US Army officer won’t accept Obama as chief

[Redeye]

After that rather stunning announcement, the GOP contenders for President may as well start writing their concession speeches now.  They don't have any credible candidates to begin with, but with this staggering accomplishment, they're probably screwed.

 

[tomahawk6]

Obama will be judged in 2012 on the economy.If gas prices are $4-6 a gal he is not going to get re-elected.

 

[Redeye]

Obama will be judged in 2012 on the economy.If gas prices are $4-6 a gal he is not going to get re-elected.

And that is a sad commentary on the general ignorance of voters.  Nothing he can do directly would impact that at all.  Whenever politicians talk about gas prices, all you can do is  :facepalm:.

 

[vonGarvin]

After that rather stunning announcement, the GOP contenders for President may as well start writing their concession speeches now.  They don't have any credible candidates to begin with, but with this staggering accomplishment, they're probably screwed.

I remember watching a skit on Saturday Night Live back in 1991 or so.  It was shortly after the First Gulf War, and the spoof was on the leadership hopefuls for the Democrats.  Essentially, they were all trying to lose the convention so that they wouldn't get their butts kicked by George the First.  If I recall, "Hilary Clinton" was there in lieu of Bill, and she said that he was unable to attend because he was at a Gay Porn Movie Cinema.

The point is, and as we've seen over the past few weeks: politics is fickle.  So, you may build a thousand bridges, but everyone calls you on the least favourable terms, if they are that bad.

 

[tomahawk6]

American voters vote their pocketbook - historically. Personally I wish our voters were smart enough not to elect a man with no executive experience in the first place. This is the perfect example of why Senators make bad chief executives. The best way to get executive experience is to be a Governor which is why alot of the modern Presidents were former governors and my bet is that the GOP will turn to a person who was a successful governor. A guy like Trump could get elected because he has gotten his executive experience in the business world.

 

[a_majoor]

And that is a sad commentary on the general ignorance of voters.  Nothing he can do directly would impact that at all.  Whenever politicians talk about gas prices, all you can do is  :facepalm:.

You mean like this:

http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/2011/04/government-cant-do-anything-about-gas-prices-then-why-did-happen-

Government can't do anything about gas prices? Then why did this happen in 2008?
   
By: Mark Tapscott 04/26/11 6:12 PM

President Obama says there's not much the federal government can do to bring down gas prices any time soon. Michael Bromwich, Obama's chief bureaucrat in charge of issuing permits for oil and gas companies to drill off-shore, said the same thing today:

“‘Even if we permitted the hell out of everything tomorrow -- every pending permit, some permits that haven't even been filed yet -- it would not have a material effect on gas prices. That's the simple, clear reality,” said the director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE).

Both Obama and Bromwich either are purposely lying or they simply don't know what they are talking about. Check out the chart that accompanies this post. Notice what happened on July 14, 2008? Oil prices suddenly plummeted from their historic high of $145 a barrel. Why?

Because that was the day President George W. Bush signed an executive order lifting the moratorium on off-shore drilling in the eastern half of the Gulf of Mexico and off the U.S. Atlantic and Pacific coasts. Overnight, the price per barrel of oil plunged, and that plunge was reflected at the pump soon thereafter.

In other words, Obama could with the stroke of a pen sign an executive order telling his appointees at EPA, the Department of Interior and the Department of Energy to stop throwing up obstacles to increased U.S. oil and natural gas production and instead work with the energy industry on a crash program to "drill here, drill now."

HT: Will Collier at Pajamas Media and Metalprices.com, which compiled the chart.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/2011/04/government-cant-do-anything-about-gas-prices-then-why-did-happen-#ixzz1LJIKh9KK

Killing Osama Bin Laden will provide a small spike to the Presidentès approval numbers, but the relentless erosion of American living standards due to Stagflation over the next two years (plus negative fallout over not winning the wars in Afghanistan or Libya, barring a black swan event or massive turnabout in US policy and military commitment to the regions).

Sadly, this officer did not choose the correct way to protest the decisions of the Commander in Cheif; resign his commission and then speak out a a civilian, so threw everything away.

 

[Redeye]

American voters vote their pocketbook - historically. Personally I wish our voters were smart enough not to elect a man with no executive experience in the first place. This is the perfect example of why Senators make bad chief executives. The best way to get executive experience is to be a Governor which is why alot of the modern Presidents were former governors and my bet is that the GOP will turn to a person who was a successful governor. A guy like Trump could get elected because he has gotten his executive experience in the business world.

You owe me a new keyboard for spitting coffee all over mine with that laugh.  You meant it, I hope, as a joke.  There is absolutely no way Trump is going to get on the ballot, never mind elected.  President Obama pretty much finished his campaign off for him last week.

Plenty of great American presidents had "no executive experience".  Kennedy didn't.  Eisenhower didn't.  And hell, Ronald Reagan had "executive experience" and made the deficit soar out of control, he was the architect, initially at least, of the mess the USA is in now.  George W. Bush also had "executive experience".

The present crop of GOP candidates is a complete and utter joke, which is a good thing for Obama, I suppose.

Voting with one's pocketbook is all fine and good if over an issue one can control.  Since gas prices are in fact something that no President can control.  Even if suddenly President Obama ordered the drilling up of every available drop of oil within US territory, it would both take a massive amount of time to come into production, and could not be enough to dramatically influence prices.

 

[Redeye]

You mean like this:

http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/2011/04/government-cant-do-anything-about-gas-prices-then-why-did-happen-

Actually, it was the also the dramatic collapse of major speculative positions that drove the price of oil dramatically down.  It wasn't really a supply issue at all.  Massive, massive bets were being placed in the oil futures market and that drove the price through roof.

To what extent a speculative bubble exists in this case isn't really clear, but I don't know that there's anywhere near as much leveraging in the markets now - I don't have an easy way to find out though.

 

[Brutus]

The GOP should focus on the 2 Houses, and forget about the White House until 2016. They'd be better off controlling those and handcuffing Obama and exploiting his resulting ineffectiveness than trying to slay the dragon slayer.

 

[a_majoor]

The Supreme Allied commander didn't have executuve experience?

I'm going to dust off my Panasonic Toughbook so I can safely deal wirh posts like that. The MacBook can't deal with spewed coffee.....