Dear Mr. President:

It's not that I despise what you believe in or what you stand for, per se. I believe that you love your country. I believe you think you've heard all the arguments, and I believe you think you have the best judgment and most objective, pragmatic ideals to navigate our nation out of our economic disaster. We both want this nation to succeed.

Please, if you'll allow, let me tell you why as a recent convert from the Democratic Party, I'm mortified by the plans you have laid forth for America.

On the campaign trail, while not patting yourself on the back for the historical nature of your candidacy, you often reminded us of your blueprint for change - especially as it concerned getting America back on the road to fiscal solvency.

On a whim, I Googled some of what you had to say on the matter as I pondered and brooded over the mess we currently find ourselves in.

Surely you're getting advice from everybody these days about what you should and should not do. No doubt your email and voicemail are full of people's ideas and concerns. Rather than interjecting my own, allow me to simply flash you back to some basic guiding principles outlined by the one person for whom you hold the very highest regard - yourself. Only, this is you before you entered the Oval Office.
Still up on your campaign website is your plan to get Washington back on the "right path" so that our economy can be healthy in the long run. "The Problem", as you rightly point out at the very beginning, is increasing debt. That was true when you began your campaign for president, it was true in September when this financial crisis began, and it is true now that you occupy the White House. Beside the severity of the problem we now face, only one major factor has changed: your perspective.

A brief parousal of your plan highlights several concerns and solutions, and you must admit that the stimulus package you championed strays severely from the principles you outlined. So does your budget. So do your bailouts. In fact, Mr. President, I can safely say you just became the posterboy of the problem. You are the problem.

You detailed for us in very specific terms that in order to return to fiscal responsibility, we must:

• Reinstate pay-as-you-go
• Cut pork barrel spending
• Make government spending more accountable and efficient
• End wasteful government spending

Is any one of those principles present in the Obama spending plan? Any one at all?

Nearly half of America voted for the other guy in November, and many of us did so because of our inability to figure out who you really are. It's not that we don't read the newspapers or listen to your speeches. The problem is that you reinvent your core beliefs from the ground up depending on circumstance. You say one thing, then do the other. You champion one idea, then fight for the other. You tell one group what they want to hear, then backtrack in front of another. The sudden and dramatic shifts in your priorities is enough to cause whiplash.

Bipartisanship doesn't mean "I won the election, so now you need to do whatever I say." It means hearing and heeding the concerns of people who don't agree with you fundamentally. It means incorporating the ideas of the other half of America that isn't in control but still needs a voice. "The Problem", Mr. President, is that House and Senate Democrats took your stimulus package as an opportunity to pile on any goodies they could conceive of, but couldn't otherwise get. "The Problem" is that this is your first major push as president, and it's disasterously off message and off base. Sir, this problem is likely to catch up with you the next time Americans go to the polls.

More Democrats voted against your stimulus than Republicans that voted for it. The budget was a strict party line vote, and any reporter left or right will tell you that the Blue Dogs had to be shoved back in line to get on board with you. Are ALL Congressional Republicans crazy? You know that the answer to that is "no". While you disagree fundamentally on whether more spending or more tax cuts should be the backbone of an economic stimulus, one thing we must all agree on is that your children's children's children will likely still be paying off the money you just put on the nation's credit card.

When you put Sacha and Malia to bed tonight, explain to them just how much money $1,000,000,000,000 is. Explain to them how many dollars they would have to spend every day for the rest of their lives to ever spend that much money. Explain to them how much money you would have to take out of their paychecks to ever recoup that money. Explain to them how that debt takes money away from their children's schools, from their social security funds, from the police that protect their neighborhood, from the campaign to nationalize our healthcare system.

