Tuesday, July 8, 2014

Part 2, Why The Obama Administration Deserves Its Rating As The Worst Presidency Since 1945

A recent public opinion poll conducted by Quinnipiac University, a traditional and unbiased source of public opinion, asked a sample of Americans who they thought operated the worst Presidency since 1945. Barack Obama won a plurality of votes in that poll for being the worst U.S. President since 1945. 33% of respondents named him as the worst President over the past seven decades with George W, Bush finishing second at 28%. 

Both of them far outpolled who I generally consider the two worst Presidents of the past hundred years, Jimmy Carter (8%) for being a President who was clueless and totally ineffective, and Richard Nixon (13%) for simply being a vindictive crook. America has to be pretty disgusted with your Presidential administration when you are mentioned 2-4 more times than either Carter or Nixon as the worst president since 1945.

Over the next few days we are going to explore the overwhelming number of reasons while this result for President Obama is not only rational but is well deserved. Before anyone starts with their counter arguments or disputing my list of Obama policy failures, criminal acts, economic ignorance, violations of the Constitution, and broken promises, keep in mind the following facts:
  • I have never voted for a Republican for President in my life and I am over 60 years old.
  • Up until November, 2010, I had never voted for a Republican for national office.
  • In the first two years of his Presidency, Obama’s party was in control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate with filibuster proof majorities in both places, I.e. he could have done anything he wanted politically and legislatively without any assist from any Republican.
  • I am not saying that anyone else would have resolved all of the issues listed below but it is difficult to think that at least some of these issues would have been resolved by people such as Truman, Kennedy, or Reagan. The Obama Presidency has been so bad that just about every issue and problem listed below is actually far WORST rather than BETTER since the onset of the Obama administration.
  • Consider an old saying: “Don’t tell me how rough the seas were, just tell me you brought the boat safely into the harbor.” In other words, a true leader takes the blame and gives the credit. No one forced Obama to become President, he knew the situation he was getting into. He should be judged on how well he managed the situation he inherited going forward. Unfortunately, instead of leadership and looking forward, he chose instead to whine, look backwards, and to blame others for his failures rather than focusing on moving forward from whatever adverse situation he inherited.
Okay, so that sets out the preliminaries: I am not a conservative, a Republican, or a neocon trying to tear down this President. This President could have done anything he wanted in the first two years of his tenure, he cannot blame the Republicans for blocking anything he failed at since he had a historic window of political opportunity. Instead of leveraging the window and leading the country, he chose to blame the previous President, the Japanese tsunami, ATM machines, and a whole host of other factors in the absence of Presidential leadership.

Thus, without any further delay and in no particular order, consider the next set of reasons why the Quinnipiac public opinion poll is probably an accurate view of why America rates the Obama administration as the worst Presidential administration in the past 70 years or so (we covered the first 15 reasons yesterday which can be reviewed at: http://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2014/07/part-1-why-obama-administration.html)

16) The President’s health care reform legislation has proven to be nothing more than a Rube Goldberg-like insurance scheme that is causing millions of Americans to lose their current health care insurance coverage, to lose access to their preferred doctors, to spend much money more for both their insurance premiums and deductibles, is adding substantially to the national debt, is causing a doctor shortage as more and more doctors retire early to avoid the trauma and nonsense of the legislation, and never addressed the real root causes of escalating health care costs, dooming his approach to failure. 
Relevant Obama quote: “And that means that no matter how we reform health care, we will keep this promise to the American people: If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor, period. If you like your health care plan, you'll be able to keep your health care plan, period. No one will take it away, no matter what.” 

17) His lies and deceptions regarding many components of Obama Care ended up getting him awarded the Washignton Post's "2013 Lie of The Year" award.

18) The President has taken extravagant and expensive vacations around the world, spending hundreds of millions of dollars, while Americans sit by and watch as their chances for a good job and good future go unrealized. 

19) He has played more golf and attended more campaign fund raisers than any other President, time that might have been better spent fixing the problems facing the country and its citizens. 

20) He has done nothing to improve the scholastic performance of American kids who badly trail many other countries along all measurements of educational excellence and who spend far less per student than the Federal government and the Obama administration do. 

21) Despite promising to operate the most transparent Presidential administration ever, he has decided that White House visitor logs will no longer be made public, breaking a long tradition of allowing Americans to know who is visiting the White House.

