Charles Krauthammer had a very good opinion piece today outlining how Obama went from king of the world to dead in the water in a mere six months.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...a564c4-b348-11e2-9a98-4be1688d7d84_story.html
I especially enjoyed the following section on the sequester. The adminstration has done everything possible to inflict maximum pain from minimal cuts. I deal with this each week when I re-enter the US coming home from work and the customs lines are twice as long because the executive branch ordered this agency to deliberately inflict the pain where Americans would feel it the most.
It began with the sequester. Obama never believed the Republicans would call his bluff and let it go into effect. They did.
Taken by surprise, Obama cried wolf, predicting the end of everything we hold dear if the sequester was not stopped. It wasnât. Nothing happened.
Highly embarrassed, and determined to indeed make (bad) things happen, the White House refused Republican offers to give it more discretion in making cuts. Bureaucrats were instructed to inflict maximum pain from minimal cuts, as revealed by one memo from the Agriculture Department demanding agency cuts that the public would feel.
Things began with the near-comical cancellation of White House tours and ended with not-so-comical airline delays. Obama thought furious passengers would blame the GOP. But isnât the executive branch in charge of these agencies? Who thinks that a government spending $3.6 trillion a year canât cut 2 percent without furloughing air-traffic controllers?
Looking not just incompetent at managing budgets but cynical for deliberately injuring the public welfare, the administration relented. Congress quickly passed a bill giving Obama reallocation authority to restore air traffic control. Having previously threatened to veto any such bill, Obama caved. He signed.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...a564c4-b348-11e2-9a98-4be1688d7d84_story.html
I especially enjoyed the following section on the sequester. The adminstration has done everything possible to inflict maximum pain from minimal cuts. I deal with this each week when I re-enter the US coming home from work and the customs lines are twice as long because the executive branch ordered this agency to deliberately inflict the pain where Americans would feel it the most.
It began with the sequester. Obama never believed the Republicans would call his bluff and let it go into effect. They did.
Taken by surprise, Obama cried wolf, predicting the end of everything we hold dear if the sequester was not stopped. It wasnât. Nothing happened.
Highly embarrassed, and determined to indeed make (bad) things happen, the White House refused Republican offers to give it more discretion in making cuts. Bureaucrats were instructed to inflict maximum pain from minimal cuts, as revealed by one memo from the Agriculture Department demanding agency cuts that the public would feel.
Things began with the near-comical cancellation of White House tours and ended with not-so-comical airline delays. Obama thought furious passengers would blame the GOP. But isnât the executive branch in charge of these agencies? Who thinks that a government spending $3.6 trillion a year canât cut 2 percent without furloughing air-traffic controllers?
Looking not just incompetent at managing budgets but cynical for deliberately injuring the public welfare, the administration relented. Congress quickly passed a bill giving Obama reallocation authority to restore air traffic control. Having previously threatened to veto any such bill, Obama caved. He signed.