Can you look them in the face and explain this to them? Do you even understand the gravity of a ONE TRILLION DOLLAR deficit? If a ten trillion dollar national debt in 232 years of this country was deplorable, why is it palatable to increase it to 13 trillion in less than 100 days? If the previous president was wrong to increase spending and decrease taxes at the same time, how then do you reconcile a so-called tax cut for 95% of Americans while pushing forth the largest expansion of government in modern history? At what point do we claim fair game on intellectually dishonest claims and proposals?

Like so many Americans, I understand the severity of the crisis that confronts us now because I know personally many who have lost their job or their home, or whose debt burden has forced them into bankruptcy. And so while I welcome the proposal of bold, new ideas over the status quo, I cannot in good faith sign a blank check in the name of my children, written on a Chinese account. That is, of course, until you can explain how the money will ever be repaid.

And so, as your first 100 days in office come to a close, we must look back and ask ourselves, are we better off? Are people's savings more secure? Are their investments worth more or less than 100 days ago? Are more or fewer people safe in their homes? Is unemployment higher or lower? Are American companies stronger or weaker? Is health care more or less affordable than it was? And most importantly, will our children inherit easier or harder circumstances than we did?

I think you know the answer to those questions, Mr. President, and I hope you join with me in toasting to your successor in a few short, tumultuous years. I'll bring the tea.

Patriotically yours,



Concerned Citizen

Today was the Tax Day Tea Party in many cities across America.

Here in Ft Lauderdale, our tea party started at 5 p.m. and lasted for hours. A friend and I went around 6 and stayed for about an hour.

During that time, reporters from the local television stations were talking with protesters, and literally thousands of cars went by honking their horns in support.

According to police, about 3,500 people had come out to support the Tea Party movement, and many more were just flocking in as we left.


The people were actually really amazing.

We kept saying to each other that we couldn't believe how many people came out to support the movement.

It was hard not to be impressed by the variety and energy of the people we met.

The people there were patriots. They love their children, their neighbors, and their country.

What they don't love is generational theft. Who could blame them?!




Everyone was so friendly!

EVERYONE was respectful and classy... and despite the genuine and justified frustration, few were foaming at the mouth.

New friends were being made everywhere. We spoke with so many people, many with their children, friends and relatives.





As cars came by and honked, the crowds cheered louder and louder.

They waived a sea of American flags and homemade signs, mingled, and cheered.

"No more pork. No more pork."

"U-S-A! U-S-A!"

They cheered on for America and against the same tyranny which plagued this country over two centuries ago.

Only this time, we stand together to send a message to Washington. And to the king, that he bite us.

God bless this land.

As the Spring draws near, the dust settles on Capitol Hill, and Obamanomics takes hold on our economy, something obvious is becoming more clear. A change has arrived. The pendulum has swung.

It will inevitably swing back.

Already, as economists come out against the president's agenda, and red flags are raised across the political spectrum, it's hard not to wonder whether America got it right when we decided to take a chance on Barack Obama last Fall.

Widely considered one of the most popular presidents, Barack Obama's approval rating sits at 62% - below George Bush and GW Bush's 63% at the same point in their presidencies, and well below Carter's 70% according to Gallup. On top of that, political pundits largely report that Obama's policies underpoll the personality of the man himself. Read the signs on the wall; the honeymoon will come to an end. Tick tock, tick tock.



Within the first 50 days of his presidency, Obama has staked his legacy on the success of the so-called economic stimulus with his name on it that he signed last week. But already, even as rumors of Stimulus Part II are still just far-off whispers, talk has heated up over the concept of Obamanomics. Will the massive spending that the president has outlined be good for our economy in the long-run, or will the debt that it saddles us with come home to roost, forever an albatross around the neck of our prosperity? Scratch that - make it the prosperity of future generations.