22) He has done nothing to develop and implement a long term and strategic energy policy for the country, instead wasting tens of billions of dollars given away to his political contacts’ and cronies’ failed alternative energy programs and companies (e.g. Solyndra). 

23) He presided over economic polices that have seen median U.S. household income decline for five years in a row AFTER the recession ended. 
Relevant Obama quote: “I'm a warrior for the middle class.” 

24) He unnecessarily intruded into the auto industry bailouts that still resulted in the city of Detroit having to file for bankruptcy and for General Motors to probably never pay back the $9.7 billion still owed to the American taxpayer, contrary to the President’s reelection campaign themes. 

25) His failed foreign policies have allowed North Korea to get five years closer to having substantial nuclear weapon and delivery capability. 

26) His failed foreign policies have allowed Iran to get five years closer to having substantial nuclear weapon and delivery capability.

27) His failed foreign policies have caused a significant loss of prestige and honor relative to the U.S. in both our allies and enemies’ eyes. A loss compounded by the unfathomable spying on the governments and leaders of our allies. 

28) His failed foreign policies have emboldened Russia in eastern Europe, e.g. the annexation of Crimea, and China in the Far East as that country bullies its neighbors over land scattered throughout the oceans in that region of the world.

29) He has presided over economic polices that have seen the average price of gas go up about 90% since the day he took office.

30) He has remained silent and allowed political allies to call his political opponents and ordinary citizens all types of slanderous and foul names despite his promise to unite the country. Those slurs include but are not limited to: a__h____s, terrorists, barbarians, Taliban, racists, Ku Klux Klan members, knuckle dragging Neanderthals, sluts, whores, among others. 
Relevant Obama quote: “There's not a liberal America and a conservative America - there's the United States of America.” 
Relevant Obama quote: “We want everybody to act like adults, quit playing games, realize that it's not just my way or the highway." 
Relevant Obama quote: “It's not surprising, then, they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.” 

31) He has failed to improve the tense situation in the Middle East, specifically the ongoing conflicts between Israel and the Palestinians. 

32) He had no plan and not a lot of interest in quickly resolving the Gulf Coast/BP oil spill, given the number of rounds of golf, the number of vacations and the number of political fund raisers he attended as the crisis was destroying nature and jobs along the Gulf coats. 

33) He has no plan for fixing the mess that is Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, who together have already gobbled up almost $200 billion in taxpayer bailout dollars. 

34) He promised to run the most transparent administration of all time and ended up running the most opaque and paranoid administration since at least the Nixon administration, implementing executive privilege too often, hiding witnesses called to testify in front of Congress, persecuting more government whistle blowers than all previous Presidential administrations combined, hunting down legitimate whistle blowers and dodging or sabotaging legitimate legal Freedom of Information Act requests.
Relevant Obama quote: "My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government. We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government." 
Relevant Obama quote: "Often the best source about waste, fraud and abuse in government is an existing government employee committed to public integrity and willing to speak out. Such acts of courage and patriotism . . . should be encouraged rather than stifled." 

35) He has failed to fix the massively expensive and stupid redundancy in the Federal government: 
  • The Federal government has 15 different agencies overseeing food safety laws 
  • More than 20 independent Federal programs help the homeless 
  • 80 different Federal programs to help economic development 
  • 82 different government agencies work on improving teacher quality 
  • 47 different government agencies work on job training 
  • 18 different programs working on food and nutrition assistance
36) He has ignored the fighting going on Afghanistan and has not implemented a strategy that will withstand the withdrawal of Western troops in 2014, likely resulting in the Taliban taking over again and negating the blood and money the country has spent there over the past decade or so. 

37) He has angered civilians all over the Arab world with his drone attacks on terrorist suspects that have ended up killing hundreds, if no thousands of civilians, including hundreds of innocent children. These drone attacks have not slowed down the growth of Al Qaeda and other terror groups while it has embittered civilian populations from Yemen to Pakistan. 
Relevant Obama quote (from Pew research): "At the end of his first term, the level of confidence those nations [Middle Eastern countries‘ citizens] feel for Obama fell from 33% to 24%. When it comes to Obama’s policies, as opposed to his personality, the drop is even greater, falling from a high of 34% to a dismal low of 15%."

Thirty seven reasons and two days and we are not close to listing all of the reasons why the Obama administration deserves to be called the worst Presidency since 1945. This is especially true when we have not even touched on the many reasons why this President has violated the Constitution, broke the laws and deserves to be impeached and removed from office. Those reasons will be covered in the coming days.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w



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