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Another Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day for Team Obama

By: tooncesthecat (Diary)  |  June 1st, 2012 at 10:22 AM  | 

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Images from Yesterday:

Mitt Romney speaking on the economy in front of the shuttered Solyndra plant.  A picture is worth a thousand words.

David Axelrod giving his best Howard Dean impersonation, attacking Romney’s economic record as Governor of Massachusetts–a record that achieved 4.7% unemployment.  Really, David Axelrod.  I guess they don’t trust their other surrogates–Deval Patrick and Uncle Joe Biden weren’t allowed close to a microphone.

Jay Carney stumbling and fumbling over a question about Obama’s position on gender-based abortions.  Carney’s ineptness and incoherence has become a major embarassment to the Obama campaign.

George W. Bush relaxed and joking as his official portrait was unveiled at the White House.  Reminding Obama that “When you have difficult decisions to make, just ask yourself: What would George do?”  Obama, unable to resist a jab at W about the economy that he inherited from Bush–most uncordial.

The jobs report:  Only 69,000 jobs created last month (expected 150,000) and unemployment inched UP to 8.2%.

The Romney campaign releasing its third web ad: “What would a Romney Presidency look like on Day One”.  Showing that the Romney campaign can stay on message, develop a contrast between an Obama and Romney presidency, and provide voters with reasons to vote for Romney instead of just reasons to vote against Obama.

Finally, Bill Clinton, real rock star of the Democratic Party, on CNN saying that  Romney had a “sterling record” as a businessman and totally undermining the Obama campaign’s attacks on Romney at Bain capital.  “I don’t think that we ought to get in the position where we say this is bad work,” Clinton said of Romney’s record at Bain Capital. “This is good work.”

Back to the drawing board for Team Obama.

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COMMENTS

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  • mikeymike143

    the playbook that worked really well for obummer last election was attacking the extremely unpopular bush. but after the way obummer and his socialist pals have wrecked our country, attacking a successful businessman like romney just isnt going to fly. it smells of desperation to me.

    every day it becomes more and more clear that romney is going to be the next POTUS.

  • http://www.tooncesthecat.wordpress.com tooncesthecat

    What is really interesting to me is the contrast between Team Romney’s ability to avoid distractions and stick to their economic message v. Team Obama lurching from one issue to another on a weekly basis and being totally incompetent at developing a successful line of attack. If the Tea Party can win Florida for Romney, this election is over.

    • APA Guy

      He seems to be much more disciplined than I initially gave him credit for…and he is sprinting to the right, which, of course, I LOVE :)

  • checkmate2012

    He an Laura are so classy and both were incredibly funny and humble all at once. You wrote about one of my fav lines of Bush but also loved his opening remark: “

    • http://impudent.edublogs.org/ kyle8

      He only looks good in comparison with the current occupant. I don’t forget that he was a blundering, big spender who never bothered to stand up for himself and thus led us directly to the Debacle of the Democrat take over and Obamacare.

      I will resist feeling nostalgia for someone who was, not nearly as bad as the left made him out to be, but not a very good president either.

      • http://www.tooncesthecat.wordpress.com tooncesthecat

        Forever etched in my memory is the image of W standing amid the ruins of the WTC wearing a hard hat and with a bullhorn in his hand. For that, I can forgive and forget a lot.

      • checkmate2012

        will agree that he spent way too much and did little domestically,

        He did stand on his convictions and didn’t change his policies with the direction of political winds. I’m not sure that any party would have kept the White House after 8 years given 9/11 and the toll it took on this country. Time will tell his legacy given historical context.

      • acat

        The Bush tax cuts.

        Yeah, Bush was no Gerald Ford or Richard Nixon.

        Mew

      • Viet71

        He was a man of his time and place. The U.S. had burst one bubble and was heading into another. There were some bad men, and he took them on. Most of all, he didn’t waver on matters of conviction.

        I did not like GWB as president. I thought the wars, the tax cuts, and the spending were mistakes.

