This past week, the president and the vice president have made some rather curious arguments on their behalf.
“If your main argument for how to grow the economy is ‘I knew how to make a lot of money for investors,’ then you’re missing what this job is about,” Obama said. “It doesn’t mean you weren’t good at private equity, but that’s not what my job is as president. My job is to take into account everybody, not just some. My job is to make sure that the country is growing not just now, but ten years from now and 20 years from now,” he said.
Vice President Biden, meanwhile, offered up this argument. “Your job as president is to promote the common good. That doesn’t mean the private-equity guys are bad guys. They’re not,” Biden said at New Hampshire’s Keene State College. “But that no more qualifies you to be president than being a plumber. And, by the way, there’re an awful lot of smart plumbers. All kidding aside, it’s not the same job requirement.”
I suppose one could say that being a plumber makes you more qualified to be president than being a community organizer, but set that aside for the moment.
The case both Obama and Biden are making is that Obama (a) understands what the job of president entails and (b) is promoting the common good. And based on his record, it’s not clear Obama understands or is doing either one.
To sharpen the point a bit: How exactly is the common good being advanced when during the Obama presidency the number of people in the U.S. who are in poverty has seen a record increase, with the ranks of working-age poor approaching 1960s levels that led to the national war on poverty. In addition, the budget deficit and federal debt have reached their highest percentage since World War II. The same is true when it comes to federal spending as a percentage of GDP. During the post-recession period from June 2009 to June 2011, the median annual household income fell by 6.7 percent– a more substantial decline than occurred during the Great Recession. The Christian Science Monitor points out , “The standard of living for Americans has fallen longer and more steeply over the past three years than at any time since the U.S. government began recording it five decades ago. The housing crisis is worse than the Great Depression. Home values worth one-third less than they were five years ago. The home ownership rate is the lowest since 1965. And government dependency, defined as the percentage of persons receiving one or more federal benefit payments, is the highest in American history.”
There’s more, but you get the point.
For Obama and Biden to lecture Romney on the qualifications for being president is like John Edwards and Bill Clinton lecturing us on the importance of fidelity in marriage. Their case is undermined by their record, their actions, and their failures.
I cannot imagine a greater in-kind gift to the Romney campaign than for the president and the vice president to run on their stewardship. But that is what they’ve decided to do, at least this week.
You are so wrong. Obama is making an excellent rhetorical argument, deftly turning Romey's business experience into a liability. The fact that Obama is lying, distorting, deceiving, omitting key facts and essentially committing fraud on the truth is 100% irrelevant because no one cares about the truth anymore or they have no capacity to get it, or if they get it, they have no capacity to understand it. A good line, well delivered, that sounds plausible, is more than enough for a country that was idiotic enough to elect this shameful deceiver in 2008, and that was cowardly enough to essentially vote for retreat during war in 2006.
Right! Stye over substance every time , but people seem to like empty suits (wonder if they will be enjoying their empty wallets as much) .
We can safely ignore people who don't care about the truth. They'd vote Obama if he came to his stump speech wearing a swastika. n nBut those who are undecided surely need some facts, if only to have answers to the propaganda the media love to spread in advance of their own agenda. The more truthful arguments the inarticulate have, the better they can try to stop the charade enacted before the honest, but gullible.
Not so fast. The proper riposte to Obama is not simply along the lines suggested by Mr. Wehner, but also to ask repeatedly: "Fine, and just wondering, but what qualifications do YOU have to be President, Mr. Obama?" In other words, fight fire with fire. He certainly will not be able to cite anything in his job history to recommend him, including the fact that he IS President. In fact, if one rummages a bit, it quickly becomes apparent that Obama has not succeeded at ANY job he has held since leaving school, including his "progressive" employment as a community organizer, an enormous dud as even he has admitted, in which the situation in the Chicago tenement he cursed with his talents was worse at the end of his tenure than at the beginning. And doesn't that ring a bell? n nWhat of his term as a legislator in Springfield and Washington? Strictly de mortuis, I fear, masterpieces of vapidity and idleness. We don't even know if he succeeded at school, this genius (who's on record as claiming that an insurance premium can somehow be "lowered by 300 percent"). All his records are sealed. He may have been — but let's face it — he probably IS — no more qualified for employment in any job than whatever qualifications affirmative action bestows on a person. Unlike Romney, who first gave to charity the fortune he inherited in order to make his own, Obama is almost entirely an other-made man, a slothful pothead, as the Maraniss bio now makes painfully clear, to whom "things happen," the opposite of a self-made man. n nSimply put: One affirmative-action hire as President is, one prays, all he is ever going to get. The poor b**rd should count himself lucky he got the one chance, take the money, and leave in an unmarked car. There's little shame in having run the con as long as he has. It's one for the books, that's for sure. Besides, the position of Secretary-General of the UN was simply made for him.
