If he hadn’t caught bin laden, would that be Bush’s fault too, for leaving him a terrorist holed up in pakistan when he should have been nailed at Tora Bora?
This isn’t mindless venting, someone made the ridiculous case that our President takes responsibility. Yeah, when it makes him look good. I wonder when he’ll take responsibility for Fast and Furious. That’s directly under his portfolio of responsibliities.
Again with the goalpost moving.
Not at all. perhaps you could give me an example of where the President has taken responsibility for things that have gone wrong in his administration.
As I recall, Obama couldn’t even take responsiblity for his campaign. He blamed his staff constantly:
http://mydd.com/users/bsavage/posts/barack-obama-the-staff-blamer
“Obama again blames staff for miscues”
Despite often-lofty rhetoric that he plans to bring the nation a “new kind of politics,” Sen. Barack Obama has surrounded himself with operatives skilled in the old-school art of the political back stab.
Yet when Obama was criticized this week for opposition research memos critical of Sen. Hillary Clinton’s ties to India and Indian-Americans, he was quick to blame his staff.
“It was a screw-up on the part of our research team,” he told editors and reporters with The Des Moines Register. “It wasn’t anything I had seen or my senior staff had seen.”
That is starting to sound familiar. It was at least the third time since February the Illinois Democrat has blamed his staff for a glitch.
And that was just in 2007. 2008 would bring a lot more passing the buck.
Start by naming something that has “gone wrong” in his administration, and for which blame can reasonably be attributed to the man himself rather than GOP obstructionism / free market forces / acts of God.
adaher, why is it that you insist Obama is responsible for all the bad things that may or may not have happened during his term in office, but rail against the notion that he is responsible for any of the good things? :dubious:
First: I apologize to all for the right-winger side track above. In my defense, I was called a right-winger first and felt a strong need to express how I do not associate myself to that term, even though I am registered as a Republican.
Second: adaher, with all due respect, this thread was about how Obama’s actions affect our MILITARY READINESS and our MILITARY POSTURE. Please start another thread if you want to talk about the economy or how Obama blamed someone for some issue related to guest workers while he was campaigning for the NOMINATION five years ago. There was no mention of military in your linked article.
Our MILITARY POSTURE is one of the most critical issues related to the selection of the POTUS. This is made even more critical now that we have Israel and Iran rattling sabers at each other like a pair of pent up weasels. When considering our FUTURE military posture, we have a choice between:
Obama - Who said while campaigning that he would invade Pakistan without their permission if given the chance to get Osama Bin Laden, then followed through with it even in an almost reckless (per adher) fashion. He’s proven a preference to focus on and eliminate the LEADERS of the terrorist groups who have acted against US citizens or on US soil. (Personally, this seems like a really cost effective and people effective way to wage ‘war’ against the ‘enemy’)
OR
Romney - who would be influenced by Xe and others that make BILLIONS from in-effective ground wars and who MIGHT be influenced on a personal level according to his over seas holdings and investments.
I am not a Democrat, but this is my dig against Democrats. Instead of framing this issue in light of the impact the choice will have going forward. They’re tripping all over themselves trying to prove that Bush was just as self-centered; that Obama didn’t really hog the credit for himself; that the guy making the claim is a self-admitted coughidiotcough Birther…
/rant out – Now, I’m going to drive into town and buy fuel for my chainsaw so I can cut/split firewood tomorrow, because I don’t have the self control to not come back here.
Ah, so he must be the greatest President of all time. I’ve never heard of a President going nearly four years without a major screwup.
But I’ll bite: Fast and Furious.
I’ve given the man credit for his foreign policy successes. I’ve said a few times on this board that I’ve been pleasantly surprised at his foreign policy effectiveness.
What he’s been poor at is domestic policy. The excuses don’t wash. Bill Clinton faced most of the same problems and handled them very differently.
An operation which began three years before Obama became president and which was neither authorized nor expanded on by him, and of which he had no personal knowledge until Republicans started cooking up grand conspiracy theories about how he was plotting to take away their guns? That’s the best example you can come up with?
Please tell us what specifically you think Obama did wrong.
The talking point about it just being an operation started under Bush is false. Fast and Furious was a change in policy. No, Obama did not personally know about it, but that doesn’t matter. You are holding the President to a lower standard of responsibility than you would hold a corporate CEO to.
Oh, I really don’t think you want to move those goalposts over there…
How much responsibility does the President have for something he didn’t know about, in your opinion?
The same amount of responsibility that a CEO has for what goes on in his company that he doesn’t know about. Which means, ALL the responsibility. Having that responsibility incentivizes a leader to find out what is going on in the organization he is supposed to be in charge of. If he can just claim he didn’t know, why should he ever find out?
Does the buck stop at the top or not?
Here’s the best part though. He could know, but pretend he doesn’t, by hiding what he knew and when he knew it, and his supporters will still hold him blameless.
THe key question is, when did the President find out, and what did he do about it when he did find out? We’re not allowed to know that.
So you don’t know what he did wrong or what he could have done better? Is that what you’re saying?
I’m not even sure we can see the goalposts anymore considering how far they’ve been moved at this point.
How is the President (or a CEO, or anyone for that matter) supposed to find out about something he doesn’t know anything about?
“adaher is there anything I don’t know about you?”
“nope”
“are you sure?”
“yep; that’s all there is to know”
Later, according to your logic, I could be held responsible for not knowing something you didn’t tell me about, even tho I asked the only source of information (you) if there was anything else to know. That’s so unrealistic an expectation you have that it appears to be madness.
like I said, he doesn’t have to find out what’s going on in his administration. That’s apparently not in his job description, actually managing the executive branch.
Furthermore, he can get away with hiding what he does know. Again, as I said.
Do you think any president has ever been fully aware of every operation being conducted by every one of the executive departments? Do you think George W. Bush spent his spare time reading up on HUD’s latest urban outreach programs?
Its not his job to manage the executive branch, its his job to lead the executive branch. He doesn’t grade the homework, doesn’t check the time cards, doesn’t decide the menu in the employee cafeteria. Doesn’t write job descriptions, doesn’t write performance reviews. He’s the President, not the supervisor.
Even if he had no idea, it wouldn’t mitigate his responsibility. But there’s reason to believe he did know, or at least his Attorney General would know, since Justice Department approval was required for the wiretaps. Nothing important enough to bother the President about, of course. Or, Holder made a decision not to inform the President to protect him. Since certain people will give him a pass for that.
Okay, so he’s LESS than a CEO? Because last I checked, CEOs were held publicly responsible when something bad happened in their company and they generally accept that responsibility.
I just want to be clear on just how low a standard we hold our Presidents to. I mean, we’ve already established that the buck doesn’t stop at the top in the federal government, now we’re getting into just how little accountability a President has, say compared to a shift manager at McDonald’s. The impression I’m getting is that the shift manager is held to a higher standard.