TWO TENDENCIES
“Looking at the big picture of Obama’s performance, two distinct patterns of missteps emerge,” New York Post columnist Michael Goodwin writes.
“While neither involves serious constitutional issues, they spell trouble and help explain the fierce opposition to many of his signature policies even as he remains personally popular,” Mr. Goodwin said.
“The first pattern shows his tendency to overuse the White House bully pulpit and cross the line of accepted behavior by employing his office and aides to demonize dissenters. His attacks on insurers, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Fox News, tea-party protesters, even individuals all reveal an intolerance of criticism that falls outside the mainstream of American political tradition.
“Clearly, the administration hasn’t found its place in the pecking order, with the most shocking evidence coming from Valerie Jarrett, Obama’s alter ego in the White House. She defended the attacks on Fox as showing how ’we’re going to speak truth to power.’
“The idea is laughable, but revealing that Team Obama still sees itself as an outsider and spouts counterculture nonsense. If Fox or any other critic attains more power than the president in the court of public opinion, it’s because a weak president let it happen. Even worse, his trying to overcome the weakness by undermining critics only shrinks the presidency, as Richard Nixon taught us.
“The second pattern is an eagerness to abdicate American power on the international stage. Obama’s apologies for the nation’s past on foreign soil, combined with a bended-knee approach to tyranny in Russia and Iran, show the president as an internationalist who believes only in ’soft’ power and will act only with a consensus.”
HARD TIMES
“The easy life is about to end for President Obama,” Fred Barnes writes in the Weekly Standard.
“For the first time, he can’t defer or delegate or depend on the media to bail him out. He has to stand and fight for the policy that defines his presidency - liberal health care reform. And the fight won’t be pleasant,” Mr. Barnes said.
“Obama is exactly where he didn’t expect to be. His popularity has declined at a record rate. His supposed power of persuasion has turned out to be nonexistent. More Americans oppose his health care initiative than support it. And Republicans are prepared to combat him and Democrats on every major provision of it.
“The large Democratic majorities in the Senate and House may look overwhelming, but they’re not. At least a half-dozen Democratic senators are queasy about Obama-style reform. If two of them bolt, Republicans should be assured of the 41 votes that would block a motion to end debate on the legislation. If only a single renegade Democrat emerges, that will suffice so long as all 40 Republican senators, including Maine’s Olympia Snowe, hang together.
“There’s less for Obama to worry about in the House. Speaker Nancy Pelosi can afford to lose about 40 Democrats and still pass Obamacare. Yet there is significant uneasiness in her ranks. When Democrats met last week, 47 said they’re opposed to the bill, and four or five sneaked out of the room to avoid declaring themselves. Pelosi softened it ever-so-slightly, and Republicans figure she’ll have the votes for passage.
The Senate is the battleground. Republicans are mounting a nonstop, full-court press against Obamacare. Minority leader Mitch McConnell has made an issue of the normally routine ’motion to proceed’ with discussion of the bill on the Senate floor.”
GOOD GUYS WIN
“The big news in Honduras is that the good guys seem to have won a four-month political standoff over the exile of former President Manuel Zelaya,” the Wall Street Journal said Saturday in an editorial.
“Current President Roberto Micheletti agreed [Friday] to submit Mr. Zelaya’s request for reinstatement as president to the Supreme Court and Congress, and in return the U.S. will withdraw its sanctions and recognize next month’s presidential elections,” the newspaper noted.
“Mr. Zelaya, whose term would have expired in January, isn’t likely to be reinstated, given that the court has twice ruled against his right to remain in office. The Honduran Congress, which voted in June to remove Mr. Zelaya, will then use that high court’s opinion to decide if he should be restored to power.
“There is a risk that Venezeula’s Hugo Chavez and other Zelaya allies will try to buy support for their man and stir other trouble. But Hondurans who have rightly stood up to enormous U.S. pressure to reinstate Mr. Zelaya aren’t likely to be intimidated now.
“Secretary of State Hillary Clinton trumpeted the result as a diplomatic triumph, but it’s more accurate to say that it extricated her and the Obama Administration from the box canyon they entered by throwing in with Mr. Zelaya. Hondurans had deposed Mr. Zelaya on entirely legal grounds for threatening violence and violating the country’s constitution in an attempt to run for a second term. The U.S. nonetheless meddled and demanded that Mr. Zelaya be reinstated.
“But Hondurans refused to bend, and the State Department apparently decided at last that Honduras was going to go ahead with its election whether the U.S. agreed or not. The Honduran compromise provided Mrs. Clinton with an elegant diplomatic exit.
“Washington and the Organization of American States have now promised to send observers and recognize the elections; there will be no amnesty for Mr. Zelaya if he is charged with a crime; and the zelayistas will renounce their plans to call for a constituent assembly to rewrite the constitution. If Mrs. Clinton wants to call this a victory, it is - for Honduras.”
READ ON
“You knew it would be long, but 1,990 pages? That’s how big the House Democratic leadership health care reform bill is that Speaker Nancy Pelosi unveiled [Thursday],” Paul Bedard writes in the Washington Whispers column at www. usnews.com.
“So how does that size up to other major works? Well, some critics have begun sending around lists to giggle at, including this:
• “King James Version of the Bible: 1,024 pages.
• “Ayn Rand’s ’Atlas Shrugged’: 1,200 pages.
• ” ’War and Peace’: 1,296 pages.
• ” ’American Constitutional Law’ by Lawrence Tribe: 1,470 pages.
• “The 2010 U.S. News Ultimate College Guide: 1,768 pages.
• “Democratic health care bill: 1,990 pages.
“And you can bet that those who want to read it in Congress are already flipping pages because Rep. Chris Van Hollen [Thursday] told reporters that members will get just 72 hours to read the initial bill and then another 72 to read the changed version before it goes to the House floor for a vote.”
• Greg Pierce can be reached at 202/636-3285 or gpierce@washingtontimes .com.
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