Michael Goodwin

Michael Goodwin

US News

Obama always pointing the finger of blame at someone else

In the New York Times the other day, anonymous aides to President Obama trashed Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. Kerry was mocked mercilessly, with officials joking “that he is like the astronaut played by Sandra Bullock in the movie ‘Gravity,’ somersaulting through space, untethered to the White House.”

A week before that, The Times reported that, despite Obama’s public efforts to calm fears over Ebola, he was privately seething at health aides’ bungling. In a bid to separate him from the incompetence of his administration, the leakers claimed Obama was “visibly angry” and “demanded a more hands-on approach” from his team.

Then there was the story about Pentagon boss Hagel firing off a memo to national security chief Susan Rice that faulted America’s Syrian policy. Then there was a story about — oh, never mind, you get the picture.

The extraordinary pile-up of crises has turned the usual White House blame game into something more lethal: a shootout in a lifeboat. The presidency is sinking, but we are expected to believe that only the president is blameless.

It won’t wash. The problems cannot be fixed by firing one or two members of the president’s team, or all of them. Something else, something more fundamental, is happening.

Obamaism, a quasi-socialist commitment to a more powerful government at home and an abdication of American leadership around the world, is being exposed as a historic calamity.

We are witnessing the total collapse of a bad idea. Obamaism, a quasi-socialist commitment to a more powerful government at home and an abdication of American leadership around the world, is being exposed as a historic calamity. It is fueling domestic fear and global disorder and may well lead to a world war.

If there is a smidgen of a silver lining, it is that the unraveling, complete with Obama’s shameless attempts to duck responsibility, is playing out on the eve of the midterm elections. Fortunately, voters seem ready to respond by giving Republicans control of both houses of Congress.

I second that emotion, and not just because Obama is a failure. For all his narcissism, he didn’t make this mess alone.

He was aided and abetted by every Democrat in Congress. They marched in lockstep with his cockamamie policies, from ObamaCare to open borders. They protected corrupt leaders in numerous federal agencies, from the IRS to the General Services Administration. They stymied efforts to find the truth about Benghazi and the Fast and Furious gunrunning debacle.

They ceded their constitutional obligations and allowed Obama to crash the system of checks and balances. The vast majority stood silent while he gutted the military and abandoned our allies, including Israel, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and courted Iran, the most menacing nation on Earth.

With painfully few exceptions, Democrats put their loyalty to him above their duty to America.

And now they must be punished. All of them.

Democrats need to be removed from every possible federal office during the midterms as punishment for the failed Obama presidency, according to Michael Goodwin.Getty Images

Normally, I am not a partisan advocate. I am a registered Democrat, though I vote as an independent.

Not this year. This is a national emergency and the only responsible action is to vote Republican for every federal office.

Sparing even a favorite Democrat or two could allow Obama to spin defeat as a minor loss. Most worrisome, if Dems keep the Senate, the election will further entrench a corrupt government and further erode America’s strength and influence.

That is not a chance worth taking. Six years is enough. Collective punishment is the appropriate answer.

If there were any doubts that the Obama Democrats cannot be trusted, look at their scurrilous campaigns. From coast to coast, their message is uniformly odious: Republicans are waging a “war on women” and they are racists.

That’s it. They can’t defend the legislation they passed, the economy they produced or the foreign policy they supported. Most don’t want to be seen with Obama, yet they take the money he raises and follow his lead in exploiting race and gender fault lines.

Scraping the bottom of the rancid barrel, they prove they will do anything to hold on to power. They cannot be allowed to succeed.

It is time for them to go.


The Bruise Brothers don’t disappoint. My dig at the rough tactics of Govs. Andrew Cuomo and Chris Christie needs an update after their latest antics.

Jersey Republican Christie turned himself into a national punch line with his “Sit down and shut up” outburst at a heckler. Although he got audience applause at the event, the video is hardly flattering.

Christie looks far too hot for the infraction, and the incident will fuel concerns about his temperament if he runs for president in 2016.

Cuomo stayed in character, too, leaving no fingerprints on a nasty piece of direct mail from the state Democratic Party, which he controls. As The Post reported, letters were sent to a million registered New Yorkers warning that party bosses, like bad Santa Clauses, were keeping lists of how they behaved.

“We will be reviewing voting records … to determine whether you joined your neighbors who voted,” the letter read.

The threatening tone drew howls of protest, though many recipients were afraid to attach their names to their complaints. And you thought government was here to help?

Cuomo is a heavy favorite to win Tuesday, but the lack of enthusiasm could deprive him of the big margin he hopes will propel him to 2016 consideration.

The Oval Office is a very long shot for both, but The Bruise Brothers could form a tag team in a different arena. I hear the World Wrestling Federation is hiring.


A friend notes an odd detail in a Politico story. “Some people are leaving the Clinton orbit, and one is described as having served as Chelsea’s deputy chief of staff,” he writes.

“Can this be true? Chelsea has not only a chief of staff, but a deputy? Paid by the tax-exempt foundation?”

Then he gets his hopes up: “Maybe they won’t run Hilary, and just skip a generation.”

Nah. She’s already running.


The turmoil at the NYPD is alarming, but not surprising, given the anti-cop agenda at City Hall.

Top cop Bill Bratton was stung when the highest-ranking black official retired instead of accepting a promotion as the top deputy.

Philip Banks III, holding the No. 3 job, reportedly was the favorite of first lady Chirlane McCray for commissioner last year. She is said to have called him and urged him to take the promotion, but he wouldn’t, thinking he was being kicked upstairs.

Bratton, who has lost both his top Hispanic and black aides, tried to take the heat off himself with a cheap shot at former commissioner Ray Kelly. He told reporters he had wanted Banks to focus on “rebuilding relationships with the minority communities after the questionable stop-and-frisk issues over the past few years.”

It’s a tired refrain. Worse, with last week’s terror attack and shootings on the rise, Bratton has yet to show he’s Kelly’s equal at fighting crime.