Bad Week for President Obama

When it rains it pours.  We've all heard this expression. Well, President Barack Obama needs an umbrella, because bad news keeps pouring in.

A week that started out with a devastating jobs report ended with the President stating that the "private sector is doing fine."  If those were the only two pieces of bad news or communication missteps to occur it would have been a bad week for the President, but when you throw in former President Bill Clinton contradicting the President's ads and talking points, a rebuff of big government in Wisconsin, serious questions about potential leaks in the Administration that threaten national security, and the Republicans raising more money than our Campaigner in Chief, you're talking about a bad week of epic proportions.

First off, to call the May jobs report "disappointing" would be a gross understatement.  According to this report, which was released released June 1, 69,000 jobs were created. This means that the recovery has slowed or stalled, which certainly isn't good news for the President's re-election chances.  On top of the dribbling of new jobs announced in the report, we also learned that the unemployment rate has inched upward.

A few weeks ago, the President's re-election team began floating ads attacking Republican nominee Mitt Romney's business record at Bain Capital.  This week, Bill Clinton torpedoed those ads, describing Romney's business record as "stellar."  Later in the same week, the former President stated in an interview that raising anyone's taxes at this time could further stall the economy, contradicting the Obama Campaign's goal of increasing taxes on the rich. Or course, Clinton seemed to retract his comments a bit in later interviews, but the damage had already been done.

On Tuesday, voters in Wisconsin rebuffed Big Government, Big Labor and the Democratic Party, which collectively tried to recall Governor Scott Walker.  The President, showing his support of Big Labor, one of his staunchest supporters, solidly put his significant political muscle behind their cause, sending a tweet of support.  Yes, a tweet. Instead of heading to Wisconsin to campaign on their behalf while he was in the area last week, he sent no more than 140 characters to his Twitter followers.  One has to believe that union leaders and members across the nation, already frustrated with the President's lack of support for the Keystone Pipeline and other energy projects that would create tens of thousands of union jobs, are going to stay home in droves this November.

It would be poetic justice if union leaders send a simple tweet of support for the President, instead of supporting his campaign with millions of dollars, organizing their members to canvass door to door, and encouraging their members to man phone banks for the President's re-election campaign as they did last time around.

Now to the leaks.  The Obama Administration simply cannot keep a secret. Information about the attack on Osama Bin Laden's compound that should have been classified was shared with the world, so much so that a doctor who helped us find Bin Laden is now facing essentially a life sentence. In late May we learned that the President has a "kill list," in a story that was placed in the The New York Times, a pro-Obama paper if there ever was one.  On June 1, another story appeared in the same newspaper.  This time the article detailed the Administration's cyber warfare against Iran. All of these pieces were seemingly released for one intention -- to make the President look like a tough guy.  In doing so, the Administration has given various enemies our gameplans for attacking them. 

You know this must be a serious issue when California Senator Diane Feinstein, Chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, angrily said this week that the Obama Administration has had an "avalanche of leaks" that "puts our national security in jeopardy."  Both Democrats and Republicans are calling for a special prosecutor to investigate the number of leaks that have occurred from within this Administration.

This week, we also learned that Mitt Romney and the Republican National Committee had raised $76.8 million in May, compared to President Obama's and the Democratic National Committee's total of $60 million.  For a President who has attended more fundraisers than his past five predecessors combined over the same time period in office, this has to be sobering news.

In the "what the heck is he smoking or drinking category," the President commented late this week that the "private sector is doing fine."  He was immediately attacked by anyone who knows anything about the current economy -- an economy that has experienced unemployment above eight percent for 40 consecutive months.  The private sector is doing fine? 

Now to the coming weeks.  I have a strong feeling that more bad news will be coming, perhaps as early as Monday.  The Justices' tough questioning of the Administration seemingly tipped their hands.  Most judicial experts believe that all or part of the President's single legislative accomplishment will be overturned. The American people don't want it, and now the Supreme Court will essentially rule that the President has tried to circumvent the Constitution. This will be a rebuke even stronger than the one received earlier this week in Wisconsin.

Add in Attorney General Eric Holder's continued stonewalling on the Fast and Furious investigation, the push by both Democrats and Republicans to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Administration leaks, anticipated weak jobs reports through at least the summer/early fall, and a soon-to-be-announced Supreme Court ruling on the Administration's suit against Arizona (immigration laws), and you have the strong opportunity for continued unnerving news for the President.

The President may want to hold onto his umbrella.  It's been raining bad news and it looks as though it may continue to pour.