Already, the only signs of bipartisanship that we have seen rise from the ashes of the Obama ascendancy have been the voices that have come together in opposition of the president's policies. Jim Cramer and Rush Limbaugh, longtime foes, are in complete agreement over the danger of the Obama economic proposals. Obama's stimulus not only didn't get any House Republican support, he lost 11 of his own people. The only 3 Senate Republicans to ultimately come over are all considered RINOs, and all from the Northeast, an area perilous to Republican ideologies. Even Maureen Dowd has had a tough time coming up with shining reviews of the president as of late. And economic experts, among whom Obama has asserted "there is no disagreement that (government injection of massive sums of money to fill the void left by the market) is necessary". The CATO Institute published full-page ads in the New York Times and Washington Post with 200 signatures from economists across the ideological spectrum which sign on to say "With all due respect, Mr. President, that is not true."

Powerful post-partisanship, indeed.

Not since 1980 have conservative principles stood such a good chance at being advanced as they will have in 2012. These four years we will be saddled by Obamanomics, the frustrating inclination to allow rogue nations to the adults' table regardless of their actions, and domestic policies which represent the worst kind of well-sounding, well-intended, and completely misguided decisions leading to awful consequences.

If the GOP can take this time to find its soul, gather around a message, open back up the "big tent", and reintroduce themselves to the American people as the party of financial responsibility, individual freedom/responsibility, and smaller, more effective government, then their leader stands a great chance of success at the ballot box the next go-around. That's the ballgame now.

And so the great irony of the Obama presidency may well turn out to be that he does bring people together in the romantic and whimsical way that he often idealized on the campaign trail. After four long years of a nation in crisis, reaction without results, and the worst kind of Washington elbow-throwing, we will likely grow tired of being sold on one idea while delivered another reality. Americans just might bridge the divide and unite behind the eviction of Obama from Pennsylvania Avenue.

That will be a change we can all believe in.

It's almost like a great personal ad: "Looking for a guy who is usually right, admits when he's wrong, and isn't afraid to take a chance? Are you tired of the same ole, same ole from guys who talk your ear off but have little in the way of substance? Ready to be swept off your feet, taken to new heights (in your portfolio), and taken care of both long term and on day-to-day issues? Contact me, Jim."

Why lie? It's hard not to be smitten. Jim Cramer is one tough cookie, and one smart guy too. He also happens to be right on the money, time and time again.

So why are the talking heads calling for his head on a platter? Because he's broken the sacred oath. He's attacking the liberal president's agenda, his cabinet, and his policies. Worse yet, he's being attacked, and he refuses to die. Remember how mad that made the media when they called for Hillary to exit the race after Iowa, yet she made it all the way through every primary? OUCH! Their new hate-child goes on Morning Joe to tell his story, and it's yet another must-see.



Economic Gurus Jim Cramer and International Superstar Erin Burnett appear side-by-side on the Today Show to inject a little perspective into our current meltdown, finger-pointing aside.

On the Forbes.com blog Digital Rules, Rich Karlgaard talks about what he describes as the "Two Front War Against Obamanomics", or the backlash that is budding against the president's brand of change.

Read the post, then sound off: http://blogs.forbes.com/digitalrules/2009/03/twofront-war-against-obamanomics.html

Drawnlines Response:

Jim Cramer is right on the money, and I keep writing about him on my blog too.

We cannot and must not forget two things:

One, that John McCain and the Republicans warned us about exactly these kinds of dangerous policies that President Obama has put in place. Yet, Obama denied any allegations of plans for huge deficits, promised a balanced budget, told us he wanted a fair mortgage bill, promised government accountability, and said it was ridiculous to think that he would pursue a Socialist agenda. He also said he didn't believe in bigger government. Boy, did we get screwed.

Two, Obama ran against the reign of George Bush essentially. Yet he has kept the most disastrous policies of the Bush administration while casting away the practical and sensible parts. The worst of both worlds. Barack Obama is Jimmy Carter, and we have flashed back to 1977.

The problem: It took George Bush a full 8 years to do as much damage as Jimmy Carter was able to accomplish in only 4. If you think that we've been on a rough ride since 2001, wait till you see the effects of this so-called "change we can believe in".

Assume the brace position.

