Regarding the debt limit.

I looked at actual numbers this week, to see if what I believed squared with the numbers.

What I believed:  That George Bush spend a LOT of money.  Wars (justified, I thought for the most part) and also ridiculous "compassionate" uses of my money, like a freakishly complicated Prescription Drug program for seniors, the now-notorious No Child Left Behind, even steel tariffs.  And TARP.  Lord, don't get me started on TARP.  But I also believed that Barack Obama spent even more.  Mind-blowing amounts on things like Cash for Clunkers, first-time homeowner support, and my very own car company.

I found this:

See the line with the dots?  That is debt limit as a percent of GDP.  Even though GDP was growing over those years, the debt limit was pretty much a stable percent of GDP.  It bumps up in 2008.  That was TARP.

But what happens in 2009 and 2010?  Spending blows up.  There is no end in sight to the spending.

Over and over I heard how this debt limit problem is another Bush issue.  But it simply isn't.  We went from about $5 trillion in 2000 to about $10 trillion in 2008.  That is all Bush.  But we now stand at $14.6 trillion, an increase of $4.6 trillion in only 30 months under Obama.

And now, as our "professional political class" negotiates a new debt limit, our President can only propose tax increases.  They have not offered one spending cut.  Not one.  Do you see that?  Nothing.  I have scoured the news wires and can only find references to tax increases and loophole closures.  In fact, there are only new programs just waiting to be implemented.  Just this week Kathleen Sebelius offered the new guidelines for insurance exchanges.  This proposal will involve the creation of at least fifty new regulatory agencies.  This is only one depressing example.

But it is Saturday night, I've spent all day at the lacrosse fields and it's time to rest and be ready for a full day of it tomorrow.  Sleep well, and let's all take a Sabbath rest from the news tomorrow.

Edited to add:  Of course Victor Davis Hanson says it all better today here.

Here I am...

with a President who apparently thinks he governs a nation of first-graders.

I happen to LIKE peas, and I'd be happy to eat them.  Carrots, too.  And, yes, even broccoli.

He also thinks the other elected members of government are more childish than his own girls:

I wonder...have you ever had a co-worker, much less a boss, speak to or about you in this way?  I have not, and frankly can't imagine a situation where that would happen.  So, is our President trying to get laughs from the press pool (which he does)?  Because there really is no other reason to be so ugly toward his fellow elected officials.

Remember, these are supposed to be three CO-EQUAL branches of government.  Our President might have the bully pulpit but he does not occupy the superior branch of government.

Maybe he is starting to be concerned about the election in 2012.  After all, this just came out today:

Of course, we don't care.  If it isn't concrete and right in front of us, we really won't think about it.  All these numbers, they're really meaningless.  Right, David Axelrod?  Just like a bunch of first-graders.

Oh, and another one of Obama's advisors doesn't think we can be trusted with our own money anyway:

Last week, Energy Secretary Steven Chu made the case for the incandsecent bulb ban last week claiming, “We are taking away a choice that continues to let people waste their own money.”

I don't know about you, but if I choose to waste my own money on a great pair of shoes, or a boat, or LIGHTBULBS THAT ACTUALLY GIVE GOOD LIGHT, I think that is my own business and no one else's.  (Except my husband's, of course.)

A palette-cleanser:

Okay, I'm feeling better now.  We are actually having a lot of fun this summer and I'll share some of that, too.

Arrogant or Incompetent?

Which is the preferred trait in a leader? Neither is great, but is one less bad? DH and I discussed this last night as we watched O'Reilly. Chris Wallace was the guest, and after much pulling and prodding O'Reilly finally got this newsman to offer his opinion. (That's not his job, but that's another issue.) Wallace believed that Obama's problem, his tone-deafness, is due to arrogance. O'Reilly reacted strongly against that word, pushing Wallace to back down from that word and chalk the disconnectedness in the White House to incompetence. Wallace was firm, and stuck by his analysis of arrogance.

