Tag Archives: president

Fifty Years After Kennedy

BY JOHN FEEHERY
Reprinted from TheFeeheryTheory.com

Originally published in The Hill

Five decades after the brutal murder of President Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson, who had promised to keep America out of war in the election of 1912, became the first president to show a movie at the White House.

That movie, “Birth of a Nation,” directed by D.W. Griffith, was a wonder of technical achievement. It also portrayed the Ku Klux Klan in heroic terms, employed white actors in black face (presumably because the director refused to hire actual black actors) and generally denigrated the historic legacy of America’s 16th president.

Continue reading →

Higher Salaries to Attract Better Candidates

BY FRANK HILL
Reprinted from TelemachusLeaps.com

I got to thinking the other day about what was ‘more important’ to the United States of America: Having great referees in our professional sports leagues….or having great representatives and senators in Congress in Washington?

Apparently, based on the way we pay our elected representatives versus professional referees, we ‘value’ the services of NFL/MLB and NHL referees at or around the same level as we ‘value’ our elected officials in this nation.

We know, we know: ‘The market values rare talent’. Alex Rodriguez, LeBron James, and Peyton Manning are those ‘rare talents’ and command massive salaries up to $25M per year. ‘They put fannies in the seats and sell advertising on the tube!’ team owners and general managers say to justify such exorbitant salaries. Continue reading →

Stop the Impeachment Chatter

BY JOHN FEEHERY
Reprinted from TheFeeheryTheory.com

When I worked for the Hammer, I told him point-blank it was unwise for him to lead the impeachment of Bill Clinton.

I explained to him that even if we could pass an impeachment resolution out of the House, a conviction would fail in the Senate because that required a two-thirds vote, and if he led the impeachment drive, it would automatically become a partisan event, making a conviction impossible.

Tom DeLay thanked me for my thoughts and said in no uncertain terms that Clinton’s actions were a moral stain on the Presidency and that he had to be made accountable. Continue reading →

Lead, Follow, Or….

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

In the ’60s a battle cry of anti-war (and anti-Lyndon Johnson) college students was “Lead, follow or get out of the way;” a concept that morphed into lyrics for Bob Dylan’s anthem, “The Times They are a’Changin.”

President Obama has tried his version of leading – which has been mostly attempting to bully Congressional Republicans into submission. It hasn’t worked.

For about five minutes after his reelection we were told he was going to spend Continue reading →

Richard Milhous Obama

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

Well, well, well. Here we are. March first. Sequester day. America Held Hostage; Day One.

President Obama has been criss-crossing the country proclaiming the dire effects of March 1 if the Republicans in the House didn’t bow to his demands. We don’t know what his demands are, but he spent a lot of money accusing the GOP of not caving into them.

The Department of Homeland Security is made up, apparently, of the only group of people in America that believed Obama. A division of DHS got a jump on Sequester Day by letting “several hundred” illegal aliens who were in jail, out of jail and into what a spokesperson called “placed on an appropriate, more cost-effective form of supervised release. Continue reading →

President’s Day Books

BY JOHN FEEHERY
Reprinted from TheFeeheryTheory.com

When I was a kid, we got both Washington’s Birthday and Lincoln’s Birthday off of school. That made February a fun month for kids. Not so much for parents.

These days, we celebrate their birthday on the same day. It’s kind of like when my wife decided to combine our son’s birthday party with the birthday party of one of his classmates. Saved time and money, and hey, it was fun for the whole family.

So, now we have President’s Day, which give us a good excuse to read books on all of the Presidents. I am currently reading a biography of George Washington Continue reading →

Inauguration Day

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

For foreigners, the only thing nuttier than watching the way we elect our Presidents is watching the way we inaugurate them.

For a nation that wears its egalitarianism not just as a badge of honor, but (as we saw this past November) almost as a requirement for office, the pomp and circumstance involved in a modern U.S. Presidential inauguration would have moved Louis XIV to modesty.

Both parties face the same issue: Looking for the balance between demonstrating a public outpouring of interest, if not affection, for the person preparing to take the oath of office without giving your political opponents any more ammunition than necessary. Continue reading →

Plan B

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

We’re now within 10 legislative days ’til the Fiscal Cliff – assuming the Members won’t be decking the Halls of Congress with boughs of holly on Christmas Eve and Day.

There is movement in the positions coming from either end of Pennsylvania Avenue. The President campaigned successfully on the idea of raising taxes on the wealthy – with the wealthy being defined as any family earning $250,000 or more annually. Continue reading →

President Obama on the Fiscal Cliff

BY FRANK HILL
Reprinted from Telemachus.com

For a ‘constitutional scholar’, President Obama sure doesn’t act like he knows who holds the cards in any negotiations on budget matters in Washington, DC.

Who does hold the cards?

The House of Representatives. Period. ‘All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House’ from Article 1 of the Constitution. There are multiple Committees on Authorization and Appropriations in the House and the Senate. None in the White House. Continue reading →

Second Terms

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

Now that the biggest parlor game in the world “Who will be the next President” is over, the next parlor game that has us obsessing here in our nation’s capital is: Who is in and who is out in President Obama’s second-term Cabinet and senior White House staff?