Draw your own line in the sand! Sound off on your own opinions of the president's leadership of our country, uncensored!

Vote now.

Jim Cramer has hit the nail on the head once again! In Thestreet.com, one of his regular outlets, the economic guru explains why he, an Obama voter, feels compelled to speak out and fight against the perilous and ill-advised path down which President Obama is steering this country.

These are the can't-miss excerpts. Read the full article at: http://www.mainstreet.com/article/moneyinvesting/news/cramer-my-response-white-house?page=1

I am a fight-not-flight guy, so I was on my hackles when I heard White Press Secretary Robert Gibbs' answer to a question about my pointed criticism of the president on multiple venues, including the Today Show.

"I'm not entirely sure what he's pointing to to make some of the statements," Gibbs said about my point that President Obama's budget may be one of the great wealth destroyers of all time. "And you can go back and look at any number of statements he's made in the past about the economy and wonder where some of the backup for those are, too."

Huh? Backup? Look at the incredible decline in the stock market, in all indices, since the inauguration of the president, with the drop accelerating when the budget plan came to light because of the massive fear and indecision the document sowed: Raising taxes on the eve of what could be a second Great Depression, destroying the profits in healthcare companies (one of the few areas still robust in the economy), tinkering with the mortgage deduction at a time when U.S. house price depreciation is behind much of the world's morass and certainly the devastation affecting our banks, and pushing an aggressive cap and trade program that could raise the price of energy for millions of people.

But Obama has undeniably made things worse by creating an atmosphere of fear and panic rather than an atmosphere of calm and hope. He's done it by pushing a huge amount of change at a very perilous moment, by seeking to demonize the entire banking system and by raising taxes for those making more than $250,000 at the exact time when we need them to spend and build new businesses, and by revoking deductions for funds to charity that help eliminate the excess supply of homes.

We had a banking crisis coming into this regime, but now every area is in crisis. Each day is worse than the previous one for this miserable economy and while Obama's champions cite the stimulus plan, it's really just a hodgepodge of old Democratic pork and will not create nearly as many manufacturing or service jobs as we hoped. China's stimulus plan is the model; ours is the parody.

Most important, I believe his agenda is crushing nest eggs around the nation in loud ways, like the decline in the averages, and in soft but dangerous ways, like in the annuities that can't be paid and the insurance benefits that will be challenging to deliver on.

So I will fight the fight against that agenda. I will stand up for what I believe and for what I have always believed: Every person has a right to be rich in this country and I want to help them get there. And when they get there, if times are good, we can have them give back or pay higher taxes. Until they get there, I don't want them shackled or scared or paralyzed. That's what I see now.

If that makes me an enemy of the White House, then call me a general of an army that Obama may not even know exists -- tens of millions of people who live in fear of having no money saved when they need it and who get poorer by the day.

Don't miss this FLASHBACK! Check out who Cramer warned us would be the BEST CHOICE on the economy:

Jim Cramer knows something about money.

He knows about stocks, he knows about economy, and he knows we're on the wrong track. On Hardball with Chris Matthews, Cramer outlined why our government is making the wrong move on housing, stimulus spending, jobs and banking.



Asked what the Trillion Dollar Stimulus will do, Cramer answered, "Uhh... very little." He went on to add, "We're not going to put many people to work, and it's a shame. That's really been a big part of the problem."

Cramer described the Obama housing plan as "class warfare" and warned that another round of defaults is imminent because the plan does little to reduce principal balances while focusing only on interest rates on mortgages.

On banking, the economic guru blasted Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner for allowing investers to destroy common stocks and creating fear. He added that the banks needed to be taken away from the marketplace and put together with private investments for longterm health. "He. Is. The. Problem., Cramer offered of Geithner."