Certainly this administration, more-so than any other in my life, appeals to the ignorance of the populace with their specious arguments.
And the scandal on a more local level is that people don't care about integrity or character . Mass is about to elect as senator someone who lies about their ethnicity to advance their career , even as Conn sits a senator who lied repeatedly about his military service . The scandal is not that low down conniving pols will lie to advance themselves . Ths scandal is that the electorate will not consider integrity and character as relevant , much lee foundational But as a Great Man said ," A people get thegovernment they deserve . "
Well said. 60 years of peace and prosperity have produced an electorate so immature that they cannot distinguish between a presidential election and a vote for American Idol. The good news is that the damage a second Obama term will do will produce a much wiser, if poorer, electorate.
For all you Romney boosters, I have one question: Exactly what does Romney believe about anything? Think hard.
Their actions negates their claim.r nAs far as Nb 4: He has no time to believe, he has to think!
That's easy! Small government and eliminating the numerous strictures (regulations) that big government places on the business world which make it near impossible for commerce to grow and create jobs. And there is more empirical evidence to back up that position than can posited by the high priest of Keynesian Economics, Paul Krugman.
Rodger , Mitt will make a fine president. I can't wait till November. Mitt believes in American exceptionalism, and a great economy… jobs.. n nSo yes, I believe Romney can do it.
Rodger; n nRomney has made certain positions clear, thankfully he's not an ideologue like Paul or a complete cipher like Obama. Do you actually buy the line that Romney doesn't have a position on anything? There's some evidence to the contrary available to you will little effort.
“Vice President Biden, meanwhile, offered up this argument. “Your job as president is to promote the common good. That doesn’t mean the private-equity guys are bad guys. They’re not,” Biden said at New Hampshire’s Keene State College. “But that no more qualifies you to be president than being a plumber. And, by the way, there’re an awful lot of smart plumbers. All kidding aside, it’s not the same job requirement.””
Socrates/Plato served up this kind of argument in “The Republic”. It hasn’t quite been the guidestone of how the American Republic is to be arranged, but liberals probably find some of Plato’s ideas to their liking…
All we need to see is that all the polls are clsoe right now. Should they remain so until November, Romney will defeat Obama. The incumbent rarely ever attarct the undecided if they are still undecided with a few days and weeks before the election. Obam's people know this which is why he and Biden are out swinging hard now at Romney, n nThe problem for Obama si that he has a record and as every day passes and Romney and hsi people start hamemring daily on the "record," Obama will sink into the sunset. n nThe American people are not stupid. They voted for him in 2008 only because they didn't knwo him adn the economic collapse was a stark Republican failure. That's over. We should be growing at 4-5% like Mexico and we are not. We shoudl be creating 300-500,000 jobs a month and we are not. n nI believe Obama is done and good riddance. One of the greatest benefits will be that we will no longer ever give an affirmative action baby a real job.
It's been said before…Obama is the least-qualified person in any room he happens to be.
I also dare Barry and Joey to run on their record. If they do, this will be a landslide victory for Mitt in Nov.
Was Biden thinking fo Joe the Plumber when he denigrated the business leadership abilities of plumbers? At least a plumber gives you real value for the money you pay him, unlike government, which is not concerned with giving taxpayers anything.
"I suppose one could say that being a plumber makes you more qualified to be president than being a community organizer, but set that aside for the moment." n nHahahaha, Oh Pete, you card! "All Obama ever did before becoming president was work as a community organizer" jokes! They never get old! n nOf course, he could add "Being president for 3 1/2 years" to his resume now. Is that enough qualification for you? n nFor someone who worked for GW Bush lecturing on another president's "failures"–that takes some chutzpah. Ask Osama Bin Laden. n