Blog mission is cherishing and holding multiple thoughts simultaneously

by cactus (lifted from comments)

Obama is already out there, doing some pre-presidenting so to speak. We’ve already had an opportunity to glimpse what he’s about.

So far, he’s been about supporting giving reams of money to the Wall Street Welfare Queen class. I had a post noting that it couldn’t and wouldn’t work as soon as they passed it, but by now, a few months later, when it should be easily apparent that it can’t and won’t work even to the fighting 24%, we don’t hear anything from him about halting the draining or trying to claw some of it back. I had a post the other day on another issues involving his cabinet, and I probably will have one soon that at least touches on Christina Romer, his CEA head. (Time is very short for me these days so no promises, but let’s just say I’m not finding what I’m supposed to be complimenting.)

Now, even good Presidents make mistakes, and even lousy ones do a few things right. So the question is – are Obama’s mis-steps the start of a pattern? Is he closer to a GW than a JFK or a Clinton (i.e., a guy who makes some mistakes but overall does a good job), or is he just a Republican-lite?

Listening to Hubbard when it comes to the current economic mess is no different than listening Heckuva Job Brownie when it comes to deploying your resources to fight a natural catastrophe. And if we found out that Heckuva Job Brownie was, indeed, providing advice to Obama on how to deal with natural disasters, and Obama was following that advice, we would have no choice but to conclude something about Obama.

And here’s what we would conclude: Obama could mouth the right things about restoring science to its rightful place, and fixing the economy, and reducing poverty, and whatever the heck else, but talk is cheap. GW promised all the same things. And he may have inadvertently delivered on small aspects of a couple of them. But for the most part, if a person displays monumental incompetence and bad judgement in one area, he will display it others.

Our job is not to cheerlead the guy. Our job is to support him when he does the right thing, and try to stand in the way when he does the wrong thing. And if he is going to mostly do the wrong thing, you better believe I want to make sure I don’t want anyone thinking he speaks in my name.
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by cactus

MG responds in comments:

Once President-elect Obama is installed in office as the President of the United States of America, his responsibility is to represent the best interests of the nation. I have every confidence that he will undertake that responsibility as best he can. I will not be worrying whether he speaks in anyone’s name other than his own as the President of the United States of America as he undertakes efforts to pull the United States from the brink of economic disaster.
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by MG