The Lamest Lame Duck
Posted on May 1, 2013
The President did a press conference yesterday, where he made some news. None of it was good for him.
He said he still has juice in answer to a Jonathan Karl's question that asked if the President was still relevant. If the media asks you if you still have juice, that it not good, especially if you are a second term President.
He said that he still wants to close down Gitmo. This was one of his original campaign promises. He ordered it closed four and half years ago. It is still open. What kind of juice is that?
He said that his health care law might be go through some bumps in the road, but most people won’t notice. The author of the health care law in the Senate recently said it was a train wreck. Insurance premiums are sky-rocketing. None of the President’s insurance exchanges are up and running. This will be one of the major themes in the 2014 campaign.
Ed Henry asked the President about Syria. Mr. Obama wants to remove Bashir Assad as the leader of that war-torn country. He has said that if Assad uses chemical weapons he has crossed a red line, which would be really, really bad. But when the Fox journalist asked about the President’s plans to remove Assad or to punish his regime for using chemical weapons, Mr. Obama was vague in his answer. Assad is still in power and the U.S. has done nothing to punish his regime.
In his answer to Karl, the President brought up the sequester. He complained loudly about it. He said it was terrible policy. He said that it was stupid for the Congress to lift the sequester for the FAA but not for the rest of the government. But he signed the sequester into law and he signed into law the lifting of the sequester for the FAA.
In a question about immigration, he basically said that he would sign just about anything the Congress sent to him, if they sent anything at all.
The President might be the lamest lame duck in history. He is not feared by anybody. Not Assad. Not Putin. Not whoever is running China these days. Not Merkel. Not the media. Not House Republicans. Not Senate Republicans. Not the House Democrats. Maybe a few Senate Democrats who are running for reelection in red states. Maybe a few Democratic lobbyists who get shut out if they say something stupid in the press.
The President’s party is not going to take back the House. They may hold on to the Senate, but under the leadership of Harry Reid, that hasn’t exactly been a very productive body in the last four years.
Mr. Obama, in a snippy aside, asked Jon Karl if he should pack up and go home given the evident lack of power that he has in influencing Congress. It was rhetorical question. He is not going to pack up and go up. He is going to pack up and go to Mexico. I wonder if he will get a chance to work on his golf game while he is down there.