Small Ball(s) Obama

Small Ball(s) Obama.  Our self-absorbed chief executive continues his pattern of maximizing his limited time in office trying to accomplish maximum screw-up with this nation.  Emboldened by recent events that broke his way with SCOTUS, selling a sell-out as brilliant diplomacy with the Iran deal, and constantly having his ego stroked by a friendly (no…that should be fawning) MSM, he is taking executive action to new heights on a daily basis.  The good news is that he has only one and a half years remaining in office.  The bad news is that he has one and a half years remaining in office.

Today’s blog title has a dual meaning.  The first is an attempt to label Obama’s remaining time in office with an appropriate strategy name.  In this case, a sports analogy would seem apt.  Having used up all his big gun ammo early on in his administration and observing that any semblance of support (either Democrat or Republican) has failed to coalesce in Congress, he is now relegated to abusing his power as president, implementing through executive fiat what he cannot accomplish through legitimate legislative means.  And shameless as he is, it is not a bother to him that even though the Judiciary may eventually overturn many of his executive and regulatory adventures, he knows that by the time that happens, much of his fantasy policy will already be deeply ingrained in our society.  Our president is tragically like the small adolescent who, finding himself unexpectedly left at home alone, rushes through the house seeing how much mayhem he can create before the parents arrive back home. 

The other tilt on today’s title is a reference to Obama as a classic weasel, in almost every respect.  He plays fast and loose with the truth, he negotiates in bad faith, he demonizes sincere and well-meaning people who disagree with him, and he sees his office as a platform from which to foist his personal ideals on our country.  Having failed miserably at accomplishing any legislative matter of quality substance (no, Obamacare fails due to the quality test), having abstained his constitutional responsibility to work with Congress on the orderly administration of our government, and having consistently taken the easier path when the harder path would have been a better choice; he now resides in his White House and pursues every cowardly option available to transform this nation into “his kind of place”.  Having been ushered into the office on the wings of “hope and change”, he is determined to exit the office on the back of “disarray and destruction”. Had he been a better man, a better representative of the people, a man of conviction and principle…; one can only swallow the regret that comes with a look back at the lost opportunities for positive and constructive change that were presented to him. 

Bereft of courage and statesmanship, our president has paddled around in his Capitol lily pond for six and a half years, either running from every substantial challenge he faced or facing it in a deceitful and dishonorable fashion.  To any objective observer, it is pathetic to see one who was once held in such high esteem with so much good will be exposed, beyond all doubt, as the shallow egotist that he is.   Playing out his game with singles, walks, and hoping for errors from the opposition (and the Republicans are all too accommodating), he stands before his final innings as a facile lame duck, flailing about for attention and full of self-aggrandizement.  Once again, can December 31, 2016 arrive soon enough?