Posted by
Bill Crawford on Friday, July 16, 2010 4:51:30 PM
Congressman Stupak and his blue dog dirty dozen held up ObamaCare in the House for almost two weeks, all by themselves. They were the last real obstacle to Speaker Pelosi dropping the gavel on our health care salvation.
Obama had a closed door meeting with Bart, and the Congressman complained that the Hyde Amendment outlawing abortions could be ignored by simple administrative discretion- if nobody in the government sought to block, punish or prosecute, what was to stop anybody from using federal funds? The President promised to solve this with an Executive Order. I wan't the only one who laughed at this notion, as such orders are ignored all the time, too. Stupak either was not aware of this, or looking for an excuse to end the stalemate, because he used the meeting as a reason to now vote yes on the bill.
And now, three states (Pennsylvania, New Mexico and Maryland) are all applying for HHS funding to cover abortions in their high risk pools, through the pre-existing condition statutes. Nobody seems to be surprised.
My point here is not that federal money is being used. Obama is fond of explaining that elections have consequences, and in this crazy democracy, I totally agree with him.
My point is that Obama is a moral relativist, and as a consquence of that, his word to anybody, on any given day, is worthless. Next time you see him speechifying and lamenting how his detractors "don't have their facts straight", keep in mind that this President wouldn't know what a fact was, even if it hit him in the buttinski with a shovel.
Crude segue, while I'm at it: here's another observation about our President. He lamented recently that the phenomenon of lowered Jewish support here for him may have something to do with the fact that his middle name is Hussein.
Obama suffers from something he shares with many intelligent people: a blinding arrogance. He is a person who takes the time to think through issues, and reach a conclusion. When faced with disagreement, the first reaction is to wonder how on earth, if you thought it through as well, you could possibly reach a different answer? They don't see the world through the Greek lens of varying premises, all possibly logical. They see it as their opponent having an underlying problem. You are reacting to my middle name, and it is clouding your judgement.
This problem is rampant in our larger cities, where their point of view predominates, and you don't spend a lot of time interacting with people who disagree with you. You know there is disagreement out there, and the acolytes share the big picture together, trading talking points and having nobody around to inform them what problems there may be with the talking points. When real disagreement presents itself in human form, there is a reaction that is harsher than normal discussion.
This happened in Obama's power hallways in Chicago. It happens in parties and get togethers in New York City. It happens in teacher conference rooms all over the country. And now it happens at the White House. It wasn't so bad with the Clintons, they came from Arkansas, where you could throw a rock and find a conservative who didn't think much of you. Chicago is a progressive's sanctuary city. What the hell do you expect?