Charles Krauthammer: Deception at Core of Obama Plans
 

Deception at Core of Obama Plans

By Charles Krauthammer

WASHINGTON -- Forget the pork. Forget the waste. Forget the 8,570 earmarks in a bill supported by a president who poses as the scourge of earmarks. Forget the "$2 trillion dollars in savings" that "we have already identified," $1.6 trillion of which President Obama's budget director later admits is the "savings" of not continuing the surge in Iraq until 2019 -- 11 years after George Bush ended it, and eight years after even Bush would have had us out of Iraq completely.

Forget all of this. This is run-of-the-mill budget trickery. True, Obama's tricks come festooned with strings of zeros tacked onto the end. But that's a matter of scale, not principle.

All presidents do that. But few undertake the kind of brazen deception at the heart of Obama's radically transformative economic plan, a rhetorical sleight of hand so smoothly offered that few noticed.

The logic of Obama's address to Congress went like this:

"Our economy did not fall into decline overnight," he averred. Indeed, it all began before the housing crisis. What did we do wrong? We are paying for past sins in three principal areas: energy, health care, and education -- importing too much oil and not finding new sources of energy (as in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the Outer Continental Shelf?), not reforming health care, and tolerating too many bad schools.

The "day of reckoning" has now arrived. And because "it is only by understanding how we arrived at this moment that we'll be able to lift ourselves out of this predicament," Obama has come to redeem us with his far-seeing program of universal, heavily nationalized health care; a cap-and-trade tax on energy; and a major federalization of education with universal access to college as the goal.

Amazing. As an explanation of our current economic difficulties, this is total fantasy. As a cure for rapidly growing joblessness, a massive destruction of wealth, a deepening worldwide recession, this is perhaps the greatest non sequitur ever foisted upon the American people.

At the very center of our economic near-depression is a credit bubble, a housing collapse and a systemic failure of the entire banking system. One can come up with a host of causes: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pushed by Washington (and greed) into improvident loans, corrupted bond-ratings agencies, insufficient regulation of new and exotic debt instruments, the easy money policy of Alan Greenspan's Fed, irresponsible bankers pushing (and then unloading in packaged loan instruments) highly dubious mortgages, greedy house-flippers, deceitful homebuyers.

The list is long. But the list of causes of the collapse of the financial system does not include the absence of universal health care, let alone of computerized medical records. Nor the absence of an industry-killing cap-and-trade carbon levy. Nor the lack of college graduates. Indeed, one could perversely make the case that, if anything, the proliferation of overeducated, Gucci-wearing, smart-ass MBAs inventing ever more sophisticated and opaque mathematical models and debt instruments helped get us into this credit catastrophe in the first place.

And yet with our financial house on fire, Obama makes clear both in his speech and his budget that the essence of his presidency will be the transformation of health care, education and energy. Four months after winning the election, six weeks after his swearing in, Obama has yet to unveil a plan to deal with the banking crisis.

What's going on? "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste," said Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. "This crisis provides the opportunity for us to do things that you could not do before."

Things. Now we know what they are. The markets' recent precipitous decline is a reaction not just to the absence of any plausible bank rescue plan, but also to the suspicion that Obama sees the continuing financial crisis as usefully creating the psychological conditions -- the sense of crisis bordering on fear-itself panic -- for enacting his "Big Bang" agenda to federalize and/or socialize health care, education and energy, the commanding heights of post-industrial society.

Clever politics, but intellectually dishonest to the core. Health, education and energy -- worthy and weighty as they may be -- are not the cause of our financial collapse. And they are not the cure. The fraudulent claim that they are both cause and cure is the rhetorical device by which an ambitious president intends to enact the most radical agenda of social transformation seen in our lifetime.

Copyright 2009, Washington Post Writers Group

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/art...ky_budget.html

krauthammer, lol great name

To what end? To make the US care about it's people like other countries care about theirs??
That bastard!!

It's hilarious how evil some people can make the word "social" sound.

"Socialism" to the extreme is not good, I get that. No "ism" to the extreme is ever good, but a healthy helping dose of government help, like a doctor for the sick, is not evil, no matter how many big bad scary "radical agenda" and "transformation seen in our lifetime" terms you can throw at it.

Good article.

People aren't blind to this. People see this and say ... "well, even if it doesn't fix the 'financial crisis', at least we will have x y and z improvements which is why we really voted for Obama anyway"

Journalists think that by throwing around the word "socialism" they can get people all scared and pissed off, but most Americans WANT Obama's reforms of healthcare, education, and especially energy to go through, even though they are (rightfully) pessimistic about the stimulus package's ability to actually stimulate the economy.

At least, as far as I can tell ..

-P

Ill say this over and over until I die, its amazing how many people bash "socialism" but went to public school and often send their kids to public school. Sarah Palin is an example lol

I dont have kids, but my home tax pays for public school and juvenile detention, how come no one screams anti-socialism when it comes to paying for public school or juvenile detention?

so OP did you go to public school? :1orglaugh

I think what worries Americans most is that American politicians have shown time and time again that they cannot be trusted with more and more power and money. They are like little kids at the candy store. I hate them all.

what a tragedy - a president who is intent on making the platform he was elected on a reality. there's absolutely nothing this or any president is going to be able to do to undo this economic mess that neither he nor Bush before him were responsible for.

best he get on with doing what he promised to do - the economy will come back - or it won't.

