The Obama Irony
And let me tell you something: For the first time in my adult lifetime, I’m really proud of my country.
—Michelle Obama
Unlike Michelle Obama, I was proud to be American long before we elected a black president. Looking at what our president is doing to the country, well, that I’m not so proud of. When historians assess President Barack Obama’s legacy, there will be an unmistakable irony to it. Yes, he will have been the first black president elected in the United States, but his story, long after he has left office, will be about how he created oppression in America through the failure of his progressive policies. The black community will be the net losers, not winners, of the first black president in American history. The irony of his presidency will be based on his misguided notions expressed through his policies: that collectivism trumps individualism and that an all-knowing government with legions of bureaucrats is the best arbitrator of economic resources. He’s shown us these are his beliefs through ObamaCare, stimulus, and command and control energy policies.
It was indeed an overwhelming majority of black voters that swept Obama into office. An estimated 95 percent1 of black voters participated in the excitement of electing the first black president. In some ways, many viewed it as the black community’s victory as much as Obama’s. One of their own was elected to the country’s highest office.
Yet, Obama’s support has slid substantially since the 2008 campaign. Not just among white voters, but the black community that swept him into power. As Gallup results indicate, more and more people are questioning his leadership. In April 2009, 73 percent of Americans viewed him as a strong and decisive leader while just two years into his presidency the figure stood only at 52 percent.2 Moreover, Obama’s “job approval rating fell from 58 percent to 47 percent between 2009 and 2010” with states like Wyoming only giving him a 28 percent approval rating.3 Much of the criticism of his presidency pertains to his lackluster performance on the economy. A February 2010 poll demonstrated that “Six in 10 Americans (60 percent) believe that President Barack Obama has not devoted enough time to economic problems” while only “33 percent say he has spent the right amount of time on the issue.”4
How ironic is it that the man that touted “Yes, we can” can’t hold on to the momentum that swept him to office. In only a two-year period, the presidency of hope and change has become one of dread and status quo. With strong approval ratings when he took office, Obama had enough tail wind to achieve almost anything. The problem, however, was not his color but his philosophy and promise to “Fundamentally transform the United States of America.” His plan went against the tide of what has made America great. I think America has now awakened to the fact that he was taking us in the wrong direction from the beginning. Instead of advancing policies that would help the less fortunate rise out of poverty to achieve economic success through economic liberation, he charted a very different course.
After all, President Obama knows from experience that America truly is the land of unlimited opportunity if individuals are allowed to empower themselves. Liberty, not big government, permits us to meet our potential.
Early into his presidency, Obama racked up some historic spending figures. There was the $3.9 trillion in spending for 2009 and similar projections for 2010, but the historic levels of national debt were the scarier number: Just three months into his term, the nation faced levels not seen before—a staggering $11 trillion. That’s almost half a trillion more than on the day he took office. The projections from his budget were even greater for 2012 (the year he hopes to get reelected!): The country, under President Obama, will face $16.2 trillion dollars in debt. Who is going to pay that bill? Numbers like that don’t free Americans. Ironically, numbers like that saddle our children with bills to pay, bills that will keep the underclass on the government plantation for years to come.
Barack Obama’s rise to the office of president of the United States from a single-parent household should have made life easier for struggling Americans. Instead his policies will make it more challenging, if not impossible for the less fortunate to gain upward mobility. He’s bankrupting the country and its people, he’s expanding and entrenching the bureaucracy and he’s drawing a roadmap for Americans to live a life of government dependency. The Obama welcome mat for working-class Americans should read: Welcome to a country that discourages advancement, entrepreneurialism, and self-fulfilled achievement. Welcome to a country that, in essence, wants you and your family on a government run plantation for decades to come.
The Obama approach to running the country has a certain irony to it. He faced the similar obstacles and challenges so many other black Americans face today in that he was raised largely without a father with his grandparents doing much of the rearing. He didn’t get an easy start by having a family name like Kennedy or Bush. Yet despite the difficulties, he still achieved the ultimate American Dream. He rose out of nothing and landed in the Oval Office.