        I’ve come to think the tax cuts were brilliant as a matter of economic policy. I’m holding my breath as to Iraq; it appears to me things may work out well there after all, but at a terrible cost. The spending — retch.

        But GWB did not try to anything but make America stronger. His heart was in the right place.

        • checkmate2012

          in office and still today. Visiting Walter Reed without cameras and still today meeting with veterans for his love of them like his 100-mile bike Contrast that to O taking press cameras to Dover, MD.

        • aesthete

          on how foreign policy shakes out in the next 20 years. If terrorism diminishes in importance (as I suspect it will with a rising China), then I think Bush will be seen on the same lines as Hoover and Buchanan (and rightly so, IMO).

          • JSobieski

            China will end up being less of a threat because their economy will slow down and they have their own internal problems.

            The ME will be more of a problem as the Arab spring brings more elections between the fast jihadists and the slow jihadists. Iran won’t get further from a nuke, they will get closer.

            I don’t see any positive news from the ME…nothing.

          • acat

            has there ever been good news from the ME ?

            Mew

          • http://www.tooncesthecat.wordpress.com tooncesthecat

            The day they dropped Saddam Hussein through a trap door with a noose around his neck,

            And the day that Seal Team Six put a bullet in Bin Laden’s head.

            Other than that, I can’ think of any.

          • JSobieski

            However the frequency and magnitude of the bad news is going to increase. I am sure a regression analysis would support my contention.

          • acat

            China more resembles a coup or a free-for-all brawl.

            I’m predicting the military comes out on top .. for a time. Perhaps long enough to, as you say, manage the economic decline/bootstrapping uneventfully.

            If so, then yes, the ME will be the area to watch .. and we’re past due for another hot war. Think it’ll take a little while longer for the brotherhood to decide they’ve got the stones, though.

            Mew

          • aesthete

            but that probably means more foreign policy problems in the region — I highly doubt that it will be a worldwide confrontation or reach WWIII proportions, but there will be significant regional friction up to and including regional war/alliance building. Unstable states with flagging economies often try to control the decline through, shall we say, unenlightened foreign policy decisions.

            You and I both agree that the ME will be a problem, but not in a way that will vindicate Bush. The only reason that Truman mostly escaped harsh judgement is because a lot of his most important foreign policy ideas won the day and the Cold War became more politically important. Bush’s “war on terror” will be seen as a partial failure, because it doesn’t address core problems and causes of terrorism, much less vigorously present a compelling ideological alternative. The rest of his agenda having been a failure, I don’t think that Bush will be seen kindly in future years. I know that his presidency isn’t seen well by me.

          • acat

            “addressing core problems and causes of terrorism” ?

            I’m partial to decimation, but .. I’m kinda old-school.

            Mew

          • aesthete

            I favor propaganda and greater support of reform movements and alternatives to religious institutions in the Middle East –explicit support where it would help, implicit where it would be better to hide the US government’s involvement. Shoring up countries which are on the right path would also help. This would be a long-term strategy, and one that would be non-violent: think Radio Free Europe and the other methods used to break the stranglehold of communism in eastern Europe. Democratization should not be encouraged as a means towards greater Middle Eastern security, nor should strong states or government to government transfer and “nation-building” be pursued (esp short term).

            Short term policy should be aimed at keeping the Middle East fractured: any attempts at political unity in the Middle East should be quashed, and most of our policy should be in terms of bilateral agreements. We should concentrate on developing better intelligence networks: in keeping with what I said above, we should specifically monitor for religious, extra-governmental intel and the potential for Al-Qaeda styled networks in both Sunni and Shia circles. Military expeditions should be punitive in nature and not seek regime change or radical alterations to the existing balance of power. Military intervention should be avoided, but where necessary the model for intervention should follow Gulf War I: ad hoc coalitions of bilateral regional partners with Euro support and funding when possible.

          • http://impudent.edublogs.org/ kyle8

            as being much more likely to bring about positive results than what we have been doing.

          • acat

            because, long term, I don’t see “middle eastern unity” as viable… or historically viable without a brutal outside force.