I got to this point in the article, busted out laughing :1orglaugh and then realized the rest wasnt credible enough for me to waste my time reading. :1orglaugh

whats even more funny is how many of these same people take all kinds of benefits from the goverment which someonelse pays for, then they scream about the less than one percent that goes to poor people. Fucking retards.

I love this part. Yes, it's that the education level was SO HIGH that they all came out major screw ups and failed.

Looking at it "perversely " is definitely a good choice of words.

However, let's look at it another way... let's say... logically.

Perhaps these people's educations were not so high, perhaps they were so low that they all came out major screw ups and failed.

Who would have thought the people of the US would act like this. I can't remember any other president getting placed under a microscope like Obama has since BEFORE his inauguration. Don't get me wrong, I am no supporter and didn't vote for him, but he WAS elected and it now seems many have voters remorse.

Why? I haven't seen him do ANYTHING yet that every other president before him has done and most certainly nothing yet that the previous administration put us through.

So again, I ask... Why is everyone on Obama's ass?

Because he is BLACK, and I find it sad AND disturbing that the America I live in is so afraid of a black man in the white house they have to go out of their way to expose him for doing what every other president has done before him.

No one wants to say it, maybe some do, but I bet you if another white man had become president we wouldn't have any of this "First 100 Days In Office" bullshit or the intense scrutiny that Obama is receiving.

:2 cents:

you make a good point

I would like to see a Hammer made of Kraut.

Err. Think Cuba.. When the US put Castro into power there they have no idea he would do what he did. it started out to get rid of a ruthless dictator that was killing people in the streets. Then it turned to some Social/ism Behaviors, and then... He took everything.

"When the US put Castro into power..."

Huh?

Rich foreigners come to America for health care. :error

Obviously American public schools are the best in the world. :error

Obamas policies have destroyed 30% of American corporate wealth since he was nominated.
Obamas spending bill has raised the national debt to a level more than all Presidents before him combined.

enough of this crap already. If Obama is doing such a bad job then he'll be out in 4 years so the haters need to STFU already. They bitch he's fucking things up the irony being if he fixed things he'll get re-elcted which is what the don't want.

everyone want everything fixed NOW if the Dow goes down again today it's somehow Obama's fault. what's irnoic is the for almsot 2 1/2 years into Reagan's term we had a recession. The last time unemploment was this high was in 1983 when Reagan was in office. Did Reagan get the blame? No people were still blaming Carter who hadn't been in ofice since Jan of 1981. If 2 1/2 years of no blame was good enough for Reagan then all the neo-caons need to STFU and give Obama the time he needs. Stop being hypocritical.

Like the guy before Castro was an angel.

If only there were some way to ... vote whether or not we want this guy as President.. hmmmmmmmmmmm..

OH.

WAIT.

NM.

Slow down there killer you are mixing up your letters and words.
It is a known fact that both Democrats and Republicans and specifically Congress has the largest portion of burden for this current crisis.
What you fail to realize with your Obama-mania is that Mr. Obama has destroyed American capitalism when he should have let them destroy themselves. Thats how capitalism works. Instead he is so worried about the trickle down effect he thinks that a larger social platform will pacify the people long enough to recapture power again in 4 years.
Look man, you really should get past your hatred and really really look and research what is happening to our financial system.

Obama has no plans of his own. His owners have plans for long run, short run etc. That's one cause of part of the confusion, there's one more dimension. This article is inside the usual frame that says: nobody ever had a lot of power or influence, and if they did, they would not try to keep it, or manipulate the system to gain advantages. This is of course a fairy tale, but it's a frame that appeals to normal people.

The people that already has perverse amounts of real power, wealth, and influence collude and make plans on a huge time table. Democrat and republican politicians and the issues they get elected on, these are just installations that split the people, so they get no where.

Wow, there's an example of socialism?? Well hell, the US is doomed!
Wait, wasn't there an example of some guy taking over Asia? Ghengis Khan?? Maybe Obama is here to conquer Asia!!!

Are you saying Cuba is a great country? Not sure what you are eluding at here.

Obama hasn't done jack shit yet and people hate him already. It's a new world record. Settle in, it's a long 8 years ahead.

im still betting yes, any takers? lol

Yea, it must be racism.

It could NEVER be the $2 trillion in 401k money that evaporated overnight, or the $1 trillion pork barrel spending bill.

ATTENTION ALL RACISTS: light 'em if you got 'em!

:pimp

Nice try but most that damage was done on bush's watch or the very end. I think you got shit confused. I don't like Obama either but you won't see me laying blame where it isn't due like you just did.

http://www.smartmoney.com/personal-f...er-microscope/

Notice the date on the article: November 2008

"If it sounds far-fetched, consider that some $2 trillion was lost from 401(k)s and IRAs in the past year, according to the Center on Retirement Research, as well as $2 trillion lost from pensions."

If your gonna hate get some facts at least, whatever quarterly losses are being reported haven't even covered his time in office yet.