I came across an article in Real Clear Politics yesterday that I just can't help but share. If you care to send the author a love letter or, more likely, hate mail, you can link back to the article here:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/02/back_to_carter.html

by David Warren

Barack Obama was at his best in Ottawa this week, charming and well-rehearsed through a brief and inconsequential visit, and flattering in the joint announcement of such vacuities as the "clean energy dialogue." Stephen Harper, too, escaped any difficulty, with the greater challenge of basking in Obama's golden glow. It is nice that both Caesars have come to bury carbon, not release it into the atmosphere.

The serious "dialogue" may begin when the Obama administration resolves to "bury" carbon through "cap and trade," and put California-dreamin' emission standards on all cars, with the Canadian government following loyally behind, like a prisoner tied to a jeep by a cord. There is the little matter of our failing auto industry; but the larger one of what happens to our cash cow, Alberta, if and when Obama and Congressional Democrats put Americans' money where his mouth was during the election campaign.

That he may well be as good as his word, on the "green" issues among others, is an appalling thought, given the present economic fragility.

The series of gestures on moral issues with which he has begun his presidency (executive orders made or impending on taxpayer funding to promote abortions, and on stem cells that require the destruction of human embryos), and the recklessness with which the "stimulus bill" was rammed through Congress (loaded with funding for various Left-Democrat causes despite Republican outrage), should help us to realize that only his promise of bipartisanship was misleading.

But while I might argue there is no moral justification for the new directions, there is certainly a democratic justification: for Obama, as he has been at pains to remind his political adversaries, won the election.

Indeed, he was fortunate to benefit when the American public was suddenly distracted by a financial crisis, from what was turning (via the Sarah Palin candidacy, and Catholic rebukes of Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi) into an interesting discussion of life issues. My reader may recall that that discussion corresponded to the moment when Obama slipped behind in the polls.

Likewise, foreign affairs were suddenly thrust into the back trunk. I argued last year that it was hard to take seriously a foreign policy that seemed to consist of punishing America's friends, and encouraging her enemies; that offered, for example, threats to Pakistan but dialogue with Iran.

I did not at the time expect that it would ever come into play, however, for I assumed that even if Obama won the election, more sober influences within the Democratic Party would prevail, and in the end he would find himself with something that secretly resembled the Bush doctrines.

I have lost that confidence since watching the new White House destructively criticize Afghanistan's Hamid Karzai, congratulate Venezuelans on constitutional changes that will enable Hugo Chavez to be president-for-life, deliver an entirely gratuitous apology for American behaviour towards the Islamic world, and send George Mitchell off to the Middle East to strike a more "balanced" posture between Israel and Hamas. This, after decisions on Guantanamo that signal a new "catch and release" approach to the world's most dangerous terrorists.

While I doubt Americans intentionally voted for any of that, they did sign a blank cheque for unspecified "hope" and "change," and they did endorse a candidate whose popularity was not only greater abroad than at home, but especially high among anti-Americans. They now have a President who is taking lectures from such as Desmond Tutu. He warns that Obama will squander the world's goodwill if he does not immediately apologize to the Iraqi people for the "unmitigated disaster" in which George Bush freed them from Saddam Hussein.

The western world has a new captain who must deal with such problems as the one presented to NATO forces in Afghanistan, by the Kyrgyzstan government's decision to evict the U.S. from a major forward air base, at a time when supply routes through Pakistan are increasingly endangered. We have some idea how such a problem would have been dealt with by previous administrations, behind the scenes. We have no idea how the Obama administration will deal with such things.

And we will see. Meanwhile, my most sanguine impression, in a sweeping view of the economic, social, and foreign prospects of the new American executive -- which embraces also the chaos we have seen in cabinet appointments and the like -- is that we have already returned to the Carter era. I hope it won't be worse than that.

It's day 35 of the president's administration. In As I do my daily news roundup, a few things catch my attention. In just under two years, the midterms will be upon us. We will head to the polls again and ask ourselves, "Are we better off than we were (2) years ago? Is it easier to buy milk and bread? To pay our mortgages? To send our children to college?

