Posts Tagged ‘Obamacare’
Waiver Nation
Sep29
By John Feehery
It used to be that waivers were a bad thing.
It was bad to be put on waivers if you were in the NFL or played Major League Baseball. That meant you were out of a job.
Now, waivers are a good thing.
The Obama Administration announced that it was going to give waivers to the states of No Child Left Behind.
Too many states can’t meet the requirements of NCLB, so they are begging the Feds to give them a break.
If there is one thing that Mr. Obama and all the Republicans running for President agree on, it is that they don’t really love that landmark law legislated by John Boehner and Ted Kennedy and signed into law by W.
It’s too hard. Let’s give the states a waiver.
That, of course, begs the question: If the law is so bad, why don’t you just repeal it. Good question.
Mitt Romney promised that the first thing he would do if elected President would be to give waivers to all 50 states to the health care law signed by Mr. Obama.
Obamacare is a sure loser. All Republicans agree with that. When Romney announced his idea to gut the law, Michele Bachmann chimed in snidely, “well I am going to repeal the law.”
That would seem to make sense in an alternative universe, but we live in the real world, and there ain’t no way the Democrats are going to join with us in repealing Obamacare, so in the meantime, give me a waiver baby.
It seems that every time the Congress passes a dumb law, states want waivers from it. As Rick Perry rightly pointed out, sometimes that even means getting waivers from the Social Security program.
Because of the wonders of our tax code, close to half of the American people get a waiver from paying any Federal taxes. No wonder the country is going broke.
Pretty soon, every body is going to want their own personal waiver from dumb Congressional laws. The problem is that there are so many stupid Congressional laws, that it is hard to know where to start.
We are becoming a waiver nation. I can think of several politicians I would like to see put on waivers.
Obama and His Critics
Sep21
By John Feehery
I was working out at the gym this morning (I know, miracles never cease), and I looked over briefly (I know, you don’t believe me), at the television and saw one of the hosts interviewing Rachel Maddow.
I am not the biggest Rachel Maddow fan in the world (ok, I am not really a fan at all) and I immediately assumed that the topic of conversation was on the President’s decision on “don’t ask, don’t tell”, an issue that apparently is important to the MSNBC host.
According to the headline blaring at the bottom of the television screen was “Is Obama losing his base?”
Interesting question, given that the previous day, the President struck a blow for some of his most passionate supporters by going through with change in a long standing military policy.
I will make this observation.
The President is not losing his base (if that is true) because he is moving to the middle. He is losing his base for largely the same reasons that he is losing the middle and losing the rest of the country.
Sheer incompetence.
Let me explain. The President’s policies are not working. We are going broke spending money we don’t have on programs that don’t work. The unemployment rate is still terrible. Economic growth is terrible. Consumer confidence is terrible.
The Obama Administration is going out of its way to destroy jobs with silly and stupid regulatory actions. Obamacare scares the hell out of small business owners. The NRLB is actively trying to stop the construction of a new airplane manufacturing plant in South Carolina. The Obama Justice Department is closing down a Gibson Guitar manufacturing company because of a stupid EPA rule.
The liberal base is made up largely of three groups: African American voters; women voters (in particular single women); rich people.
What has Obama done for these three groups? Unemployment with black Americans is at record highs, a fact that Obama never talks about, ever. A new book from Ron Susskind details how the Obama Administration really feels about the ladies. And Obama spends every speech talking about how evil rich people are.
No wonder he is losing his base.
A new poll just came out that shows Sarah Palin is just 5 points behind Barack Obama if she chose to run for President.
Sarah Palin?
Other polls show that just about any of the announced Republicans would beat Obama right now, including Ron Paul.
The President probably thinks that everything is going to be all right, and maybe that is true. Maybe the economy will come storming back and maybe people will start listening to Mr. Obama, after largely tuning him out for the last year and a half.
Maybe. But I doubt it.
I still think there is a possibility that the President will face a serious challenge from a serious challenger in his own party. His incompetence will catch up to him sooner rather than later.