BTW... Lets see your proof it evaporated overnight. Something like that would be big news, sorta like the 500 billion run in October which was smaller than your supposed 2 trillon lost in one night.

Sheshhhhh ..... Were did you get that fictstory book ..... Amazing how uneducated and ignorant people try to sound .....

What's coming will be much deeper than socialism.

The G20 summit on April 4th should be a good gauge.

Lol you do realize November 4th was election day. :error
...and November 5th the DOW plunged 500 points. :1orglaugh

Wall St does not like the Obama administrations policies, and rightfully so. Look dude you either believe in capitalism or you dont. Obama does not, he is trying to shift this country to more socialism.

This isnt about racism at all and really I think its pretty ignorant of you to say that it is.

Sorry, election day doesn't mean dick... When he gets inaugurated in January and starts making policy THAT is when the blame starts, not a moment before.

This two party system is what is guaranteed to keep this country divided. We KNOW we have an imperfect system and we HAVE to have someone to point fingers at. To even blame Obama for our current economic woes is beyond ridiculous. If that mother fucker was that powerful he wouldn't be president, he would be sitting at a much larger table with much less attention drawn to him. He most certainly isn't helping the situation but he didn't bring it about.

My man didn't get in so personally I don't care what happens, lets let the people get what they wanted. I hope the whole house of cards come tumbling down just to show them all what sheep they have become.

There is no such thing as "Change" just a different method of control.

Now that I agree with, I really dont think we are very far off in opinions.

Bump for the greatest wealth destruction in the history of the world!!

Well....he put himself under the microscope. I have never seen a campaign like his before. Things like the creation of "The Office of the President Elect", his PR team splashing his image everywhere possible, his PR team grabbing every soundbite they could, references to "Camelot" etc.. He has created unreal expectations in what can be accomplished.
He has whipped the people into a frenzy with a promise of "Change". He has made promises to fix everything and now he has to deliver on those promises. Along with making all of those promises, he needed to do a better job of making the people understand how long it is going to take, and what changes to the system are required to make those changes.
I don't think race is the issue here.
:2 cents:

Thats funny, it would have been 10x worse, nothing better in todays culture to blame republicans and conservatives which I see as two different groups... Till republicans get back to being what the party is historically known for.

Granted I am somewhat liberal on social issues, but conservative in fiscal and foreign policy issues.

Obama is right now on the path to being a reincarnation of jimmy carters political career.

:2 cents:

Krauthammer is a douche and full of shit just like usual... he has been spitting the same crap for years and they all loved Bush... Fox News Contributors all.

After the republicans drove the economy into the shitpit, nothing anybody can do is going to fix it without enormous pain.

If it can be fixed at all, after such colossal republican and corporate mismanagement.

And Krauthammer is a totally owned stooge of the corporations.

Americans stay so fucking distracted with the pointless Republican/Democrat paradigm that they always seem to miss the important things.

"The Republicans did this, the Democrats did that, whaa whaa blah blah..." Can't you see through the bullshit? Divide and conquer. Americans stay divided into 2 groups arguing and bickering back and forth over bullshit while important shit goes unnoticed.

Everyone just wants to stick up for their "team." When people ask me what "party" I am a part of I tell them I'm not part of any party, I'm an American. I don't care which bullshit party you affiliate yourself with, as long as you are an honest person and are looking out for the best interests of this country then you're okay in my book. Not many people like that currently in our government though, unfortunately.

Krauthammer thought the Iraq War was a good idea and that our safety was in question, so he doesn't exactly have a strong ability to predict the future.

How a party that has screamed and worked to deregulate as much as possible for over 30yrs. Has the balls to blame the guy who is in for 6 weeks is too funny. Lets see W was in for 8 months, got reports osama is going to attack us with fucking planes but that was clintons fault. the problem is the whole liberal media myth is really bullshit. The right controls the message, the news companies are owned by large corporations.They know who butters their bread. No matter what station from the supposely liberal msnbc to fox. I would say 80 percent of the time some right wing douche bag is spouting bullshit with very little push back.

John stewart verbally slapped the shit out of cnbc and he is on the fucking comedy channel something is very wrong with that. How Jim kramer and others saying everyday thing is good days before these motherfuckers crashed. And we got to hear it from John stewart. Something is very wrong.

after i first saw this guys name... playing Call of Duty was never the same... i keep thinking "shit.. i need a kraut hammer... where's my kraut hammer..."

How about when Obama said everything was alright? How about when Obama said the first bailout would ease credit? How about when Obama said the first bailout would stop the market from tanking? How about when Obama said it was a good time to buy stocks and the very next day the dow and sp go down almost 5%?

Not defending Kramer because he is a fucking tool.

Politicslol. :angrysoap

Are you trying to portray John Stewart as some kind of educated analyst, more educated than perhaps Jim Cramer or any other CNBC analyst for that matter???? :1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

I agree and does anyone else notice that all his speeches sound like he is STILL on the campaign trail? Like he hasn't switched gears yet?

Pet peeve: It's Jon Stewart, not John Stewart.

thank you john stewart is the singer jon is the funny man