Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Obama's Town Hall Meeting on CNBC

It takes a certain amount of chutzpah to stand before the President of the United States at a town hall meeting and state that you are tired of defending him to critics. This woman did just that and folks on both sides of the aisle are cheering her on.

"I'm one of your middle class Americans. And quite frankly, I'm exhausted. Exhausted of defending you, defending your administration, defending the mantle of change that I voted for," a woman told President Obama at a town hall.

"My husband and I have joked for years that we thought we were well beyond the hot dogs and beans era of our lives, but, quite frankly, it's starting to knock on our door and ring true that that might be where we're headed again, and, quite frankly, Mr. President, I need you to answer this honestly. Is this my new reality?," she added.


Obama's initial reaction was to laugh as the woman spoke. It was an odd reaction to most who witnessed it. Then he went on to attack the Tea Party movement:
But, he insisted, the economy is moving in the right direction. He also took the opportunity to challenge the Tea Party, calling out the grassroots movement for being too vague: "What would you do?" he asked of them. “It’s not enough to say ‘get control of spending.’ I think its important for you to say, ‘I’m willing to cut veterans’ benefits,’ or ‘I’m willing to cut Medicare or Social Security,’ or ‘I’m willing to see taxes go up.’

The Tea Party attack was not unexpected to political observers. And the fact that he immediately went to military cuts and scaring the audience with the Medicare and Social Security reference is classic liberal demagogue.

The New York Times reported that the latest election year strategy against the GOP by Team Obama is to go after the Tea Party movement and link them as extremists uniting with the Republican party, wishing to take the country into the past. “We need to get out the message that it’s now really dangerous to re-empower the Republican Party,” said one Democratic strategist who has spoken with White House advisers but requested anonymity to discuss private strategy talks.

The White House denies any such strategy.

He also went into the standard denying the possibility of extending the Bush tax cuts, now law for 10 years. By not allowing them to sunset, it does not make it a tax cut. It makes the law continue. No new tax cuts are coming. It simply allows the rates to remain the same. Obama and the Democrats continue to call them as new tax cuts. The implication is false and deliberate so as to allow tax rates to go up.

Obama and the Democrats are very nervous of the upcoming elections. The writing is on the wall and CNBC allowed a floundering President Obama to have an hour on a televised campaign stop. He called it a town hall but since he continues in campaign mode - he never stopped after he won the 2009 election - it was just another campaign stop for him. Same talking points with the added flavor of the new attacks on the Tea Party. The audience was hand picked by CNBC. The CEO of GE, the parent company of NBC is an adviser to Obama and a big supporter.

After the town hall, Obama boarded Air Force One and flew off to do two DNC fundraisers. Just another day. Problems? What problems?

1 comment:

Janelle said...

Cut and run......no answer, no ideas. This is our worst POTUS ever. Frankly, he had more advantages handed to him than all of the worst for far less reason.