            As for long-term .. I mostly concur there as well. The problem is the culture, the solution is changing the culture, and .. being blunt, Americans have no masters in terms of changing cultures. One can argue Japan .. but it’s a weak argument.

            Let’s McDonalds them to .. non-death!

            Mew

          • http://www.tooncesthecat.wordpress.com tooncesthecat

            1. Achieve American energy independence, so that we can tell them to go to hell.

            2. Use drones to take out terrorist cells wherever we find them and without seeking permission or approval.

            3. Make foreign aid contingent upon recognition of Israel’s right to exist, cooperation in eliminating terrorists, religious toleration, protection of Christian minorities, and termination of all efforts to obtain nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.

            4. Massive retaliation for any attack against the United States, U.S. facilities, or American military and/or civilian personnel.

          • acat

            Step 1 – something
            Step 2 – something else
            Step 3 – (always blank or ????)
            Step 4 – Profit!

            Look, it’s not a bad *idea*, toonces, but .. short of a massive jump in electrical storage technology (supercapacitors?) or power generation (true cold fusion) your Step 1 is a non-starter.

            Mew

          • http://www.tooncesthecat.wordpress.com tooncesthecat

            NT

          • acat

            …

          • gekster

            ntntntnt

          • http://www.tooncesthecat.wordpress.com tooncesthecat

            I had written “frac, baby, frac” instead of NT and then changed it because I thought you would ridicule me.. But seriously, energy independence is not a pipe dream, pun intended. We have tremendous untapped reserves of coal, oil, and natural gas. Advances in technology make access safe and economical. We simply have to increase leases on federal lands and off-shore, fast track permit and approval processes and eliminate EPA regulations promulgated by Obama. We should also significantly reduce (I would eliminate) the corporate income tax and watch money flow into the U.S. for exploration, development, and production. Just for starters.

          • acat

            in fact, both of the obstacles to frac’in are exactly the same .. the greenies. On one paw, they object because “it’s dino-derived!” .. ignoring that it’s *significantly* cleaner than oil or coal. On the other paw, they object because “it messes with the water”.

            Solve that by marginalizing the greenies (and Solyndra plays right into that …) and bam! Frac, baby, frac!

            Mew

          • http://www.tooncesthecat.wordpress.com tooncesthecat

            Step One: Defeat Obama.
            Step Two: Replace Chu with Gingrich as Energy Secretary.
            Step Three: Eliminate all energy tax credits, subsidies, and grants.
            Step Four: Pass a law requiring them to wear beanies with propellers, so that they are easily recognized, subjected to public humiliation, and can generate their own clean energy.
            Step Five: Send them for re-education to a hog farm where they will be required to provide for all of their own energy needs by learning to convert manure into methane.
            Step Six: Make them live without using anything produced by using coal, gas, or oil for Romney’s first term in office. They’ll be voting Republican by the mid-term.

          • Dave_A

            1) Require all states to allow without penalty or additional tax/fee, the sale of pure petroleum gasoline.

            2) Ban the use of federal transportation funding for ANYTHING involving toll roads, any mass-transit vehicle other than a car-ferry or airplane, or the construction/maintenance of road lanes not freely open to single-occupant-vehicle traffic.

            3) Ban the use of federal funds to construct or maintain any power generation facility utilizing solar or wind power.

            4) Cut off federal block-grants to any ‘POV hostile municipality’ – defined as any city that implements policies designed to discourage automobile use (like Seattle).

            5) Close un-needed domestic military bases (Consolidating troops at large, underutilized domestic installations, or re-basing overseas), and lease the land to oil companies for the construction of refineries on federal land – allowing those who build on said land to be exempt from all state taxes and regulations.

          • http://www.tooncesthecat.wordpress.com tooncesthecat

            confiscate everything the greenies own that was produced using oil, gas, or coal and leave them naked and shivering in the cold.

