I was thinking today about all of the reasons why I won't vote to reelect Barack Obama in November. And then I looked at the polls and saw that he has a slight lead in the average of all polls on realclearpolitics.com
How can this be? Are there people out there who will blindly vote for him because he's a Democrat or because he's black? Are there that many voters in America who aren't paying attention to what has happened to our country in three and one-half short years?
After looking at his record, no one should vote to reelect President Obama. No one.
Today's jobs report showed an up uptick in unemployment to 8.3%. Let's put this number in perspective. In EVERY ONE of the 42 months that Obama has been in office, unemployment has been above 8%, the longest record of 8%+ unemployment in the history of our country. In contrast, in 96 months with George W. Bush as President, we did not have a single month of unemployment at 8% or above. Not one. Why would any person hoping to find a job vote for President Obama in 2012?
The "real" unemployment number is over 15%, when you count those who have given up work and those who are stuck working part-time jobs although they want to work full-time. For those 18-29 years old and African-Americans, the numbers are even worse. Why would any young person or African-American vote for someone whose economic policies have made winning at roulette a much more likely proposition than actually finding a job?
Let's look at a few more good reasons to not reelect President Obama.
In three and a half years, he has increased our national debt by 50%. If President Bush spent money like the proverbial drunken sailor, which he did, President Obama has spent our tax dollars like a drunken sailor on crack. Why would any taxpayer vote to reelect President Obama?
For a President who promised transparency when he was elected, he has been one of our least transparent Presidents. He passed the healthcare law without giving Congress time to actually read it. His administration is full of lobbyists. His Attorney General, Eric Holder, has claimed "Executive Privilege" rather than releasing documents to a House investigation. We learned this week that members of his administration have been meeting lobbyists away from the White House so that their visits would not show up on the official White House log. We also learned this week that members of his staff have been using private e mail addresses to conduct official business. Transparency? Yeah right. Why would anyone who expects transparency in government vote to give Barack Obama a second term?
What major promise has he actually kept? He promised to close Gitmo. It didn't happen. He promised to cut our debt in half by the end of his first term. It's gotten worse. The Obama Administration also predicted that our unemployment rate would be about 6% now if only taxpayers wrote a check for his $800 billion stimulus to pay for shovel ready jobs that we later learned from the President himself "weren't quite shovel ready." And yet, our unemployment rate is 8.3% if you don't count all of the people who have given up looking for work or are working part-time at McDonalds after their unemployment ran out -- instead of working full-time at IBM or Microsoft. Why would anyone who believed Barack Obama when he was running in 2008 vote for him again in 2012?
So, what else hasn't he been doing?
Well, at at time that millions of Americans desperately need jobs, his Jobs and Competitiveness Council hasn't met in over six months, and his Cabinet didn't meet between the end of January and the end of July. Imagine the CEO of any major organization not having a staff meeting in nearly six months. This clearly shows a lack of leadership. Why would anyone expecting leadership from a President vote for someone who has displayed little or none?
Now, let's look at a few of the more underhanded things he's done.
I bet you hadn't heard that his campaign has now filed a lawsuit attempting to limit the number of service members who will be able to vote. Presently, Ohio allows the general public to cast a ballot in-person up until the Friday before the election, but members of the military are given an additional three days to vote. The Obama Campaign has filed a suit to eliminate this extra time given to those service men and women who just might happen to be fighting on the front lines and need the extra time to vote. Why would any active member of the military vote for a President who doesn't want to make it easy for him or her to vote, even when they're valiantly serving our country?
Or how about when his chief campaign advisor, David Axelrod, suggested that presumptive Republican nominee had committed a felony? Instead of backing away from this outrageous statement, the President insinuated that Romney should be investigated. Although some of his staunchest supporters were interviewed in the news media saying that these allegations were ridiculous, the President continued to fan the flames with insinuations. Why would anyone who demands the truth from his or her leader vote for Barack Obama again?
