Closing In On His Own Self-Imposed Three Year Deadline For Fixing The Economy, Obama Becomes Very, Very Angry About Dawdling

That headline is just a slight variation on Andrew Malcolm's.

Speaking on behalf of millions of Americans who've grown angry and frustrated over the president's 32-month ineffective inactivity on the job creation front, President Obama on Thursday told members of Congress they really have to do something about the crummy employment situation -- and do it quickly.

Citing the plight of millions of struggling Americans whose wishes for jobs Obama ignored for most of the 961 days he's been in office while chasing shinier healthcare and financial reforms, Obama said it was time that Congress stop blaming others. He said it was time members take responsibility for their inaction and halt their phony partisan games and political circus acts that pervade Washington culture.

Because the Americans Obama hasn't been listening to are really hurting now. And -- who's....

....counting? -- but it's only 424 days until Nov. 6, 2012. No plan yet to pay for Obama's ideas. But he wants immediate passage of his American Jobs Act anyway.

As IMAO put it...

So the plot, as I understand it, is that Obama has great ideas for creating lots of jobs, but waited 2 and 1/2 years to unveil it.

The attempt at a desperate jui-jitsu move here is obvious. It is Obama who has been president for nearly three years; the Republicans have controlled the House for eight months now. And yet it seems it is the latter which is to be accused of dawdling and wasting time.

And why are we talking about a Stimulus to right the economy now? Shouldn't we have passed such a stimulus in 2009?

Oh right, we did, with similar confident predictions and dire warnings about inaction.

The speech mostly gave us a sense of déjà vu. From the president’s language, you would never know that Congress already has acted under his watch to save jobs — the $800 billion stimulus plan passed shortly after he took office.

“Over the next two years, this plan will save or create 3.5 million jobs,” Obama proclaimed in a speech to a similar joint session of Congress on Feb. 24, 2009. We’re not sure about the jobs saved part, but the country has certainly not created net jobs since then — there are almost 2 million fewer jobs since he made those remarks 2 1/2 years ago. That gives a sense of the economic burden he will carry into his reelection campaign.

So here’s a pop quiz. Which of the following quotes came from the 2009 speech, and which quotes came from the speech this week?

That's the Washington Post, and their quiz about which line came from which speech is illustrative. It's the same damn thing. Most of the proposals are in fact just continuations, extensions of what was passed in 2009.

The RNC collected up quotes from a lot of Big Media noting the obvious problems here.

The Detroit News: “President Barack Obama's much-anticipated plan for putting Americans back to work turns out to be a scaled-down version of his original stimulus package, which is well on its way to becoming one of the most monumental economic policy failures in the nation's history.” (Editorial, “Obama Offers Stimulus Lite,” The Detroit News, 9/9/11)

The Wall Street Journal: “We've had the biggest Keynesian stimulus in decades. The new argument that the 2009 stimulus wasn't big enough isn't what we heard then. Americans were told it would create 3.5 million new jobs and unemployment would stay below 8% and be falling by 2011. It is now 9.1%. But this stimulus we are told will make all the difference.” (Editorial, “The Latest Jobs Plan,” The Wall Street Journal, 9/9/11)

Chicago Tribune: “President Barack Obama didn't use the S-word even once Thursday evening, but his American Jobs Act proposals to grow U.S. employment fully qualify as another stimulus package. … We view as sincere — and not just self-protection — Obama's effort to help those who are out of work. But we've witnessed the failure of Keynesian stimulus programs to dent this nation's jobs crisis. This is the wrong time for a president to tell Americans, ‘I'm from the government and I'm here to spend.’" (Editorial, “The Wrong Stimulus,” Chicago Tribune, 9/9/11)

Did history really begin two weeks ago? Does Obama expect us to forget his predictions and prophecies from 2009?

Now, he informs us, with ginned-up confidence to match the authentic but misplaced confidence he showed in 2009, these new stimulus measures investments and infusions will begin working positive change in the economy immediately.

But we were told the same thing in 2009. It is now almost three years later and we continue waiting for the $847 billion in stimulus to work its magic.

Apparently, unbeknownst to the Rara Avis Lincoln scholar in the White House, he actually needed a $1.3 trillion stimulus, and is here now to tell us he made a slight error in his earlier calculations.

Don't even think about it, don't even question -- Just Pass this Bill.

Pass this bill, and we suddenly have plenty; pass this bill, and we all have economic security.

Don't pass this bill, and you hate jobs.

We heard this same song in early 2009. Our neophyte president was so confident that the $847 billion stimulus was all our economy needed for repair that he immediately took the next two years off to pursue liberal policy goals, intermixed with telling the country about all the green shoots in the Summer Recovery and oh by the way America is Back!

But now he means it, I guess. Before he was just lying to us, or misinformed (turns out, there was no such thing as shovel-ready jobs); but now he's got the facts at his fingertips.

We've already spent trillions on saving one single job -- Obama's -- and now, panicking he might get a long-deserved pink slip, he tells us he just needs five hundred billion more.

Oh, only another half a trillion dollars? Why didn't you say so in the first place.

Even More Expensive Than The Last One: Terrific. Nevermind that we just fought to get a mere $7 billion clipped from next year's budget, and that will now be swamped by $447 billion in new spending.

But pass this bill.

Obama's job is riding on it.

Like a crazed gambler, he just needs another extension of credit, because the next hour of betting, he's due for a big win.

posted by Ace at 05:23 PM

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