Gordon Osmond

Gordon Osmond
Location
Sao Paulo, Brasil
Birthday
November 09
Company
those with whom I choose to keep
Bio
Retired lawyer, playwright, English teacher, tennis umpire. Author of So You Think You Know English: A Guide to English for Those Who Think They Don't Need One. ISBN: 978-1-61546-414-2 and Wet Firecrackers http://www.publishamerica.net/product38929.html Osmond hosts a weekly interactive broadcast dedicated to the discussion of books and ESL education. To participate, check out www.publishamericaauthors.com

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MARCH 18, 2009 10:42AM

An Unprincipled Presidency

Rate: 1 Flag

An Unprincipled Presidency

 

Two hot new news topics illustrate how willing the Obama Administration is to put politics over principle.

 

As unpopular as the AIG bonuses are, it is undeniable that their aggregate amount is relatively insignificant.  However, because of all the popular buzz, and a decline in their popularity polls, D.C. Democrats are spinning out of control in an effort to claw back the bonuses, whether by sacrificing the concept of contract, a cornerstone of civilization, or by confiscatory taxation which is Constitutionally suspect at best.  To make matters worse, these unprincipled efforts are being pursued not to recover the bucks which are minimal, but rather to divert public attention from the fact that the whole mess could have easily been avoided had Obama’s lieutenants (junior grade) performed their duties with a minimum degree of care.

 

Then, to appease the Teamsters, the Obama team is taking action relating to Mexican trucking in the United States which has minimal if no effect beneficial to the United States but which may well trigger significant retaliatory action by Mexico in terms of higher tariffs on American exports.  Shades of the buy-America provisions, which were almost enacted and which would have had disastrous consequences to international trade.

 

The only principle our fledgling President seems to be capable of pursuing is to have the country borrow itself into a stupor and then spread it around according to need.  He also has a disturbing tendency to respond to the wheel that is squeaking the loudest at a particular moment.

Author tags:

obama, politics, mexico, trade, aig, bonuses

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Oops sorry, I thought from the title this was about two failed terms of the Bush adminsitration.
Stellaa

For starters, honesty, rule of law, living up to one's undertaken obligations, predictability as embodied in the constitutional principles of ex post facto, due process, bill of attainder, etc.) and protection of private physical, intangible, and intellectual property.
It's interesting that so far there's no substantive defense of the current administration and its rookie leader, only critiques of the past. Hmmmmm.
Just heard Obama's "defense" of Tim Geithner: he didn't WRITE the AIG bonus contracts. Apparently when you're in charge of giving away billions of taxpayer dollars to a private company, you're only charged with knowledge of company commitments that you have authored. Just how stupid does Obama think the public is?

Other Obama "defenses" include the observation that TG works hard and, guess what?, inherited a big mess. It appears that Obama is having as much difficulty defending TG as OS liberals are having defending Obama.

I wonder if TG's sale of his New York digs is rescindable. If not he can always say, as some Dems in Congress are, in effect, saying, "What's a contract? Just a piece of paper."
Conservatives(and I am assuming you are a conservative, Gordo)have been running into each other since last September, trying to define the debate over the current economic situation in such a way as to exonerate themselves and their "principles" from any responsibility. We've all heard this drek. It's rather like a child, when caught with hands in cookie jar and chocolate on face, denies any culpability in the disappearance of the cookies. Of course you don't want the actions of the former administration factored into the equation. Stupor? These characters borrowed the country into a near comatose state, and then spent some of the the money on worthless military adventuring and stole the rest. And being good conservatives, they would never put politics before principle...errr..well; there was that CIA agent, and those US attornies, and those no bid contracts. The lying to congress was kind of awkward, and shredding the first, fourth, fifth, sixth, and eighth amendments to the Constitution was regrettable but necessary. Editing critical scientific reports to congress, ignoring the Geneva Conventions, and suspending even the appearance of congressional oversight are so far down on the list of priorities they hardly seem worth mentioning. The important thing is that "principle" was preserved. Please, you guys have no credibility, and have proven to the world that you are so bad at governing that you probably shouldn't be allowed to do it. Unprincipled Presidency, indeed. I think a quote from the late George Carlin is appropriate here: "It's all bullshit and it's bad for you". The truth is, our current state is simply conservative philosophy translated into real terms and taken to it's logical conclusion.