Obama Regrets His Vote
by Big Dog on Apr 12, 2011 at 04:20 Political
When Barack Obama was a junior Senator and the Republicans were in charge there was a vote on raising the debt ceiling and he voted against it. The White House issued a statement today stating that Obama regrets his vote. He is now saying that it was a mistake because raising the debt ceiling is important to the economy.
I am not buying that. Obama now needs the debt ceiling raised because we will soon hit our limit and he wants a higher line of credit so he can continue to spend rather than cutting and living within our means. While I believe that it is a fact that Obama is now saying he regrets his vote because he now wants what he once opposed I believe that it runs much deeper than that.
Obama actually regrets the words he used when he he voted against raising the debt ceiling. He said that doing so represented a lack of leadership and that we should live within our means rather than passing debt on to our children and grandchildren.
That was the case in 2006 when Republican George W. Bush was president and Obama, a freshman senator from Illinois, declared on the Senate floor: “The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. … Increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that ‘the buck stops here.’ Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem.” Yahoo News
Obama was absolutely correct when he made those statements and they more closely align him with the thinking of the Tea Party that he has maligned. The Tea Party is derided for these beliefs by Democrats who thought Obama was a genius when he made such proclamations. America does have a debt problem and raising the debt ceiling will do nothing to solve that problem. It did not solve it any other time that it has been raised. It only allowed Congress to keep spending more money with little or no regard to the burden it placed on our children and grandchildren.
Obama’s real regret is that he said those things which can now be used against him when he pushes for the very thing he once opposed.
How will Democrats reconcile the words of Obama in 2006 with his and their desire to raise the limit now? How will they respond to the obvious contradiction?
I imagine they will blame it on George Bush. After all, Obama was directing those comments to him back in 2006. That kind of rhetoric helped Democrats take control later that year and they were happy to spew it every chance they got. In addition to Obama, Reid, Pelosi (and many other Democrats) were also against raising the debt ceiling.
To be fair, the Republicans wanted to raise the limit then but are opposed now. Funny how the more things change the more they stay the same.
Now, of course, the Democrats are begging for it to be raised without condition.
That is not going to happen. I think that the debt ceiling should not be raised but I am willing to go for an increase if the complete repeal of Obamacare is absolutely tied to the increase with no caveats whatsoever. I would even throw in the defunding of Planned Parenthood and NPR for good measure. While we are at it, we could add a ton of cuts to the measure in order to ensure we get our fiscal house in order.
Obama cannot oppose any cut attached to the debt ceiling increase because, in his own words, America has a debt problem.
How can he ask for a higher debt limit without measures to cut the very debt he derided five short years ago (and one that was much smaller)?
It looks like Barack Obama was an early Tea Party supporter whether he realized it or not.
And that is probably something he regrets as well.
By his own account, Barack Obama is a failure of leadership.
Cave Canem!
Never surrender, never submit.
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Tags: debt ceiling, debt problem, eating his words, lies, Obama, regrets
Clearly like the debate over gas prices Obama’s vote was political. We can’t not raise the debt ceiling and everyone intelligent knows it.
I agree that the GOP can be inclined to attach things to the extension of course though to make it worth while. They’ll need to play it safe though just like they did with the shutdown. If they attach too many nutty things to it then Obama will get a political win for vetoing it. The GOP will need to find a few key things that they want that Obama’s base won’t hate him for signing off on.
The GOP caved on the budget plan. Democrats could not have won any argument about a shutdown since they failed to do their jobs and pass a budget last year when they were legally required to. Only liberals can argue that it is someone else’s fault that they did not do their job.
I think we should be reaching for the lower hanging fruit. Obamacare will be the major one. Repeal that and we save money and they GOP scores a big win. Obama would have to be willing to allow the government to default completely (it IS what his people say will happen) in order to hold onto something most people do not want.
I do not care if Obama’s vote was political. You cleazrly miss the point and that is his words. He said that it was a lack of leadership and passed debt to our children and grandchildren. He said we had a debt problem. He was right on all three points back then and he should espouse that now. The vote might have been political but the words were spoken from the heart. Of course there was politics involved because he wanted to attack Bush. The issue now is, does the same standard apply to him? YES. If we are meeting to raise th debt ceiling it is because of a lack of leadership (his words), we are passing debt to our children and grandchildren (his words), and we have a debt problem (his words). All true. So if he now figures it is not true he owes a public apology to GW Bush.
However, i think he was right then and it holds true now. He spent too much so we are once again going over the limit. Lack of leadership.
Actually, Adam- we can pay the interest on our debt off with the existing taxes we bring in- of course, ALL socialist programs would have to, of necessity, cease to exist, but we all know THAT is a small price to pay, and we would not need to raise the debt ceiling.
That said, the pols will probably raise it, since few of them have any balls-
Jug-ears was against it before he was for it- there’s a political ass for you.
“He was right on all three points back then and he should espouse that now.”
I agree that he was correct but he wasn’t President then and he could grandstand all he wanted. It’s fair game hammering Obama on what he said now versus what he said before. I understand why he’s changed his view but I agree it’s fair to attack him on it.
“Obama would have to be willing to allow the government to default completely (it IS what his people say will happen) in order to hold onto something most people do not want.”
Only about half the country wants repeal. It’s not some overwhelming majority and in fact the numbers have slipped over the weeks from a high of around 65% of people polled supporting repeal to about 50%.
The idea that the GOP would even dare to attempt such a thing is laughable and foolish. I welcome such a move because I absolutely believe it would wreck their already soiled image.
I don’t know how you can say their image is soiled without acknowledging that all politicians (from Obama down) have soiled images. So called landmark legislation such as Obamacare should have more than 50% (and I feel that number is high) support. It affects every person in this country and should be more accepted if it is all that good.
It is a stinker and will be bad for us. Repeal would go over much better than you would have people believe. That was one major facto in the blow out election in November.
“…and I feel that number is high…”
It probably has about 40% support for sure. If you factor in the people who want it to go further and therefore don’t want to repeal what we do have then it might be about 50% depending on the pollster involved. I’m not suggesting the public loves it but I do know the number of people wanting to repeal it has dropped over the last few months.
“It affects every person in this country and should be more accepted if it is all that good.”
When you were smearing Pelosi’s statement about passing it to know what’s in it you missed her point: Your side lied over and over and over about the bill so much that people did not even know what was reality or not. Just watch though. The longer the bill exists and the more parts go into effect then the more folks will like it. If the GOP is going to act on it they’d need to do it early but they don’t have the power.
The Democrats lied and lied about what was in it. The more we are seeing the more it has stuff we were told did not exist.
It is like any program, even if it is unconstitutional or bad (or both), the longer it is around the more people accept it. That is no way to do things.
The fact is, people should not be forced to buy insurance and it is not up to the government to provide it. People understand that.
The reason the regime pushes forward is so that it can implement these things and get a lot of people who do not pay into the system so they will clamor for it when removal is tried. Those who have objections are ignored and it is forced upon them so as not to upset those who are getting a free ride.
Social Security is much the same way. A Ponzi scheme that cannot be sustained without wealth redistribution (that people would do better investing on their own) but now it is the third rail. No one can touch it or try to reform it because the passage of time has made people dependent. It is bad but they do not want to let go.
Thus is the goal with Obamacare.
If this is not defeated it will cause a lot of problems and those who caused it will be long dead. Those around who pushed it should be severely punished for their part in the crime.
Yea let’s raise the debt ceiling some more.