BTW, the purpose here wasn't to critique O'Reilly. That would take SEVERAL more posts.

So DH and I started talking about it...would we prefer a leader who is arrogant or incompetent? Well, of course the right answer is "neither," but I think we are stuck with at least one of these traits for two more years. Arrogant--there was no one with a bigger ego than Bill Clinton, but I think he wasn't terrible. I completely disagreed with his policies, but he was sensitive to the electorate, infuriating to his opponents, and endlessly creative. A leader who is arrogant will stick to his own point of view rather than reach out for others. He'll claim credit for anything good that happens, and find ways to pin blame for the bad on those who are outside his circle. He'll try to lead by force of his character. Humility? Unheard of, in the leader or those around him. Be humble around this guy and get run over. Hmmm...the shoe seems to fit.

An incompetent leader, on the other hand, will lead us down the wrong road. "President" is a big job, the biggest big-picture job in the world. Not only do you need a big picture outlook, you must surround yourself with people who can do the same within their own spheres. Look at who runs this administration: more Ph.D.s and non-profit/government workers than any previous administration, and fewer private, business-oriented, big picture citizens than ever before.

My DH, a Ph.D. himself, has said more than once that as you proceed through higher education, you know more and more about less and less. Eventually you know an infinite amount about the asshole of an ant. A person can be brilliant but incompetent, failing to see the big picture. An incompetent leader might surround himself with other experts, all various asshole experts, but not realize he also needs to understand the general manure pile. (Man, that metaphor is stretched way too thin. Sorry. I'll quit.)

They've all convinced themselves that they are experts, but things keep happening "unexpectedly." When was the last time you heard a piece of bad economic news that didn't include the word "unexpected?"

The worst possiblity is that these two traits aren't mutually exclusive. An incompetent AND arrogant leader may be what we have. Someone who fails to learn from past experience and says that he doesn't have anything to learn.

The arrogant/incompetent meme seems to be gathering steam. Just this morning I saw this from Commentary Magazine:

It’s a deadly combination — intellectual arrogance and lack of sympatico with the public — that leads him again and again to stumble. And when his shortcomings lead to embarrassment or failure, he strikes out in frustration — at Israel, at the media, and at the American people. The image of himself clashes with the results he achieves and the reaction he inspires. No wonder he’s so prickly. You’d be, too, if everyone your entire life had told you that you were swell but now, when the chips are down and the spotlight is on, you are failing so badly in your job.

So we may be in for a "prickly" couple of years. Arrogant, incompetent, or, tragically, both?

Too far?

Has he gone too far?  A trillion here, a trillion there, that's just money between friends, right?  But this, trying to negotiate with that guy up there by LETTER?  God help us all.

Oh no they didn't

They did.

The rule of words

Words mean things.  Which is why the repeated use of the word "rule" with regard to the government is really bugging me.

When I was in high school civics we were introduced to the concept of the "rule of law."  I found it a confusing phrase, because I kept thinking of a ruler, like with inches and feet, and not a ruler of a country.  But I finally get it, that the authority of the government in our country vests not in any one person or group of people, but in the Constitution.  Those people elected to government, in particular the President and by extension the rest of the executive branch, are guardians of the Constitution.  The President does not RULE.  The laws rule.  

So why does it seem like I see "Obama's rule begins" or "Pelosi's rule" (I know, Pelosi, how scary is that?) in the press so often?  I really don't recall the word "rule" associated with Bush or the Republicans in years past, but I am sure hearing it a lot now with regard to the Dems.  So I'll google it and see what I get:  2,140 hits, and I agree that all of them don't apply.  But that doesn't include the infamous "Obama will be ready to rule on day one" quote from the campaign.  I DON'T WANT A RULER!  What about the Democrats in general?  909 in the past year.

So what about Bush?  Okay, 5570, but I went through the first through pages and all of these refer to rules made by the Bush administration.  Rule of Bush?  123, and it looks like a lot of those are bloggers.  (Maybe I can finally get Googled by someone!)  But, from what I can find, no one is using "ready to rule" or "not ready to rule." 

