glorious ekpyrotic bonfire! The fewer institutions and puppetmasters that survive, the longer it will take for the cancer to return! Burn all the debt and the corporate welfare and the law books, and America will be reborn like a phoenix, free of the NWO!
I'm not sure it matters who we elect. You can't cut any government program except for those that are actually beneficial. The rest of them are jobs programs for entrenched parasites. Yeah, you can take a few million from NASA or NIH but not from Head Start. That boondoogle has been running for two generations now and are the children it 'serves' doing any better in school? No, their performance has worsened over the decades. Yet Head Start still gets $5 billion every year because its a jobs program for people who don't want to work and have no skills to do useful work anyway.
Don't forget "You're fired." It will roll off tongue. Good to yell after big disappointments of Obama. But not good choice. He fits profile of anti-christ from history channel. The problem's no good choice now. Who? Palin not smart, no history knowledge. Romney looks like into something kinky. He not even close last time. I vote McCain even though he choose to lose with Palin, mistake. Too old now.
What about hedge man who posts here sometimes. Maybe his blog? I suspect, not sure. Michael Kriger? I like his posts. Need ideas of good choice for President, now not see one.
We can turn it, don't believe fools here who say election not important. Think how hard US fight freedom to vote, it's mark of freedom, women right to vote, blacks right to vote. Need to find brave, blunt, pull up boot straps, hero type for President, for what we face.
Good or bad, like him or not, Newt Gingrich is the best candidate out there today and tomorrow. Not only that, he's the best prepared to serve as President of the United States. I don't know where you stand and I guess it doesn't matter, but the facts are the facts, and Gingrich is the best of the bunch.
on the left we have a pig (parasite) with lipstick
and on the right we have a pig (parasite) with lipstick
...it's like being in a candy shop with such yummy choices and beautiful colors all around ...spoilt rotten for choice by democracy (cough, splutter)
Campassion is the new word. Hope and Change is gone, that was so ancient. Yeap.
I sincerely hope that he is simply, " TAKEN OUT "... Period
No, the new words are Restructuring America. I can see it coming. It is all perfectly clear now. Hundred year bonds.
c'mon man!
Let's revisit this. Demagoguery, a beauty pagent, warmongering, emotional appeals to self-interest -- and that's the Obama platform? The irony is beyond ridicule.
Double-speak at it's finest. Jeez that's a turd.
I have never voted for a Democrat. But I will from now on - let's hasten the collapse! VOTE DEMOCRAT, kill the system.