The Back Alley Archives

Mr. President, with all due respect, do you think everyone in this nation is mentally retarded?

As he pressed forward with ambitious plans at home to rewrite the tax code, expand health care coverage and curb climate change, Mr. Obama dismissed criticism from conservatives that he was driving the country toward socialism. After the interview, which took place as the president was flying home from Ohio, he called reporters from the Oval Office to assert that his actions have been “entirely consistent with free-market principles” and to point out that large-scale government intervention in the markets and expansion of social welfare programs began under President George W. Bush.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/08/us/politics/08obama.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2&ref=todayspaper

Hasn't Obama talked his whole life about how all our problems stem from the free market being unregulated and out of control under GWB? Wasn't that a big part of his campaign? And didn't he basically promise to be different than GWB and now he's claiming that he's just continuing GWB's government interventions and social welfare?

Well, i didn't read the article but in his defense, I think he was putting that statement in the context of "these policies are no more socialist than GWB"...not that he wants to continue his policies. Basically, he is totally going against many of GWB's policies in regards to social programs (stem cell research, abortion etc.) but he is keeping with the thing that Bush really messed up...the economy and gov't intervention in the markets.

To be honest, I wish we had a president who did the exact opposite...keep the social programs that GWB had in place, but stop build up of gov't that he started.

But that's me. I think BHO is doing what he promised all along. I don't see why this should be a surprise to anyone...except those Dems that promised he would govern more from the middle than from the far left. What were they thinking? What in his background gave them any idea that he would be a centrist? Eh bah.

yes we can!