So here's my point...there is a glee surrounding Obama and the Congressional Democrats, and it is coming from within and also from the main-stream media.  We didn't elect a new king, we elected a guardian of the Constitution.  The problem is that if we start looking at the "rule of Obama" or  Pelosi or whomever, then they step outside of the law.  The perception is that the ruler creates the rules and is not subject to them.  It isn't true, at least not yet.  The problem is that if you say something often enough then it becomes the truth.  (Lenin said that, not me.)  I don't want this to become the truth.

I got one!

Do you remember this ad:

I got one!!  Yes, I'm now the proud owner of a part of history, "commemorating the day the world changed forever."  (I'm not sure if that is threatening or merely creepy.)  Thanks, Steve!  I'm displaying it in a prominent place for as long as I can stomach it.  And when I find my **)#$% camera, then I'll share with the rest of the world.

Observations

There has been so much in the news lately, and it's so overwhelming that I'm not sure where to start...so I'll just jump in.

The Blago thing just looks dirtier and dirtier.  But do you remember the sit-in staged by workers at Republic Windows in Illinois?  They did it earlier this year; the company had closed when BoA said "no more money." Blagojevich strong-armed BoA, saying he'd take away state business if BoA didn't loan Republic more money.  At the time I thought it was an astonishing threat--how dare he interfere in the private sector like that?  Apparently, though, interfering is the name of the game for this governor.

It also continues a disturbing trend of government officials telling private companies what to do.  Think about what we are seeing at all levels:  Fannie and Freddie collapsed under the weight of subprime loans they were ordered to make by Congress; an auto bailout will subject those companies to the oversight of a "car czar;" incentives and threats to locate new plants in locations (less egregious but still). I have another story that I'll tell in a second post about something going on in DH's industry, threatening to put the entire industry out of business.  (Where's their bailout?) 

But I want to stay on this for a moment...I didn't realize until yesterday that Rahm Emanuel worked at Freddie Mac for a while, riding the gravy train.  Who else?  Gov. Tom Vilsak has just been named Ag Secretary.  He was responsible for taking away local control of hog farms in Iowa, among other things.  That has been terrible for the water quality in several communities.  He's also tied in tight to Monsanto and ADM...neither party will take on these guys, but it looks like were in for, at the best, more of the same.  Both of those companies are also big into food-based biofuels, which are responsible for driving up food prices with no comparable benefit in the fuel department.  

Arne Duncan will be Secretary of Education.  He's from Chicago, of course, and Bill Ayers has spoken highly of him (yes, I know they've gotten crossways with each other, too).  Mostly, that one is that he is from Chicago.  Really?  Another Chicago guy?  We are seeing the unwinding of a dirty, Byzantine political machine and I cannot believe that there are too many clean guys up there.  

It occurs to me that if someone from that pool really is clean, as it appears Obama is, then there were other people working very hard to make sure he stayed clean.  I wonder what the real story is there.  None of this feels very hopey or changey.

I'll try to check on some more cabinet members later.  I want to do that other post and also need to make some cookies.  Tis the season!

UPDATE:  Here is some information on Holdren, Obama's science advisor.  And here.

And, quick!

Just saw this, it is for real, it is hilarious, but I have to run:

At American Digest, via Instapundit.

Weekend Update

Bulletin!  The Office of the President-Elect issued its weekly address:

I didn't know there WAS an office of the president-elect.  Where, exactly, is it?  In Barack's basement, judging from the cheesy paneling and the souvenir basketball in the corner.

But to move beyond the snark, listen to what he has to say, if you can.  It's really, really boring, and he doesn't say anything new.  Just that we can rise again, together, one nation, blah blah.  I'm concerned that he's going to drown us in this controlled access--always scripted, never questioned.  This will be interesting to follow. (Assuming, of course, we can stay awake.)

I am NOT making light of this, but...

Chick or dude?  Yeesh.