Obama’s results will determine mid-term election Results
And Obama’s political results will also determine if he Returns
Results, not charisma and fair speeches shall determine his Future!
August 4, 2009
http://www.tribulationperiod.com/
Proverbs 26:23-28 – Burning lips and a wicked heart are like a potsherd covered with silver dross. [24] He that hateth dissembleth with his lips, and layeth up deceit within him; [25] When he speaketh fair, believe him not: for there are seven abominations in his heart. [26] Whose hatred is covered by deceit, his wickedness shall be shewed before the whole congregation. [27] Whoso diggeth a pit shall fall therein: and he that rolleth a stone, it will return upon him.
[28] A lying tongue hateth those that are afflicted by it; and a flattering mouth worketh ruin.
Center Field: Obama beware: Sometimes personal magic can be tragic
July 30, 2009
Gil Troy , THE JERUSALEM POST
Barack Hussein Obama has now been president for six months – when campaigning he avoided using his full name, now he embraces it. As he passes this half-year milestone, his honeymoon with the public may be ending – although America’s media remain gaga over him.
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The $787 billion stimulus plan could end up being Obama’s albatross. He erred by allowing the congressional pork-kings to dictate the legislation, burdening it with pet projects rather than smart stimuli. He further erred by forgetting his vows of bipartisanship and post-partisanship, thus failing to share responsibility with the Republicans.
ULTIMATELY, like Reagan, Obama has time on his side. All he needs is a recovery by spring 2012 and he can still claim a new, Reaganesque, “morning in America,” with his own liberal twist.
But by veering as far left as he has domestically, by playing the hard partisan game he has, he risks following in the footsteps of Jimmy Carter – who six months into his presidency scored about 10 percentage points higher than Obama has in public approval surveys. And Obama is now entering a particularly difficult passage in his presidency as he tries to overcome the health care reform curse that stymied Bill Clinton – another young charismatic Democrat with great potential.
In foreign affairs, Obama’s addiction to his own rhetoric and charisma is more apparent, and more dangerous.
Foreign policy has often been a refuge for modern presidents, an arena for bold actions, stirring speeches and fawning headlines with less congressional or press interference.
But many major presidential disasters of the past half-century were rooted in foreign troubles.
Most people forget that the phrase “the best and the brightest” – which has been used repeatedly to boost Obama and his Ivy League advisers – was more epitaph than tribute in David Halberstam’s classic work on Vietnam. John Kennedy’s people, despite his charisma and eloquence, despite their smarts
and pedigrees, steered America into the bogs of Indochina.
So far, while his actions in boosting troops in Afghanistan and keeping troops in Iraq have been measured, Obama’s instincts abroad have proved troubling. Reacting feebly to in-your-face North Korean missile tests and initially dismissing heroic Iranian protests while belligerently targeting Israeli settlements further evokes unhappy memories of Jimmy Carter, who incompetently alienated friends and appeased enemies.
OBAMA’S CAIRO speech revealed his characteristic tendency to hover above the fray, create moral equivalencies between opponents and promise to reconcile the unreasonable combatants.
World affairs are rarely that simple. Naivete and moral obtuseness usually fail, even if George W. Bush proved too heavy-handed, simplistic and incompetent.
Still, the presidential learning curve, especially in foreign affairs, can be steep. The presidency, despite being the world’s most scrutinized job, is also ever-changing, providing more plot twists than an Alfred Hitchcock movie. Nikita Khrushchev bullied John Kennedy when they first met in Vienna in 1961, only to be outmaneuvered by a more experienced JFK during the October 1962 Cuban missile crisis.
And Israelis forget that George W. Bush, whose warm friendship for Israel seems to have put off Obama, did not enter the White House as an obvious friend.
Well into Bush’s first year in office, Bush – or his secretary of state Colin Powell – criticized nearly every Israeli action against Palestinian terrorism, which mounted with increasing intensity that awful year. Only the horrors of September 11, 2001 – followed in January 2002 by Yasser Arafat’s direct lie to Bush claiming not to know anything about the Karine-A illegal arms shipment from Iran – changed Bush’s approach.
A now-famous YouTube video shows Obama killing a fly easily during a television interview. Obama gloats at his success, which was cool and impressive. As he governs, Obama has demonstrated great potential but even greater confidence. Whether his cool personality roots him, or his arrogance defeats him, remains to be seen.
Ultimately, results not charisma will count.
The writer is professor of history at McGill University, on leave in Jerusalem. He is the author of Why I Am a Zionist: Israel, Jewish Identity and the Challenges of Today. His latest book The Reagan Revolution: A Very Short Introduction has just been published by Oxford University Press.
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