But the numbers speak for themselves. Under the Obama administration, unemployment is still soaring and more than 46 million Americans get food stamps in order to feed their families. Nearly 460,000 jobs have gone away—evaporated—and despite many promises to create new ones, none of Obama’s vast number of policy initiatives has moved that number much. We are hearing a lot about a “double dip recession” too. And how about this: Recent government data shows that less than half of the population of black teens in America have jobs.5
Across the country, moms and dads are desperate for help with shelter, clothing, and the bare necessities. In 2009, in Detroit, a city devastated by the recession and declining auto sector, tens of thousands of people stood in the bitter cold for days waiting for government to help them meet their basic housing and utility needs. However, the grants were only enough to assist an estimated thirty-five hundred families. The system is bursting at the seams in Atlanta as well, where the need for Section 8 Housing is so great that recently thirty thousand applicants stood in line in the hot summer just to get on a waiting list. A mortgage modification plan in hard-hit Florida brought twenty thousand applicants out seeking help in a five-day period. The problems and dependence are only going to get worse. Obama is creating oppressive policies and a vast number of them: stimulus, overregulation and over spending.
The irony, of course, is the consequences of his policies will take opportunities away from those who face similar challenges. Too bad he isn’t going to let millions of Americans reach their dreams too. Too bad he isn’t turning into the role model so many had hoped he’d become. Obama should have been the president who proved that in America anyone could become anything with hard work and focus and a belief in individualism. Instead, he and his administration, through policies, stimulus, and the cronyism, are entrenching status quo politics whereby the rich get richer, on the backs of hardworking Americans.
It shouldn’t be like this. We live in a great nation with an abundance of human and natural resources. We should be doing better. But we are approaching the problem incorrectly. The solution doesn’t lie in handing out more assistance. Giving food away, providing temporary shelter, and handing out vouchers for utilities are little more than Band-Aid solutions. Why? Because next month the same people will still be living well below the poverty line. Nothing has changed for them except the freebies they received last month need to be replenished this month.
We need to stop the cycle of dependency that Obama’s policies are unleashing. We need to reverse his dependency politics approach to governance and look for leadership elsewhere. We need to stop the migration of Americans to the government plantation and start recognizing that handouts are a life sentence of poverty. The dependency approach that Washington elites want to entrench will only ensure that poor Americans remain poor for generations to come.
We need to revisit the current policy approaches to remove the air of uncertainty. Government should be about creating an environment that allows for individuals to pursue economic prosperity. It should be about creating a pro-business climate to ensure job creation is flourishing. We need to make sure that manufacturers want to put their companies in the United States because our workforce and our resources are second to none. We need an energy policy that will encourage development of our natural resources, provide jobs, and needed tax revenue. We need to create a tax environment that works for CEOs rather than against them. And most importantly, we need to help the American people realize that getting handouts will only hurt them in the long run, that they need to use their own skills and hard work to get ahead.
Ironically, it is the government that creates the need for government assistance. The Obama administration is responsible for creating a path to greater dependency. The country must reduce the public’s need for handouts. We don’t want Americans to spend their lives scrounging for basic needs. The government should create a political and economic climate that will ensure people can provide for themselves and stand on their own two feet. This is what Americans want and this is what our president should want.
Instead, Obama and Washington’s elite are entrenching status quo politics. They are wedded to that big government agenda because their friends benefit so much. Let’s look at what ObamaCare is doing to the country’s bottom line: According to a congressional panel report, we’re going to get slammed with $569 billion in higher taxes to pay for health care that won’t really help the majority of Americans. We’re going to see cuts as high as $529 billion to the Medicare system.6
And talk about red tape: Two new government bureaucracies are being created to control the system. Not only will we spend loads of cash to hire more policy drones to staff these departments, but also they will create more red tape to effectively block people that are trying to get help. And these mandates to insurance companies are too complicated. They are lengthy and will just add to the costs.
If you’re wondering why the pharmaceutical companies aren’t crying out in opposition to this plan, just remember one thing. It is they, not the American people that are going to benefit from ObamaCare. They will gain billions of dollars in new revenue from all the newly insured people going to doctors and filling prescriptions.7 Big Pharma spent nearly $100 million lobbying for this plan because they are the ones that will be making more money. The legislation allows the drug industry to circumvent price control and avoid regulation. The consumer will see a $3.5 billion a year bump in drug prices.8
And the extra costs that they may face? No worries, they will just pass them on to government agencies, their own workforce and you the consumer. That is right; you’ll be paying for this mess for years to come. Not only will the money come out of your wallet directly, but indirectly as well through the imposition of higher taxes that will be necessary to pay for it. And the shocking part of this—you will get little return on your investment.
