Yesterday President Obama the man who ran on the promise of being a new kind of politician who was going to change the way Washington does business including earmarks quietly signed the massive $410 billion omnibus spending bill, laden with earmarks, on the heels of the recently-passed "stimulus" package. The overall total for both bills exceeds more than $1.6 trillion of taxpayer money, including interest. After signing the bill without cameras the president gave a speech about how this was the last time this would happen; that from here on out things would change, including the earmark situation, but after he had first justified the need for earmarks in certain situations. He also repeated that this was last year’s business. Excuse me… This is a new year; he is a new president and it is this year’s money! The budget didn’t pass last year because President Bush wouldn’t sign it and it has now doubled and tripled in size and earmarked projects, but Obama had no problem signing it.
‘I will stop earmarks and review the bill next time’ and ‘this is the last time I sign a bill like this’ is like an alcoholic saying I’ll stop drinking next time and I am just taking this one final drink. If President Obama was really the type of leader and politician that he promised during the elections he needed to veto this entire bill or go through it line by line and use his power of line item veto. Instead what he did prove again is that he is not the leader that his followers had hoped for and that the signs of change that we have seen have not been for the positive.
We have a man in the White House preaching to the Average American about practicing personal restraint and responsibility during these tough times who can’t stop smoking while essentially living in a non-smoking building and who can’t stop spending long enough to breathe and take account of what is going on around him.
This is not the hope and change that Obama’s followers voted for or that the American people in general hoped he would bring.
By: Marion Algier - Ask Marion
Source: the Daily Thought Pad
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