Raise 'em up and cut 'em down - at the same time

Barack Obama spoke last night to Congress and the American people, and while he finally offered a smidgen of hope, he mostly reverted to campaign mode and pretty much dashed whatever hope was on offer.

"The day of reckoning has arrived," said he. Well, thanks for that! I was beginning to wonder...

Anyway, I don't know what you'd call a well-spoken, narcissistic, sad-sack scold with hutzpah and energy, but he's it. He'd be a terrible gardener. He'd plant the seeds but then kill the seedlings with herbicide in an effort to kill the weeds.

And so it went last night. In the same speech he said we need a sound financial system but then in almost the same breath, whacked Wall Street again for spending money on drapes and private planes (why hasn't the fact that a White House jet was sent to pick up a lone Dem congressman in Ohio to bring him back to DC for the stimulus vote?). Who cares?

And by the way, we don't need more regulation, we need better enforcement. Under the current line of thinking, we should all be under house arrest, and just not move. If someone stole a loaf of bread and got caught, we wouldn't change the laws. We'd just prosecute as we always do and the breadseller? Probably get someone to watch the bread more closely. I don't know if that gets across what I'm talking trying to say but the current regs are fine. Actually, if there is one reg that we need is some sort of "too big to fail" law that prevents financial entities from getting too big and thus, pose a systemic risk if they do fail.

But I digress. My main point here is the crappy leadership. Why does Obama continue to hammer the people he's trying to help? I realize that you have to offer a little sternness to the bankers..."I'll give you another the juice box but if I have to stop this car!" But to revert to populism in doing so is just bad. It's old politics that he's supposed to be rising above. It's not letting go of the childish things, etc. Let it go, O!

People get so wrapped up in the sky-high, pie in the sky, rhetoric when they should be focusing on the solutions Obama proposes. They also shouldn't be so focused on the partisan angle. I want give and take. I want objection, dissent. I want this thing to be done right. And right means hashing it out until it comes out right. Back and forth.

But so far there is lot of nothing but money throwing. There is no daring, no bold moves, nothing that would wow anyone. We need a suicide squeeze but instead we get plain vanilla hit and runs. We get more of the same old garbage from the Democrats and reaction from Republicans. If there were a sizable amount of GOPers who sided with the Pres about the stimulus with a big group of those who opposed, I might think, well, those guys are just getting in the way. But to have all but three Republicans in both the House and Senate object, you've got to think, wait, maybe there is a big problem. And don't tell me that now's not the time for dissent. Democrats certianly went to the mattresses when Bush was in office. I think they prolonged the Iraq war.

But instead we get the same stuff. I was promised change. I don't see it. The actors have changed but it's the same show.