You really think that the poor kids who live in Detroit or Harlem are going to be the beneficiaries? I’ve got a bridge to sell you if you believe that one. Small businesses will really feel the implications of ObamaCare. They are going to have to pay huge payouts for healthcare that really won’t benefit their employees. Small businesses will eventually feel the implications of ObamaCare. They are going to have to provide healthcare that is cost prohibitive and really won’t benefit their employees. When small businesses can’t afford government-mandated health insurance they’ll simply just stop hiring. Or worse, they will lay off workers. Translation? ObamaCare means fewer jobs at a critical time for our economy.
Obama’s policy initiatives are never ending, but even his proposal to push up minimum wage is a job killer and a surefire way to end hiring among small businesses. Entrepreneurs can’t afford higher wages right now. Small businesses can’t afford to pay more in an already squeezed marketplace. Once again, the administration is advancing policies that will backfire, slowing the economy’s growth and setting itself up for failure.
Cap-and-trade is another great example of legislation that could have had a negative effect on the economy. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) defines cap-and-trade as “an environmental policy tool that delivers results with a mandatory cap on emissions while providing sources flexibility in how they comply. Successful cap-and-trade programs provide strict environmental accountability without inhibiting economic growth.” If it sounds like a lot of garble to you, know that you are in good company. In reality EPA’s description of cap-and-trade is misleading at best and at worst dishonest. But no worries . . . Obama will have a plan B in mind following this failure too.
Even Obama admits his green initiatives are going to raise prices for electricity. On the campaign trail he said, “Under my plan of a cap and trade system electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket, even, you know regardless of what I say about whether coal is good or bad, because I’m capping greenhouse gases, coal powered plants, you know, natural gas, you name it. Whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was, they would have to retrofit their operations. That will cost money. They will pass that money on to consumers.”9
You know what it really means? It means soaring energy costs, less disposable income, and fewer jobs in this country. Jobs under the Obama green plans and initiatives will head overseas to places like Saudi Arabia, where Alcoa and Dow Chemical are already setting up shop. Fewer jobs in the United States will ensure that Americans remain on the government plantation of dependency, subservient to foreign masters as well as their own.
Another irksome number on the Obama tally is the continuation of Wall Street bailouts initiated by President George W. Bush like TARP, the $700 billion bailout started under Bush and continued under Obama with the auto industry. Our bailout money didn’t generate jobs for millions of Americans. Rather it went to wealthy bankers and their trader friends in order to ensure they could keep paying those elite golf club memberships.
And if the economic policies of Obama aren’t problematic enough, just look to the racial controversies that he has stirred up both directly and indirectly. During a press conference on health care, Obama was asked about the arrest of black Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates by a white police officer at his home. Obama veered off the health care topic and said the Cambridge police “acted stupidly.”
Without having any of the details regarding the incident Obama weighed in on a local police matter suggesting the police action was racially motivated. He said, “. . . what I think we know separate and apart from this incident is that there’s a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately. That’s just a fact.” Once the dust had settled, Obama held the now-infamous beer summit at which Obama, Gates, Biden, and the responding Cambridge police Sergeant James Crowley met at the White House for a beer.
Obama’s Department of Justice (DOJ) decision regarding the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation issue in Philadelphia during the 2008 presidential election also raised race-based concerns. The DOJ refused to bring charges of voter intimidation against the organization even with video evidence of New Black Panther members intimidating white voters at a polling location. The DOJ under Attorney General Eric Holder settled the voter intimidation case with an injunction against only one of the three members of the organization.10 Following the decision, concerns were raised that under the Obama administration, charges of voter intimidation by blacks were not going to be aggressively pursued and this view was factored into the Justice Department’s judgment in the case. That’s what I call color-coded justice.
J. Christian Adams, a former Justice Department official who resigned over the case, said in a commentary published in the Washington Times, “I believe the dismissal of the Black Panther case was motivated by a lawless hostility toward equal enforcement of the law” and “Refusing to enforce the law equally means some citizens are protected by the law while others are left to be victimized, depending on their race. Core American principles of equality before the law and freedom from racial discrimination are at risk.”