And so, let's see where we are on day 35 of our post-partisan, post-racial, and generally better-direction for our nation that we were promised. Afterward, if you still think that I'm just being a namby-pamby contrarian, then... I guess you aren't paying attention. At what point do we get to issue The Drawnlines Blog: I Told You So Edition?

CNN: Bipartisanship Didn't Last Long in Obama Era
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/22/obama.so.far/index.html

During the most contentious stretch of the Democratic presidential primary campaign last winter, then-candidate Hillary Clinton mocked Barack Obama for his pledge to transcend Washington's entrenched partisanship.

President Obama, who won the presidency on a bipartisan platform, now faces a very divided Washington.

"The sky will open. The lights will come down. Celestial choirs will be singing and everyone will know we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect!" Clinton bellowed.

Obama dismissed Clinton's sarcasm as overly cynical and further evidence she was a creature of Washington. But as President Obama prepares to make his first major address to the nation, Clinton's comments are borne out.

For a candidate who won the White House on a mantle of bringing the country's two political parties together, Washington could not be more divided on Obama's initial weeks in the Oval Office and the policies he has put in place.

Poll: Most favor bipartisanship; Democrats, not so much
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/20/bipartisanship.poll/index.html

The survey's release comes one month after Obama's inauguration as president.

Two out of three people questioned in the poll approve of the way Obama is handling his job as president. And more than seven in 10 think that he is a strong leader who inspired confidence and is tough enough for the job.

"But the public appears more attracted to Obama's personal characteristics than his stand on the issues, and they don't think he can end partisan gridlock in Washington, one of the key messages of Obama's presidential campaign," Holland said.

Opinion about the president, while still fairly high, has dropped a bit since December on some measures, including six to seven point losses on inspiring confidence and the president's ability to bring change.

Guantanamo meets Geneva Convention standards, study finds
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-guantanamo21-2009feb21,0,2083521.story

When you're trying like hell to close down a detention facility on the grounds that it is being used for immoral means to an end - and especially when this is a major campaign theme - you certainly don't want your own Pentagon's internal studies to show that your concerns are off base. You don't want a major newspaper spreading the word that we're basically running a terror bed-and-breakfast in a tropical island setting. OOPS! Who forgot to tell the LA Times? Guess their guy is getting kicked off AirForce One for promoting unflattering news.


Dark, Dark, Dark - by Maureen Dowd
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/22/opinion/22dowd.html?ref=opinion

Let's be clear. If you're a liberal, and Maureen Dowd of all people isn't thrilled about your leadership while she sings your praises, you've screwed up big. If you can't muster up some praise from Dowd and the Daily Kos groupies, clearly your wagon has lost a wheel. Yet, this morning, Maureen hits it right on the nose (oddly enough):

...Obama is oozing empathy compared with his attorney general, who last week called us “a nation of cowards” about race.

Eric Holder, who showed precious little bravery in standing up to Clinton on a pardon for the scoundrel Marc Rich, is wrong. We have just inaugurated a black president who installed a black attorney general.

We need leaders to help us through our crises, not provide us with crude evaluations of our character. And we don’t need sermons from liberal virtuecrats, anymore than from conservative virtuecrats.

In the middle of all the Heimlich maneuvers required now — for the economy, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, health care, the environment and education — we don’t need a Jackson/Sharpton-style lecture on race. Barack Obama’s election was supposed to get us past that.

And to round out our news day and really close the deal on the bang-up job our new leadership is doing, how about this little nugget from New Hampshire. You know, the state with the nation's first primary? Yeah, that New Hampshire:

Obama's Markets: Please Be Quiet
http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Obama%27s+markets%3a+Please+be+quiet&articleId=9ca1d5f8-b299-413c-a929-d6cfc79bd697

On Thursday, The Wall Street Journal's top headline read: "Housing Bailout at $275 Billion."