Putting together the senior team for a second term is far different from the first term. Oh, there are professional members of the transition team who have served in previous Administrations, but the new boss is likely to be overwhelmed with the number of decisions that have to be made in the relatively few weeks between election day in early November and Inauguration Day on January 20. Continue reading →

Game Change or More of the Same?

BY JOHN FEEHERY
Reprinted from TheFeeheryTheory.com

It was a status quo election. Or was it?

The players all seem exactly the same. Barack Obama. John Boehner. Harry Reid. Mitch McConnell. Nancy Pelosi. The only change in any top leadership position was John Cornyn taking over from Jon Kyl as the Republican Whip.

Power in Washington is a game of perception. Who has it? Who doesn’t? Who can keep his troops in line and who can’t?

Power slowly recedes from a second term President. Second terms are never pretty. Continue reading →

Debate Backwash

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

The first debate between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney changed the direction of the campaign. In the two-plus weeks since that debate Obama’s lead in national polls and nearly every battleground state poll has shrunk or Romney has pulled ahead.

The second debate, which most observers believe Obama won on style points, has had no effect on the race whatsoever.

At least so far. Continue reading →

Presidential Debate, Channeling Al Gore

BY JOHN FEEHERY
Reprinted from TheFeeheryTheory.com

Naomi Wolf must have called Barack Obama and given her two cents about how the President could seem more macho in debate number 2. He certainly was channeling his inner Al-Gore at the beginning of the “Thriller on Long Island,” when he moved aggressively into Mitt Romney’s personal space.

Romney followed suit, and at a few points, you thought that maybe something bad was going to happen. It never did, but this debate showed the personal animosity that the President has for his opponent.

Continue reading →

Obama Rebounds for Win

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

Short answer: Obama rebounded strongly in this debate. Romney was prepared and did as well as he did in the first one, but Obama’s performance was so much better than last time, he gets the win.

Mitt Romney got the first question (from a college student asking about the availability of a job after he graduates). He walked over to “Jeremy” and spoke directly to him. Barack Obama also walked to the student and used the answer to attack Romney on wanting to “bankrupt Detroit.”

Candy Crowley busted the rules right off the bat by asking a follow-up question – what about short-term jobs – which both men used as an excuse to get on each other. Continue reading →

The Real Mitt Romney

BY JOHN FEEHERY
Reprinted from TheFeeheryTheory.com

The central question of this Presidential campaign seems to be an odd one:  Who is the real Mitt Romney?

We could ask the same question about Barack Obama. Is Obama the left-wing socialist, the lucky s.o.b. who beat a series of weak candidates to waltz into the White House and a job way over his head, or the most brilliant political strategist in the history of mankind?

I honestly don’t know the answer to the Obama question. He has elements of all three in his political persona.

The Romney question is a bit easier to answer. Continue reading →

The Big Debate: REE-Act

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

The pundiferous universe was acting as if the laws of political physics had been repealed as it tried to make sense of Barack Obama’s abysmal performance in his debate with Mitt Romney Wednesday night.

Why didn’t Obama respond? Why didn’t Obama mention the 47 percent? Or Bain Capital. Or that dog-on-the-roof-of-the-car thing?

Why, at a minimum, didn’t Obama challenge Romney on the facts? Continue reading →

Presidential Debates and Other Matters

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted by Mullings.com

With most of official Washington on nitroglycerin tablets awaiting tonight’s D*E*B*A*T*E between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney in Denver, there are other things going on.

To start with, those pesky polls are beginning to tighten up again. Remember just about 10 minutes ago how the worldwide cadre of official political pundits, reporters, hangers-on, and operatives said this race was over and Obama could just take a knee for the next five week? Continue reading →

Barack Obama’s Charmed Life

BY MICHAEL S. JOHNSON

President Barack Obama has had a charmed political life.

He has been a first class passenger on a supersonic rise in politics from community activist, state legislator and part-time U.S. Senator to President of the United States. And now he is running for a second term, wrapped in coats of Teflon slapped on so thick the negatives just don’t stick.

President Obama is rising in the polls and enjoying high personal popularity at a time when so much seems to be crumbling around him. Continue reading →

Romney, Obama, Comparing Candidates

BY JOHN FEEHERY
Reprinted from The Hill

You never really get a chance to size up two candidates for office until they stand shoulder to shoulder on the stage.

Mitt Romney is about an inch taller than Barack Obama. Usually, the taller candidate wins elections in American politics. They are a study in contrasts, Obama and Romney, but united in a singular purpose: They want to run the country.

Obama is aloof in person and warm onstage. Romney is warm in person and stiff onstage. Continue reading →

Real People, Real Issues

BY RICH GALEN
Reprinted from Mullings.com

Living and working in Your Nation’s Capital I forget, sometimes, that grand issues are fun to debate on CNN or MSNBC, but real people deal with real issues.

At a fundraiser for Rep. Bill Johnson (R-Oh) last night, I heard from a nurse anesthetist that there is a continuing shortage of the basic drug she uses to put people to sleep for surgery. And that when they have the drug it often has a label written in some language other than English, and that the efficacy of the drugs is not constant. Continue reading →