Unfortunately, I was in Romania when Obama made his State of the Union speech. If I wanted to watch it live I would have had to stay up until 4 a.m. I certainly wasn't about to do that. Maybe for the Super Bowl but definitely not for Barack.
When I returned home I was feeling kind of guilty, so I watched a replay. It was exactly what I expected. Miraculously, he had become a reformed moderate and seemed to promise everyone his far-left liberal days were over. It's the same tactic he took to get himself elected, and I guess he thought it would work again. I thought maybe I was watching his first campaign speech for the 2012 elections.
Unfortunately, Barack (for you, that is, not for the country) it's not going to work this time. Your soaring rhetoric and charismatic charm dazzled a lot of people the first time, but you have lost a lot of those prior supporters simply because they have seen that you were untruthful about everything you were promising in 2008.
It worked the first time when you had people totally ignoring your past track record of being the Senate's most liberal senator, having no experience, abstaining on many Senate votes (what leadership) and no history that proved you had the competence to sit in the White House.
How much of the youth vote do you think you're going to get this time after they have watched you on your foolish spending spree, which yielded no results but saddled them with an impossible-to-pay future debt burden?
I can't wait to hear you explain the $3 trillion additional debt you created in only your first two years, bringing the total up to $14 trillion, and most of this debt is owed to the Chinese. I seem to remember when you called the $8.3 trillion debt limit requested by President George W. Bush "a sign of leadership failure."
How about the $1.4 trillion budget deficit you have saddled the country within just your first year? How about the failed trillion-dollar stimulus bill to create jobs, yet unemployment went from 7.8 percent to well over 9 percent (I think it peaked at 9.8 percent) with no sign of lessening? The only policies that have worked for you have been those that were a continuation of Bush's policies. You remember him, don't you? The guy you loved to blame all your failures on. People are seeing through that strategy as well.
Let me teach you a lesson. Government doesn't create jobs, Barack; all governments create are bureaucracies.
No, Barack, your days are numbered. You have called in all your chits, and no one trusts you anymore.
You are so caught up with yourself that you don't even see yourself -- or Democratic leaders Rep. Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Harry Reid -- to blame for the historic shellacking your party took in November. The three of you gave the Republicans (mostly conservatives) 63 seats in the House of Representatives and six more Senate seats, so your majority there went from filibuster-proof to only 53 to 47.
Even better news is the 2012 elections will allow further gains in the House as conservatives find better candidates to run.
The Senate picture is looking pretty rosy also. Of the 33 Senate seats coming up for election in 2012, 23 are Democrats and only 10 are Republican. It is estimated that only eight of the Democratic seats are safe, and 12 are from states that went Republican in 2008. The other three are toss-ups. Do you really think your slim majority in the Senate will hold up as those vulnerable senators fight for their political lives?
So, Barack, your political career is coming to a rapid end. It does not matter what you say anymore or how well you say it since you have proven yourself to be dishonest. Remember all the times you or your minions have called the Republicans enemies who "should be punished" and arrogantly told them to passively sit in the back? How about when you said they (the Republicans) bring a knife to a fight and you'll bring a gun? What civility, Barack; what bipartisanship.
But we conservatives can't afford to rest. We have plenty of facts of his failures to keep reminding centrists and independents that they didn't get what they thought they were getting and not to make the same mistake again. I can assure you that there are vast numbers of individuals who are having voter remorse.
Yes, I became very distrustful and suspicious very early on in his speech. I think it was when his lips started moving.
Tom Sears is a local professor of accounting in Oneonta. He can be reached at searsthomas16@gmail.com. His column appears every other week. His columns can be found at www.thedailystar.com/tomsears.
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Coinciding with our websites redesign, we launched our new story comments feature through Disqus.
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February 15, 2011
On the Right Side: Obama's tactics won't work a second time
- Big Chuck D'Imperio
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Upstate theme parks offered affordable thrills
I saw in the news last week that Disney theme parks are raising admission prices to almost $100 a person. Children (who Uncle Walt considers 10 and under) are now $86 a day.
Continued ... - Getting creative with gifts for grads
- Safety Patrol D.C. visits never get old
- My pal Brucie, savior of Sidney's hospital
- Catching a whiff of 'Vermont Vapor'
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Upstate theme parks offered affordable thrills
- Cary Brunswick
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Book-banning has a tendency to backfire
So what does the 1960s game show ``What's My Line'' got to do with the Bloomsday festivities occurring in Dublin, Ireland, this week? Surprisingly, there is a link.
Continued ... - Envisioning a world without terror
- We've become our own worst enemies
- Plenty of blame to go around for Bangladesh horror
- Obama is going against his word on Social Security
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Book-banning has a tendency to backfire
- Chuck Pinkey
- Guest Column
- Lisa Miller
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A view from above
Fire towers in the Catskill Mountains have always been destination points, built to capture some of the region’s best views. These sentinel stations served an important role for the earliest possible sightings of forest fires in the remote mountain ranges. But the fire towers and those who manned them fulfilled a multitude of other roles as well.
Continued ... - Being a parent is a constant learning process
- Healthy doesn't have to mean expensive
- A family era ends with close of Potter series
- Independent stores make up for loss of Borders
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- Mark Simonson
- Rick Brockway
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Don't play around with snappers
The other day, I was driving along Route 205 between Mount Vision and Hartwick. Suddenly, I had to swerve out of my lane to miss a huge snapping turtle. It was crossing from a large swamp on the left to some higher ground on the other side of the road.
- Emmons Pond Bog is pretty easy to enjoy
- Fishing has gotten a lot more complex
- Waterfalls are even better when you keep them to yourself
- Kids have sparkle in their eyes
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Don't play around with snappers
- Sam Pollak
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Justice Dept., IRS abuses worth screaming about
"If this had happened while a Republican was president, the liberal media would be screaming."
Continued ... - THIS WEEK'S POLL
- Using time off in the worst way possible
- Terror lives on, and there's no end in sight
- Remembering the glory of their times
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Justice Dept., IRS abuses worth screaming about
- William Masters
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Schreibman tops Chris Gibson on women's issues
As the time to vote draws near, we need to remember how money can run politics more than we can. Raising funds is a prominent (if not the dominant) task of getting elected. Raising issues is also crucial, but those efforts are subject to distortion and fear-mongering.
- Republicans feelentitled to allthey can garner An entitlement is a legal benefit available from the government to individuals who are within a defined category of recipients, such as needing insurance for unemployment or health services.
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Romney focuses on self; Obama emphasizes unity
Mitt Romney criticizes President Obama for saying a person's success is rooted in his community, and is not all his alone. Romney belittles this with his belief in individual initiative. He is better at the put-down than the push-up.
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Romney shows little regard for common man
The Republicans in Congress have voted over and over, 33 times, redundantly and uselessly, to rescind what they call Obamacare.
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Scouts' gay ban creates problem where none exists
The Boy Scouts of America's "emphatic reaffirmation" of its vow to exclude any and all homosexuals from its hallowed ranks is ill-considered and pathetic, especially in view of its having reviewed the matter for two years.
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Schreibman tops Chris Gibson on women's issues
