OBAMA BACKS OFF (KINDA-SORTA)

Today was the first full day of the catastrophic less-than-three-percent cut in the Federal government "across the board".  This is less than the amount most people will tip a klutzy but well-intentioned waiter.

 

And yet, in the runup to this we have heard nothing from Obama and the Democrat Party but predictions that life would suddenly be hell on earth for every single citizen in the nation unless the Republicans once more dropped the soap and bent over so the Democrats could enjoy a nice little donkey show.

 

Surprise, surprise, surprise. For once the Republicans have shown some spine.  And today as in every other day people went to work, they went to the airport, senior citizens and disabled folks got subsidized cab rides and everything went as ususal.

 

NOBODY GIVES A FUCK ABOUT THE SEQUESTER. For most people here in D.C., an extra "mental health day" is a blessing.  Nobody is getting out-and-out fired. Obama had been hyping bubonic plague, but this sequester is no worse than a low-grade cold going around.  Compared to what Obama has wrought on the economy, the sequester is like getting bear slobber on your face while a grizzly is trying to make you into its dinner.

 

So today, Obama changed gears and said that the 'full effect" wouldn't be felt for "about a month".  But "about a month" is when the "continuing resolution" to maintain the government in the absence of a budget runs out. For almost FOUR YEARS THE DEMOCRATS HAVE FAILED TO SUBMIT A BUDGET TO THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES AS REQUIRED BY LAW.

 

  Well, not exactly. A couple times they have given the House a "budget" that was patently ridiculous, sort of as if parents had demanded of their children a budget for their allowances and had recieved a proposal that the family money be spent on ice cream and cake and a moon bounce to greet the sun on a daily basis.  And then chided their parents for being "irresponsible" for rejecting such frivolousness.

 

But Obama and Chris Rock have it wrong. Obama and his wife are not "the nation's Mom and Dad".  That perception of a national leader was last applied to Romanian dictator Nicolae Caeucescu and his wife, who wound up in front of a Romanian firing squad on Christmas Day back in the 1980s.

 

Today Obama tried a new tack, saying that since the Republicans have stood fast and "failed to compromise" (which means they failed to bend us all over the Democrat barrel); then from now on each and every economic misfortune to befall each and every citizen of each and every one of These United States is now by His Imperial Decree the fault of those damned Republicans, who let the "sequester" go forward. 

 

There are interesting days ahead. What do you suppose Obama might say in the event that the TEA party Republicans and their stance on this sequester led to an engendering of confidence among the investors of the world that the USA was the place to invest? What if instead of collapsing because of the "sequester" the economy takes off, as people worldwide begin to see that there are people in these United States who are SERIOUS about the way things are going and reject just printing more money and grabbing out of the hands of investors and employers as the way to prosperity?

 

Obama said that the Republicans are going to be held responsible when the "sequester" leads to pain.  It'll be fun to watch if instead it inspires confidence that our system has adequate countermeasures to having a boob in the White House and the economy takes off. Who will be responsible for that, we wonder?

 

Interesting times, aren't they?