The next morning, the Journal's top headline, in larger type, read: "Market Hits New Crisis Low." The day Obama's housing rescue plan became public, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 89 points.

That was after a 5.1 percent drop in the four days following Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's announcement of the Obama administration's new plan to shore up credit markets.

The more economic rescue plans Obama puts out, the further the market drops. The administration's ad hoc, "do something" approach, carried over from the end of the Bush administration, is hurting, not helping.

That is what we were promised for over the last year from the Obama campaign. This was of course immediately followed up by the Obama administrations "Ethics Guide" on his first day in the Oval Office. One would think that it would be incredibly hard to fault Mr. Obama for signing such an act into place; well that was however until the last few weeks of senate and house hearings on his appointments. It would seem that the rest of the Democratic party has been playing by it's own set of ethics for the last few years. Four, count them FOUR, of Obama's selections for the nations top political appointments have been caught with, shall we say, their pants around their ankles once hearings started.

The first of course was Mr. Richardson. Once a presidential contender himself, and as many thought, a guaranteed pick for at least one spot in the Obama cabinet, his tenure as an appointee was short lived once stories of his pay-to-play sort of politics came into the public eye. Not that pay-to-play is anything new to Mr. Obama.

Enter Timothy Geithner, President Obama's pick to head up the US Treasury. While from the beginning there was some rumbeling about this appointment being that Geithner was at the help of the New York Federal Reserve Bank and had an enormous hand in the Bear Sterns debacle/restructuring/gift to Jamie Dimon and the JPMorgan family, there didn't seem that we should expect any hiccups in the confirmation hearings. Until we found out that the person we were putting in charge of the dept. tasked with collecting the nations most important revenue sources, federal taxes, in fact hadn't been very good at sending in his own tax payments. This was quickly brushed aside as a "mistake" and the confirmation process continued. Timothy Geithner is now running the very entity he neglected to pay. Ironic.

Then there is Nancy Killefer who was tapped to be the nations first Chief Performance Officer. While the exact duties of this position were still a little fuzzy, the main goal as set by the administration was to rate, investigate and improve the performance of the federal government. We soon found out that she probably needed to be looking into the performance of her own accounting skills because she too had some tax issues. Not only did she have a few hundred dollars in currently owed taxes but she also had a federal tax lien filed on her in 2005. I bet in retrospect, that few hundred dollars would have been a good investment to not screw up a federal appointment that basically entailed telling the government what they were doing wrong.

And last but not least comes former majority leader Tom Daschle. The third appointee to decide that paying taxes to the fine country that he swore to serve just wasn't for him. He was the nominee to serve as the Secretary of Health and Human Services, but withdrew his name on February 3, 2009, the same day that Nancy decided to duck out to tend to her own housekeeping issues. Like Richardson, it was long thought that Daschle would end up in the cabinet as a long time Obama supporter. Again like Richardson however, this was short lived once it was found out that not only had Tom amended his tax returns for 2005, 2006 and 2007, he knew about the discrepancies back in June of 2008, and for some reason didn't see it fit to address until he was being offered a new job.

The lesson here? I guess don't pay your taxes until you get offered a job by the entity you have avoided paying for years. Whereas no one can really blame Obama for these people not paying their taxes and being involved in not so up and up business transactions, what he can be held accountable for is standing behind them even after knowing full well they had done wrong against the country he was appointing them to serve. Perhaps President Obama could fund his 816 Billion dollar stimulus package in cash if he would just audit the governments own employees. That seems to be the only way to get these people to agree to pay their taxes.

A mixed bag of news continues for President Obama as he tries to gain focus and momentum in his 100 day leadership blitzkrieg of our nation. Let's see how he's faring.

