I am not sure which is more amusing:
Option 1 – Our glorious President’s transparent teleprompters have been replaced with a big-screen television us peons can only dream of having in our living rooms (TOTUS would like to make it clear that it was still the brain behind the screen, though.).
Option 2 – President Barack Hussein Obama, the champion of hope, the leader of change, the living halberd behind whom everyone placed their dreams, the savior who would bring us out of darkness, came out and admitted, “There are no quick fixes,” in yet another attempt to stall those demanding their rainbow-farting unicorns… and that he follow through on his campaign promises.
On the one hand, he has finally embraced that which most of us already knew, but few were willing to admit to – without his script roling before his eyes, his public speaking quality and consistency is sorely lacking (and even with that script, there are no guarantees). On the other hand, one can only imagine what the stresses of trying to live up to his campaign promises is doing to our glorious President… I mean, for Heaven’s sake, who would have thought that the American people would actually hold him to what he promised!?
Par for the course. I think it’s largely an assumed that no candidate–presidential or otherwise–will ever really keep most (let alone all) the promises he or she made on the campaign trail.
Politics is a more powerful force that even the Executive Officer of the nation, neh? I think that even if Obama is/were doing everything he could to effect his vaulted promises (and I’m not saying that he’s not, even though the evidence might seem… sparse), he’s still only one arm of a three-tiered systems designed to check and balance itself.
Congress can beat vetoes. Judges seem to be enjoying legislating from the bench, more and more. The President can talk all he wants, and work all he wants, but unless he can control congress and the courts… good luck.
What’s kind of sad is that the American people seem to view the President as some sort of god, or genie, who can just do whatever he wants at a whim. Then they completely ignore their congressmen, who, by and large, are probably much more accessible, and probably more concerned with *their* specific state than the President is.
It might be difficult to unseat an incumbent congressman, but I think it’s probably a bit easier to sway the opinion of a single state than the opinion of an entire nation.
We need *all three* branches of the government onboard if we really want something done.
For now, Obama is performing up to what I expected of him. I’ll leave it at that.
Hey Stan – I see you found my little corner of the ‘verse
.
The problem is that very assumption – If a President is not going to keep all of the promises he made on the campaign trail, he lied, and there are no two ways around it. Do we really want another liar in office, guiding our country wherever it goes?
Checks and balances only work so well when those other two branches of the government are actually interested in doing their jobs. With a majority control of Congress (though Obama seems to be doing his best to alienate those Democrat Congressmen) and the possibility of Obama appointing one to three Supreme Court Justices, the entire concept of “checks and balances” goes right out the window. Sure, if the President does something unconstitutional or just plain wrong, it is the duty of the Congress or Supreme Court to stop him, whether they share parties or political beliefs or not. But do you really expect that to happen, especially in a day when the majority of Republicans do not even know what “conservative” means?
You say that it is easier to sway a vote than a nation… then explain to me how Obama actually got elected? The man was a nothing before the Presidency – he had no history, he had no accomplishments (short of being a Senator who missed more days than he showed up), he had nothing short of a very powerful public opinion machine, a very charismatic speaking style, and countless (now meaningless) promises. And the majority of Americans bought into it. On the other side of the spectrum, we have countless Congresscritters who voted for Bush’s first disastrous “bail out bill” – the majority of which got re-elected.
Americans view thier President as a god because we created that image, we are allowing it to stand, and, with this new President of ours, we are expanding that image at every single opportunity. The individuals in question are undeniably capitalizing on the situation, but we are creating our very own nightmare, as we speak.
Indeed, Obama is performing up to what I expected of him – and that, right there, is part of the problem.