Fom their official statement issued after the big speech, "John Boehner declared war against the Tea Party. Publicly and privately, Speaker of the House, John Boehner is waging war on the Tea Party, conservative Republicans, and our values."
Obama may not have won much support but it seems clear that the main conflict in Washington has moved from the Republican-Democratic axis to a food fight among Republicans. This development must be dismaying to GOP strategists who believed that they had a chance to take over the Senate because of all the discontent with Obamacare.
Liberals must be dismayed too, especially when Obama embraced drones and spying, justified as necessary to stop terrorist and cyber attacks. His call to close Guantanamo has been echoing for five years with the White House opposed and the Congressional Torture Caucus still wedded to punishing terrorists who in many cases never have been.
Writing in the Globalist published in Europe, Editor Stephen Richer asked about the President, " Why has he been so captured by the apparatus? The bubble in the White House is one reason. Relative youth and inexperience another. Fear of being held accountable "in case something happens" a third. But let's keep personality traits and political considerations to the side.Obama's hesitation to stand up for democratic controls of the intelligence machinery is indicative of a fundamental misconception of American freedom."
Maura Stephens, an anti-fracking activist in upstate New York, was aghast at Obama's stance on extracting natural gas, writing:
"It was very ironic that the day we were honoring Pete Seeger -- a hero of peace and the environment -- that President Obama would double down on fracking claims. Seeger has been one of our champions in the fight against fracking in New York State, coming to virtually all of our rallies."
No one in the media pointed out that Seeger sang with Bruce Springsteen at Obama's 2009 inauguration. On the day that every newspaper carried heroic obits, Obama said nothing.
There were other criticisms of his unwillingness to challenge the over reliance on tests in schools and new standards to close the unequal gap between wages for women and men. That issue woke the audience up, but no new initiatives were floated.
These critics forget that what Obama was ultimately selling was himself.
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