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The Day After the Day After
Part One of Four By Dave Andrusko Good evening, and thanks for taking time to read Today's News & Views. We continue to have lots to say about Tuesday's elections. Part Two talks about an amazing press conference President Obama gave yesterday. Parts Three and Four are expressions of gratitude from NRLC. Over at National Right to Life News Today (www.nationalrighttolifenews.org), another thank you; a great explanation of ObamaCare and rationing; and one more look at Tuesday's results. Please send your comments on Today's News & Views and National Right to Life News Today to daveandrusko@gmail.com. If you like, join those who are following me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/daveha. "I think we'd be misreading the
election if we thought that the American people want to see us for the next
two years re-litigate arguments that we had over the last two years."
As remarkable--and remarkably positive--as the results from Tuesday's elections were, they came as little surprise to most anyone who's been watching the public's mounting opposition to all things Obama. But as you watched (or, in my case, listened) to pro-abortion President Barack Obama's press conference, it was clear that he was clueless. He wasn't feigning ignorance, he really did not see it coming. Okay, if true, what difference does that make? Let me suggest a couple of possibilities. Go back to the quote that begins this blog. Even judged on Obama's scale of arrogance, this was a pip. Take any poll you want, and the message going in and coming out was unmistakable: the public firmly believes that Obama dramatically overshot whatever mandate he may have been given. But according to the President, we're "misreading the election" if pro-lifers (for example) attempt to "re-litigate" (roll back) ObamaCare. There were questions specifically about health care and compromising with Republicans, many of whom ran on the platform of deep-sixing ObamaCare. Sure, they could compromise, Obama responded brightly. Together they could figure out ways to implement ObamaCare faster! (I kid you not.) Time after time, question after question, Obama responded with canned answers--which is fine. But they bore no relationship to reality. Zippo. Dana Milbank is a reliable Obamaphile for the Washington Post, but even he balked on the nonsense that Obama distributed freely. "What failures he did admit were those of tactics and communications," Milbank wrote. "It's not that he has poisonous relations with business, he said, but that he needs to do better at 'setting the right tone publicly.' It's not that his economic policies were flawed, he said, but that people 'don't see' the progress." In many ways Obama's answer to Peter Baker of the New York Times was the most telling of all. So where would you looking to compromise with Republicans? "I've been willing to compromise in the past, and I'm going to be willing to compromise going forward," the president responded, fingers tightly crossed behind his back. Why is that important? For two reasons. First, because everything Obama said yesterday pointed in one direction--he and/or his policies had not been rebuked by voters and what problems he did have were in "messaging." (Failures in "messaging" is the last resort of a failing presidency.) Second, this pretense that he already HAS been working like a dog to find "common ground" with Republicans is a prelude to what we will hear when people like pro-life House Speaker-designate John Boehner (see Part Two) begin to topple ObamaCare by whittling away at it. Obama will tell us that he is burning the midnight oil seeking, in vain, to accommodate those rascally Republicans. The POLITICO has a story this morning, the gist of which is that while Obama talks about the dangers of living in a "bubble," according to aides and former aides he's already in one. By that they mean a handful of aides, operating in an "ill-defined chain of command in the West Wing that concentrates too much power in too few hands," made worse by "a surplus of West Wingers who spin out ideas by the bushel -- and a shortage of seasoned middle managers to execute and sell them." But this, of course, is just another variation on the same excusatory theme. The ideas and agenda are just hunky dory. With a few more veteran operatives (aka salesmen), they'll captivate the electorate and steamroll the opposition. Nothing could be further from the truth. President Obama and ObamaCare were massively repudiated Tuesday. And it's because we know that--and the pro-life Republican leadership knows that--we are looking forward to reversing what Rep. Boehner rightly calls the "monstrosity" that is ObamaCare. |
