Change We Can't Believe In

For those wondering when Barack Obama would reach the point of irrelevance, the suspense ended with his descent into it this week.  First of all, he tried to schedule his much-ballyhooed jobs speech before Congress next week on Wednesday, September 7, to give the Republican presidential candidates (who are debating on MSNBC that night) some politically charged competition.  House Speaker John Boehner said no, though, and so the President gave in (again) and agreed to have the speech the following night . . . at 7 P.M., when few people even bother to watch political speeches - especially when more attention will be paid to the opening of the 2011-12 football season with a game between the Green Bay Packers and the New Orleans Saints that night.

Also, President Obama overruled his own Environmental Protection Agency leadership and decided not to implement anti-smog regulations, saying they would adversely affect the economy and would be too costly. This sounds like something a President McCain would have said and something a President Reagan did say. (Reagan vetoed a clean water bill in 1987 citing the cost involved; his veto was overridden.)

Finally, the economy is not improving. A net gain of zero jobs - zero, nothing, nada - was created during the month of August 2011, and the President's jobs speech - for which expectations have already been lowered by several thousand feet - is almost certain to be a major letdown, likely offering few if any new and inspiring ideas.

So, it appears that there's a lot that Obama simply cannot and will not attempt to do, anything he has done hasn't been been enough, and what he has accomplished will be torn out by the roots when President Perry takes over in 2013.

Please don't bang your head against your PC monitor, dear reader . . ..

Tiny Tim

I don't know which comment made at the Republican debate in New Hampshire was the worst. They, like the candidates, were all pretty terrible.

I guess the worst comment would have to have been from former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty. T-Paw, as he's called, was insulted - nay, outraged - by the idea that we're more or less in the same economic situation as any other country and that we can't sustain continued growth.

"We're not the same as Portugal, we're not the same as Argentina," Pawlenty said. "This idea that we can't have 5 percent growth in America is hogwash. It's a defeatist attitude."

Aside from offending two countries he might have to deal with as President, Pawlenty disregarded top economists with his comment, even though they were the ones who found his 5 percent projection based on even lower tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans to be flawed.

And even though he planned to go after Mitt Romney on the health care issue, he ended up demurring and failed to follow through. In short, Tim acted like a Democrat.

When voters take a look at the budget mess Pawlenty left Mark Dayton, his Democratic successor as governor of Minnesota, he's going to look even more minuscule in this race.