In addition, in his book, Injustice: Exposing the Racial Agenda of the Obama Justice Department, Adams explains how racial radicals have infiltrated the Department of Justice affecting the department’s policies. The book reveals that while Obama was campaigning for president in 2007, he spoke at a New Black Panther Party rally in Selma, Alabama. Pictures of the event show Obama sharing the same podium with NBPP Chairman Malik Zulu Shabazz.11
Obama’s silence when racial accusations were flying is part of the overall Obama irony. Does anyone who opposes Obama’s policies get deemed racist? In truth, even I thought that we had finally put racism well behind us when the country elected a black president. Instead his administration is actually having a very negative impact on race relations by using race as both a shield and a weapon to defend his agenda. Now anyone who happens to disagree with Obama’s policies is deemed racist. It’s not the way it should be.
Conveniently, Michelle Obama’s participation drew national attention at the NAACP 2010 convention. It was very timely. Was she invited simply to drum up press during the exact conference at which the organization had a resolution condemning racism within the Tea Party movement? And it’s a little outrageous that Obama hasn’t more harshly criticized Charles Rangel in the wake of tax issues in New York.
Interestingly Al Sharpton was on the scene to deal with the new legislation in Arizona that is being labeled racist for trying to control illegal immigration—Al Sharpton. According to Obama’s friend, Harvard Law School professor Charles Ogletree, “Al Sharpton has become the lightning rod in moving Obama’s agenda forward.”12 A front-page story in the Washington Post had a headline that read, “Activist Al Sharpton Takes on New Role as Administration Ally,” suggesting a political alliance between the first “post racial-president” and race-baiting rebel rouser.
Why, early into his presidency, did Obama go off tele-prompter and “go street” on the arrest of Harvard professor Henry Lewis Gates Jr.—a black educator arrested by a white police officer? Why even hold the ridiculous beer summit? How many people were laughing with me when they had to bring Joe Biden to the table to make sure that two savvy black educators weren’t sitting side by side with one white cop? Why fuel the racial fires by getting involved at all? Don’t get me wrong; I am not suggesting the arrest was fine or even legitimate. My point is, why is the president of the United States getting involved here? This is the guy that is responsible for appointing judges to the highest bench in the land. What happens when the executive branch starts interfering in the day-to-day operations of police departments? What happened to judicial independence? How many police officers are going to second-guess themselves before making an arrest because they fear the president will effectively label them racist for arresting someone who is black?
Part of the problem: Does President Obama even really have the shared historical understanding of racism in this country? Maybe that’s the truest irony of this black leader’s presidency. Author Dinesh D’Souza, in his book The Roots of Obama’s Rage, points out that the president doesn’t share the life experience of most Americans, let alone black Americans, as his upbringing was tremendously different. As such, D’Souza thinks Obama is more dangerous than many of us had originally imagined and that his presidency is potentially a conspiracy to equalize us with the rest of the world. Obama never talks about winning wars. He never talks about the oil. He seems to demonstrate a soft spot for resources in emerging markets, more than ours—like Brazil. We’re not drilling here, but he’s happy to help other nations drill.
D’Souza says that’s because Obama wasn’t raised in a place where the civil rights battles of the 1960s would have affected him, but instead was driven solely by an “anticolonialist” and “inherited rage” against the West that comes from his African father.
D’Souza demonstrates a two-sided, two-faced Obama, a clear Obama irony. The first being the face of an Obama wanting to get elected, the second being the anti-wealth, Wall Street–hating, federal regulation promoting Obama. In the book D’Souza isolates several quotes from a pre-elected Obama that ironically don’t mesh with the elected Obama message. Take a look:
“We will need to remind ourselves, despite all our differences, just how much we share common hopes, common dreams, a bond that will not break.”13
“A new kind of politics, one that can excavate and build upon those shared understandings that pull us together as Americans.”14
Consider his words at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, which reinforces the notion as well: “There is not a liberal America and a conservative America; there is a United States of America. There is not a black America and a white America, a Latino America and an Asian America. . . . We are one people, all of us, pledging allegiance to the Stars and Stripes, all of us defending the United States of America.”
And conservative themed words that Obama made on the campaign trail like “. . . the people I meet in small towns and big cities and diners and office parks—they don’t expect government to solve all of their problems. Go into the collar counties around Chicago, and they’ll tell you that they don’t want their tax money wasted by a welfare agency or by the Pentagon. Go into any inner-city neighborhood to learn.” D’Souza calls these quotes “inspirational” and words you’d normally hear at the “Republican convention.”15
And where are those limited-government, liberty-touting words now? Nowhere. This Obama is all about federal control. But even more worrisome than this shift in Obama’s message, is the root of his anger. D’Souza makes the point in his book that Obama is an anticolonial thinker, with the desire to equalize America with the rest of the world, to put us on the same economic footing as the rest.