            But, seriously, your proposals are a good start. I particularly like eliminating the diversion of transportation funds, which are derived mainly from the gasoline tax, to mass-transit boondoggles like AMTRACK. Let those greenies in the NE Blue States pay the full cost for their own mass transit.

            And, yes, we will need more refineries to achieve energy independence.

          • checkmate2012

            states impose a gas tax and then the fed tacks on their tax fee.So if the states weren’t beholden to the feds for a matching fund, they would deal with their own problems as needed.

          • acat

            start showing the cost of gaia-ist programs to the voters.

            Low-flow toilets require San Francisco to hire extra sewer workers because their old drains need a certain volume…. show the cost.

            Plastic bag ban in Seattle means everyone’s shopping with paper or reusable. Show how much paper costs, show some of the “international waters” floating sawmills, show jobs lost to those mills… then show germs on the re-usable bags.

            Show the road salt ban in Seattle .. and then show the increase in winter accident claims before the ban and after… and how many were fatal.

            Show the studies on how highway auto safety decreases as fuel efficiency increases .. simply because heavier vehicles are safer in wrecks…. then show the increase in lives lost.

            Yes, it’s good to hit them on petroleum, but we can’t “just” hit them there. We need the average citizen to understand how much gold and blood we’re spending satiating the green gods…..

            Mew

          • checkmate2012

            I.C.E. (in case of emergency)

            O hates big oil, let him take the coal train to stump.

            Love Step 4 most but all great ideas and all very humorous!!

          • Dave_A

            1) No problem with this step

            2) Most Middle East nations can knock down drones like they’re swatting flies. Afghanistan isn’t the ME, and Yemen is the poorest & most defenseless of the nations that are. The only reason UAVs worked in Iraq was because we invaded first, and took away all their air defenses.

            3) It’s not our business how they govern their people, so long as they isolate Iran. If we want to protect middle eastern minorities, let them immigrate here.

            4) Unless your massive retaliation is invasion & occupation, the ME tyrants don’t care. You can bomb them as many times as you’d like, but if they’re still in power when the planes leave, they’re fine with it….

    • Melody Warbington (rwm52)

      and wondered if anyone had done a word count of how many times “O” said I, me or my. Totally classless. Regardless of the fact that I have issues with President Bush and Laura, they handled the occasion with class, humor and dignity.

      • checkmate2012

        accepted that the ceremony wasn’t about him. Classless indeed.

        • cactusjack

          all you need to know about the Middle East and Bush presidency (i dont normally use that tone in the presence of such great contributors, but here goes)
          1. Because of its size, population and longevity in the Middle East, Iran (Persia) is the 400 pound gorilla in the room. Nixon knew that. Kissinger knew that.They fashioned a military alliance between Iran, the US and Israel (hard to believe but true!)
          2. The Middle East has been in constant turmoil and destabilization,ever since that fateful act of Carter not supporting the Shah when he asked for help in 1979.. ALL our present woes in the region , trace back to, or through, that watershed foreign policy catastrophe. That includes the terrorism we are dealing with today. Yes, even the Taliban, Hamas, Al Qaeda. The terrorists we are fighting today in AF and Iraq are being supported from the regime in Iran.
          3. Theefore there has been a power vacuum of sorts in the Middle East, ever since Shah Reza Pahlavi, a friend of the United States and Israel, was exiled from Iran. Which one way or the other, the United States was going to get pulled into. Think of it as foreign policy Kharma.
          4. Thus we were going to be back over there someday, somehow. It manifested in recent history as our wars against/in Iraq and Afghanistan.
          5. We won in Iraq, it will pay dividends down the road and is now. Iraq was quiet and stable during the “Arab Spring” upheavals.
          SUMMARY: Bush did well with what he was handed by history. Carter really did screw things up and worse than we realized. But Bush was still a big spender domestic program wise, and that was not good.

          • Melody Warbington (rwm52)

            wasn’t Iraq, it was the spending/stimulus which he now admits didn’t work. I’m thankful beyond words he was POTUS after 9/11 rather than the lying, self-serving Gore.

  • sbm1

    literature reference….

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