Keep in mind, this is good/bad news, from the perspective of the administration:

Good news:

• Eric Holder has been confirmed by 75 Senators, a much larger margin than expected based on his rocky confirmation hearings, sketchy leadership history, and support for closure of the Guantanamo detention facility without any clear plan for the released detainees.
• Bill Lynn, an Obama Pentagon appointee, appears poised to squeak through confirmation after Senator McCain of Arizona released his hold. Questions arised over the nomination of Lynn after it became clear that Lynn lobbied the Pentagon on behalf of Raytheon in recent years. The Obama administration has a strict rule against hiring lobbyists to positions in a department they have lobbied in the past two years. This appointment is a clear reversal of the policy.
• Hillary Clinton has been sworn in as Secretary of State and is being dispatched abroad immediately. This is very good news for the administration and the world.
• Obama's approval rating is still hovering around 65%.
  

Bad news:

• Tom Daschle is the second Obama appointee to have clearly and blatantly skirted tax obligations in the recent past, and to have made an embarrassing reversal and correction. Daschle is popular in the Senate, and still likely to be confirmed as HHS Secretary.
• Despite intense lobbying from the White House and an over-the-top call out for so-called bipartisanship, not only did the Stimulus Bill not achieve a single Republican vote, but 11 Democrats defected as well.
• As the debate has moved to the Senate, and more sunshine has been cast on the details of the spending package, excessive pork has made the bill subject to higher scrutiny and may fall short of the 60 votes necessary for passage. A party-line vote would only provide 58 votes, and the Democrats desperately need to pick off at least two Republicans while holding onto their entire caucas.
• As of today, the Dow is below 8,000, gas prices are on the rise, more jobs are being shed everyday, and housing prices continue to plummet.
• Economists are now estimating that America won't start to climb out of recession until late 2010. That would make for bad mid-term elections for the Dems.

Stay tuned. The 100 Day Report continues, and Drawnlines Blog will be here to bring you the good, bad, and ugly!

To be sure, the pressure on President Obama to hit the ground running on his election day is huge, and I don't envy him for it. America and indeed the world wait with bated breath to hear what new inspirational message and what specific direction he will set this nation down.

After preparing for this moment since he began his presidential run in.... 2004? 2002? since he moved to Chicago in the 1980's? - the expectation for him to set us off down a new path is one which must be met if not exceeded. He is, after all, the messiah. He is, let it be known, "The One". He is the love child of the media and the liberal propaganda machine and those beloved so-called 'Washington Outsiders' who hope we don't notice that they've been the ones in control since the mid 1970s in the first place.

It's 16 minutes into the Obama presidency as I'm typing this, and here's the score. So far, he's completely botched the Oath of Office, and immediately lapsed into the "Crisis of Confidence" aka "General Malaise" speech that was widely thought to be one of the final nails in Carter's coffin. See below, if you don't believe it. It's almost word for word the first few minutes of Obama's address:



So, as I hear President Obama blabber on, it's impossible for me to avoid pondering what concrete measures he will take to control our government. After all, the ups and downs of our nation are officially his fault/credit now. What other bold, new ideas lay ahead? According to the president, here are some highlights:

Massive government expansion
Soaring deficit to reach 1 Trillion Dollars
Immediate closure of Guantanamo, setting dangerous national enemies free
No movement on healthcare reform
Reverting to the Bush timetable for Iraq withdrawal, which he specifically campaigned against
Unlimited, unrestricted diplomatic access to dangerous foe nations (S Korea, Iran)
Limitless federal bailouts to any company without sound business practices
Chief of Staff not-so-subtly declares war on Pelosi/Reid, promises to go around them to legislate


So, dear readers - buckle down. We've got 3 years, 364 days, 23 hours and 30 minutes until we are saved from this roller coaster once more. God help us... No, seriously.

It is our duty as Americans now to hold President Obama accountable for the decisions and direction and tone taken by our federal government, just as was done with Presidents Bush and Clinton and Bush and Reagan and so on. Obama holds the reigns of our Democracy now, and we will celebrate with him in victory just as we scold him in defeat. Hopefully "The One" will lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil... but then again, you know what they say about false idols in the scripture. It usually turns out ugly.