Perhaps Obama showed his true allegiance when he sent a bust of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill back to England. The bronze bust was a gift on loan from Great Britain to President George W. Bush. It was on display inside the Oval Office. And this isn’t a surprise. For many of us, Churchill stands for freedom and victory over tyranny and evil. When the Brits told Obama he could keep it, he said no thanks and replaced it with one of Abraham Lincoln. What’s the undercurrent of this move? It’s pretty clear according to the British newspaper Telegraph:
Churchill has less happy connotations for Mr. Obama than those American politicians who celebrate his wartime leadership. It was during Churchill’s second premiership that Britain suppressed Kenya’s Mau Mau rebellion. Among Kenyans allegedly tortured by colonial regime included one Hussein Onyango Obama, the President’s grandfather.16
I suppose still waters run deep.
Since D’Souza is right and Obama’s thoughts on anticolonialism are the very foundation for his ideology, we are heading down a very bad path. We are heading down the road to economic destruction at a far greater speed than maybe we’d thought. Couple that with the fact that Obama is creating increased racial tensions in the country and we have to stop and think why anyone would want Obama’s leadership for another term.
I don’t know how we calm the racial tensions Obama’s created except to get him out of office. And we can’t wait that long to start correcting his backward approach to the economy and job creation. To me, the fix seems so simple too. Lower taxes for starters and put the money in the hands of the people, who know what’s best for their families. Americans know how to spend in order to provide what is needed in their households and small business, but big government is impeding the process. That’s what’s most frustrating.
Limited government in America could really bring about the change Obama called for during the election. Obama’s progressive agenda is a disaster and will result in bigger government and less freedom. Our limited resources will be further constrained because the government will have all the power and control. We don’t need higher priced energy in an economy that’s already struggling, but that’s what policies like climate change legislation and renewable energy mandates will provide. We need job creation. And we need working-class families to have more money in their weekly household budgets so they can spend and expand the economy and create jobs.
What’s really maddening about it all is that Obama seems oblivious to the fact that we’ve been living in some pretty tough times since he took office. How many of us would like to be jetting off to Hawaii and Florida for multiple family vacations. Living large on the backs of taxpayers—is this the kind of change we expected from him? While Americans struggle just to feed their families, we watch the first lady vacationing in Spain with several friends and their daughters where she visited King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia. Does she think she is a queen too? Yes, first ladies travel, but our nation is facing some seriously challenging economic times and flashy, taxpayer-funded world tours give the wrong message.
Home foreclosures are piling up and the jobless rate in this country has yet to rebound. Yet here we are watching television coverage of Obama playing eighteen holes with his friends, some reports say, every weekend since he was elected during his first year in office. He takes lavish vacations while a growing number of Americans are living out the staycation on the government plantation. And when they’re not globetrotting, the Obamas entertained in the White House estimated to the tune of $9 or $10 million in 2009 alone. Despite failed policies and a declining economy, Michelle and Barack demonstrate an attitude of arrogance and elitism. They seem to act more like white elites than blacks struggling to keep their heads above water in these desperate times and that’s wrong. And I get called a racist for raising these concerns?
Obama’s radical policies are driving more Americans to the government plantation by using big business and elites (Hollywood and environmental activists) to help him. He will wheel and deal with businesses to co-opt their money, power, and influence so they use their resources to support his legislative goals. Unsuspecting CEOs have become Obama’s useful idiots. If he can’t get the entire progressive agenda (no public option for ObamaCare) he will settle for an incremental power grab and he or another progressive will get the rest of the agenda at a later time.
D’Souza is right about Obama’s end game to lower our standard of living. And once everyone is on the government plantation they will get used to it, settle for it, and vote for the progressives who provide them with their daily needs. Already, almost half of the country does not pay federal income taxes. The elites will have theirs, and everyone else will be blocked from climbing the social economic ladder. Ironically, the policies the administration is peddling now would have prevented Obama from achieving his success.
We need change. We really do. Ironically we just can’t afford the kind that Obama and the Washington elites are currently advocating.