And the rise of; not Socialism, but Fascism.
Barack Obama was elected not on a record of accomplishment, but on hollow, but appealing populist rhetoric of "hope" and "change". Much like Gov. Deval Patrick in Massachussetts, this rhetoric is rapidly showing that it is truly the emporers new clothes.
The President of these United States has a number of duties that can carry serious consequences if mishandled. One of the most basic is presenting the face, the character, and the founding philosophy of the United States of America. In his first 70 days, President Obama has insulted our most stalwart ally, the United Kingdom, by giving the prime minister, Gordon Brown, as a gift, a DVD, that wasn't even in British PAL format so that he could watch it. This is juvenile on many levels, first; a new presidents gift to such a partner's head of government is usually something of cultural significance, for example, Britian once gave the United States a desk made from the decking of the H.M.S. Resolute, the very desk that the president still uses today. He compounded this basic error by removing the bust of Winston Churchill from the oval office, and returning it to Great Britain. This was topped off by the gift to the Queen of England of an iPod! And the first lady putting her arm around the Queen's shoulders! Yes these are small transgressions, but they are indicative of the general lack of knowledge, care, tradition, and respect, embodied throughout this administration.
Another job of the president is to set policy direction, present a budget, preserve and defend the Constitution of the United States of America. In these tasks he has, so far, failed miserably. America is a country founded on the principles of limited government, self-reliance, limited taxation, and local government control. President Obama evidently feels that the government that governs most governs best. After running a campaign during which his overriding purpose appeared to be excoriating president Bush for ending fiscal 2008 with a $426 Billion deficit, president Obama has, in his first 70 days, called for the issuance of the $385 Billion unexpended balance of the TARP funds passed by Congress in October 2008, pressured congress into passing a further $1.1 Trillion of new spending, which he characterized as a stimulus package, which was so immediately necessary that congress couldn't waste the time to READ THE BILL, it had to be passed immediately! Well now that we have the time to read the bill we are finding out about all the earmarks, bonuses, pork barrel spending, and useless vote buying spending included in this "earmark free, emergency stimulus bill". In his first 70 days, president Obama has spent, or more accurately, called on congress to spend over $3 Trillion dollars, which over 10 years will cost the taxpayers $9.1 trillion dollars! Just to put that into perspective the entire GDP is something on the order of $14.264 trillion(according to the BEA)! in 2 months president Obama has managed to spend 64% of what every man, woman, and child EARNED in the USA last year! More than EVERY PREVIOUS PRESIDENT COMBINED!
Moreover, he has displayed a penchant for continuous shifting of blame to his predecessor, short temperedness with his critics, a tendency to apologize for America... Continuously! As well as spending money on a scale that would embarrass an aircraft carrier full of drunken sailors.
As a president, he will have only a short honeymoon, before reality's tendencies test his leadership mettle. We believe, based upon his track record, that he will be found wanting, to America's detriment. His constant verbal bashing of business, his constant lauding of government, will combine to follow in the footsteps of FDR, to extend the life of this recession immeasurably, possibly even turning it into a depression, when simple government non-intervention, would be the better recipe.
Time will tell, but Mr. Obama, in the mean time, please read the Constitution, and the Federalist papers, they may be eye openers.