Another recent revelation is that the Obama Administration is telling our border control agents to let any illegal immigrant go free who says that he or she has graduated from high school or has a GED. No proof or verification is required, and even those who have attacked and injured our border control agents are being let go. The latest is that a border control agent was suspended for arresting an illegal immigrant who had a number of traffic tickets. He was told to let the person go free, but the agent refused. Funny him, he actually thought it was his job to protect our borders. You can't make this stuff up. Why would anyone who expects our borders to be secure vote for a President who has essentially opened our borders to anyone and everyone willing to say that he or she has a high school diploma?
Of course, part of this equation was the Executive Order signed by the President that essentially directed border control agents to ignore immigration law passed by Congress and signed by a previous President as long as the illegal aliens met certain conditions. This wasn't the first time the President has trampled on our Constitution. An order from his administration to force religious organizations to provide free birth control as part of their healthcare plans is yet another example of how President Obama has looked at our Constitution as a "suggestion" for how this country should be run. Why would anyone who believes in the Constitution written by our Founding Fathers vote to give President Obama another chance?
And then you have all of his statements that clearly show he is out of touch. He said that the "private sector is doing fine." He said that his economic plan has worked. The President has also said that he sometimes forgets how bad the economy is. Maybe he doesn't realize what's going on in the lives of ordinary Americans because he hasn't met with his Cabinet or his Jobs Council in six months? Of course his Press Secretary, Jay Carney, gave a perfectly reasonable explanation for the President's lack of attention on jobs, saying that the President "has a lot on his plate." Why would anyone vote for a President who has more important things to do than strive to help millions of Americans get back to work?
He's found enough space on his plate to play over 100 rounds of golf and attend more fundraisers than any of his predecessors. But who are we to judge a President whose administration has experienced 42 straight months of unemployment over 8%? But then again, why would anyone who expects our President to actually work for the American people vote for Barack Obama in 2012?
On top of all of this, you have an EPA that is clearly out of control and a General Services Administration that seems to be doing more partying than working. The EPA has been slapped down by courts several times in the past few months for overstepping its bounds. Policy is now based on whim, not science, and even an EPA official said that he was attempting to "crucify" certain industries. As for the GSA, more was recently revealed about this bloated agency that spends taxpayer dollars on lavish conferences and huge bonuses for employees at a time the country is going broke and millions are out of work. Why would anyone who expects "government by the people and for the people" vote to reelect Barack Obama in 2012?
And then you have the President's statement to business owners that "you didn't build that." He clearly doesn't understand the sacrifices required in terms of time, money and sweat to build a successful business in America. Why would any business owner vote to reelect our current President after he belittled their hard work, courage and intelligence?
Speaking of business, what about our domestic energy industry? President Obama and his EPA are trying their best to kill the entire coal industry, from mines to the coal-fired power stations. As a candidate, he boasted that his policies would cause electric rates to "necessarily skyrocket." This is one promise he's kept. He's wasted billions on alternative energy companies like Solyndra, but has done little to encourage drilling in our domestic oil and natural gas reserves. Even when he had the opportunity to create tens of thousands of jobs and bring millions of barrels of Canadian oil to our refineries through the Keystone Pipeline, he balked. As a result of his energy policy, or lack thereof, Americans are now paying close to $4 per gallon of gasoline at the pump, electric rates are increasing dramatically, dozens of power stations are being retired prematurely and hundreds of miners and employees at coal-fired power stations are losing their jobs. Why would anyone who uses electricity, natural gas or gasoline, or anyone who works in the energy industry for that matter, vote to allow President Obama to expand upon his job-killing, price-hiking policies in a second term?
Lastly, in three and a half years in office, our President has done nothing to address the skyrocketing costs of our entitlement programs, putting them in jeopardy for future generations of Americans. He's made no proposals to save Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare. Our President has focused his attention on playing golf and raising money for his reelection, instead of leading our country and making tough decisions. Why would any senior citizen, or anyone who expects to receive Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare for that matter, vote for a President who has "kicked the can down the road" instead of trying to save these programs for future generations?
Once you put all of this information together in one blog, it's frightening to see what's gone on in this country the past three and one-half years. It's pretty clear: No one in his or her right mind should vote to reelect Barack Obama. No one.
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