Article

2012-10-25 -Election 2012

Obama: No Regrets Over Prioritizing Obamacare Over Jobs

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Posted by Au Auric 2012-10-25 00:00|| || Front Page|| [2 views ] Top

#1 The Wall Street Journal fact checks with extreme prejudice:

President Obama doesn't give many interviews these days outside Comedy Central, so it caused a stir Wednesday when editors at the Des Moines Register managed to pin him down and even elicit some news. Specifically, Mr. Obama said he wants to pursue immigration reform in a second term, as well as a budget "grand bargain" with Republicans that includes tax reform.

This will come as a surprise to voters reading the President's just-released 20-page brochure on his second-term agenda, which makes little or no mention of these priorities. Perhaps that's why the White House first demanded that the interview be off the record, making the transcript public only after the Register editor objected in a public blog post.

But the larger reason to be skeptical concerns Mr. Obama's answer to another Register question: Whether he regrets pursuing ObamaCare and other liberal social priorities in his first two years rather than focusing on the economy.

"Absolutely not," Mr. Obama told the Iowa journalists. "Remember the context. First of all, Mitch McConnell has imposed an ironclad filibuster from the first day I was in office. And that's not speculation."

Whoaaaa there, big fella. Mr. McConnell was then and still is the Senate Minority Leader, and in 2009 he had all of 40 votes. Mr. Obama could have pursued any agenda he wanted, and the Des Moines editors wanted to know why he didn't focus on the economy first. Yet Mr. Obama's instinctive reaction is to blame Republican obstructionism that never happened.

In those first days of progressive wine and roses, Mr. Obama managed to peel off three Republican votes for his stimulus blowout in February 2009. He got five Republicans for the trial-bar gift known as the Lilly Ledbetter bill and nine for an expansion of the state children's health program, both in January. That was some ferocious filibuster.

Posted by trailing wife 2012-10-25 04:55|| 2012-10-25 04:55|| Front Page Top

#2 Obama's #1 priority. More time in front of the mirror.

Posted by Bright Pebbles 2012-10-25 08:35|| 2012-10-25 08:35|| Front Page Top

#3 Let's all hope he has a lot more time for the mirror after Election Day.

Posted by Ebbang Uluque6305 2012-10-25 15:29|| 2012-10-25 15:29|| Front Page Top

#4 No jobs -> No taxes paid -> No funds for Obamacare*

This isn't rocket science.

* Timmy and Bernanke can print the stuff but that just reduces it down to the old Soviet saying - they pretend to pay us [with funny money] and we pretend to work.

Posted by Procopius2k 2012-10-25 20:42|| 2012-10-25 20:42|| Front Page Top

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