Category: Politics

Deb Riechmann of the Associated Press might as well be penning love letters to President Obama with drivel like this:

WASHINGTON – Leaving the White House for the last time on Tuesday, President George W. Bush blew a kiss out the window of his presidential limousine, a gesture that capped an eight-year administration marked by two wars, recession and the biggest terrorist attack on U.S. soil.

Bush’s exit was bittersweet. He left office with low approval ratings, but he remained upbeat, smiling and joining in the celebration of President Barack Obama’s ascent to rock-star status, even as he faces daunting challenges, especially a depressed economy.

I’m surprised she didn’t use “marred” rather than “marked.”  I am not unhappy to see Bush go.  In many ways, I think his was administration was disastrous, especially for the cause of limited government.  But I question how much of his effectiveness as a chief executive was hampered by difficult times.  He did not ask for 9/11, nor the housing and financial crisis.  He didn’t ask for high gas prices or low gas prices.  He may have gone to war in Iraq, but he inherited the Iraq problem from previous adminsitrations.  Perhaps a better chief executive could have better dealt with these challenges, but I suspect that no matter who had been in the White House in 2000, we’d be sick of him by now.  Barack Obama’s day of reckoning is yet to come, but it is coming, and I wonder whether reporters will still be reporting of his “rock star” status then.

First, I’d like to remind everyone that just because we have a president who may not agree 100% with our politics doesn’t mean we should devolve into the antics that were mainly displayed by the left over the last eight years.

Second, my thoughts.

Well, I’d have to say I was confused at times.  Some reasons were mildly humorous.  Like when I turned on the Hulu stream and suddenly heard it compared to Princess Di’s funeral.  Umm, okay.  I don’t remember people partying and dancing.  Or when I posted that I sure hope there were no environmentalists in DC today.

But, in the spirit of patriotic dissent*, I was quite confused by some of Obama’s words.

Lately, it seemed like Obama was backing off of the farther left policies he supported during the campaign.  Given that elections have consequences, I wasn’t that upset by many of them even if I didn’t personally support them.  With his past, anything that’s not far left is an improvement.  In this speech, he seemed to back to talking the talk of massive government.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions — who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short.

He called anyone who said his plans were too broad cynics and said they had short memories.  He embraced big government and asked people to keep faith in that, as well as faith in relying on each other for charity.  It’s a little hard to support individual charitable efforts when everything is going to fuel the government.  But apparently that concept is lost.

Yes, Obama threw a bone out to saying that markets generate tremendous wealth, but if government removes most of the incentives, then there will be no more wealth to tax.

It’s hard to say whether this was just an exercise in lofty speeches again knowing that most of the people watching weren’t really going to follow through and look closely at his policies.  It’s entirely possible considering he won the election that way.  However, he’s also promising an end to false promises, so he might try to deliver.  But then again, promising an end to false promises sounds nice and hope-y change-y.

I think what surprised me most is that he did a specific message to the Muslim world.  It wasn’t just a message, he started out announcing that he was talking to the Muslim world.  I don’t mind what he said, but the way he opened that paragraph kind of struck me as odd.

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect.

Will it stoke more of the “not a citizen” attitudes?  I think that’s a fair concern, and if he wants an end to petty politics, there’s no reason to keep promoting that kind stuff.

I know this isn’t terribly insightful, but after watching the campaign, I don’t think there’s much of a point in trying to analyze it.  As Jim Geraghty says, everything Barack Obama says has an expiration date.  It could be in 4 years, or it could be tomorrow morning.  You never know.

*Though I did reminded Farrah that dissent was only patriotic during the last eight years.  Now, I fear, it may go out of fashion.

Glenn Reynolds on the Inauguration:

Today will be the last day we’ll be saying “President Bush”, and it’s been a long eight years.  While I am not happy with the result of the election of 2008, in a lot of ways, I’m happy to put George W. Bush behind us.  Not having voted for him in 2000 (or Al Gore for that matter), I was never his biggest fan.  But I always supported him on the decision to invade Iraq, and I still support it.  The future success of Iraq and the Arab world will be the yard stick by which his administration’s success is measured.

For a coalition that deserves a lot of credit for getting him elected twice, Bush never treated the gun rights community with the respect I think we deserved.  Nonetheless, I think the state of gun rights over the eight years of Bush is one of continued improvement.  Bush came into office arguing for renewing the Assault Weapons Ban.   It never happened.  We passed or expanded right-to-carry in several states.  We got the National Park rule on concealed carry changed (for how long remains to be seen).  We ended the continual threat of lawsuits that threatened to bankrupt gun makers.  We got Heller, despite Bush’s Solicitor General’s best effort to scuttle it.  And despite noise on our side that Heller is worthless, it’s already toppled more gun bans in the few months that it’s been in effect than we could ever have hoped to accomplish legislatively in a decades long campaign.

While Bush was no great friend to gun rights, nor was he a great enemy.  By not using the bully pulpit to beat the drum for greater gun control, he allowed us to make some cultural progress on the topic of guns.  Both 9/11 and Katrina probably helped facilitate that a great deal.  But I don’t think it can be denied that it’s far better to have a half-hearted friend in the White House than an avowed enemy.

It remains to be seen yet how much political capital Barack Obama is going to be willing to gamble on the topic of guns.  Clinton gambled a great deal on it over his entire presidency.  I’m both comforted and terrified that Barack Obama seems a good deal politically smarter than Clinton.  Comforted that he probably understands he would burn signficant political capital fighting a contentious culture war issue, but terrified because in his heart he is an avowed enemy of civilian gun ownership.  Bill Clinton, when it came to gun control, was a backgammon player.  Obama will be a chess player.  The latter has the potential to be more dangerous played over the long run.