Michael Goodwin

Michael Goodwin

US News

If only Obama were just a fake

Dear Mr. President,

It didn’t seem possible, but you shocked me. After lowering my expectations for you, from very high five years ago to bottom-of-the-barrel now, I figured you could never again disappoint me.

But you did it. And if your aim was to further diminish respect for the office you hold, mission accomplished.

The content of Monday’s hyperpartisan speech was par for your hyperpartisan presidency, but the timing marked a new low. Let me be clear: Have you neither decency nor shame?

You knew when you took the stage to denounce Republicans that a gunman had opened fire at the Washington Navy Yard, but you didn’t know the full extent of the carnage because nobody did. That’s why you should have stayed silent.

Yet, in remarks hastily put at the top of your speech, you noted that the incident was “unfolding” and said, “We still don’t know all the facts, but we do know that several people have been shot, and some have been killed.”

Later, we learned that 12 innocents already lay dead, not just “several.” How could you be so cavalier, especially with incidents like Fort Hood, Benghazi and the Boston Marathon bombing previously happening on your watch? For all you knew, this one, too, was the work of an Islamic terrorist.
Your ritualistic tough-guy mode didn’t cut it.

You sounded like you were going through a checklist when you promised that “we will do everything in our power to make sure whoever carried out this cowardly act is held responsible.”

Somewhere, Bashar al-Assad and the Benghazi killers must have had a laugh. They are living proof that your promises of accountability are as good as a $3 bill.

From there, you were off to your appointed purpose, which was to demonize those who disagree with you on the budget and ObamaCare. Or, as you put it for the rainbow group of human props standing behind you: “The problem is, at the moment, Republicans in Congress don’t seem to be focused on how to grow the economy and build the middle class. I say ‘at the moment’ because I’m still hoping that a light bulb goes off here.”

The White House transcript helpfully includes the word (“Laughter”) to show your props appreciated your sense of humor.

So you, the commander-in-chief, were making a joke as a deadly attack was taking place at a nearby military base. It’s hard to imagine a more tasteless moment in presidential history.

Fortunately, not many people heard your obscenity, because the cable networks had bailed to cover the slaughter.

Yet you plodded on and soon found your patronizing groove, allowing that some Republicans are “decent folks.” Of course, to earn that honor, they have to “step up,” meaning agree with you.

The rest was predictable— how you’re focused on the jobs crunch, the deficit, blah blah blah. Naturally, you reminded us that you won the election. Thanks for clearing that up.

The speech, then, was a routine summary of your worldview—Obama good, everybody else bad, except those who agree with Obama.

It’s the timing that I can’t get over. The fact that you went ahead before police had released the full number of dead or wounded is breathtaking.

Heroic law-enforcement agents still were plucking terrified survivors off rooftops with helicopters and hunting for what they thought was an accomplice.

The unknowns — including who did it, why and whether the shooting was a terrorist act — had so unnerved the Capitol that Congress was in lockdown most of the day.

Yet news reports say there was not even a discussion in your office about whether to postpone the speech.

Again, shades of Benghazi. Your disappearance during the attack on Sept. 11th of last year still has not been explained. We know you had no contact with your Defense Secretary after about 6 p.m., and presumably went to sleep even as four Americans were being killed in the Libyan deathtrap.

The next day, you spoke in the Rose Garden as your aides spread the lie that the attack was the spontaneous outgrowth of a demonstration against an anti-Muslim video. You concluded your remarks by vowing that “justice will be done,” then hopped on Air Force One for a campaign trip to Las Vegas.

America is still waiting for justice, Mr. President. But while we wait, I humbly offer a suggestion.

Go away. Just Go Away.

If that is asking too much, then please, please be quiet!

For America and for decency.

*

Biggest loser: NY elex board

Democratic candidate Bill Thompson left the mayor’s race with a fiery blast at the Board of Elections that should wake up New York.

Thompson wanted to wait for a full tally of votes before conceding to Bill de Blasio, but election officials seemed in no hurry to do their jobs.

Thompson called the molasses-in-January pace a “disgrace” and added, “We don’t know how many votes I got, or how many votes were cast. We’re talking about tens of thousands of votes.”

Some 78,000 paper ballots, or more than 10 percent of all votes, have not been counted. Nor did the board finish by Monday its survey of 5,000 old lever-style machines brought out of storage for the primary, a job it said would be finished over the weekend.

Board Executive Director Michael Ryan had an excuse for everything, ranging from “unforeseen issues” to state law. Asked by reporters when there would be a final tally, he refused to be pinned down, saying only it would require “a good few days.”

Actually, all it requires is a Board of Elections capable of operating in the 21st century.

Everything else is bull.

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Albany’s pol-lution solution

Here’s how you can tell Gov. Cuomo’s Moreland Commission is on the right track: Legislators are squealing like stuck pigs.

Faced with a demand to detail outside earnings over $20,000, the Senate and Assembly lawyered up to fight back.

Members of both parties are making threats that Cuomo’s agenda is dead in the water, the next budget could be late and they might investigate him.

In effect, they’re threatening to hold 20 million New Yorkers hostage if the governor insists on seeing whether they are crooks.

But too many of them are, as recent prosecutions prove.

The pattern of selling legislation, votes and grants is so well documented that Cuomo had to clean house.

He shouldn’t back down. With legislators acting so guilty, they must be hiding something important.

Carry on, Gov.

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Summers’ bummer

Burdened by worries? Troubled by anxiety? Think of Larry Summers and your cares will vanish.

The brash economist was Obama’s first choice as to be the next head of the for Federal Reserve chair, but pressure from fellow Democrats forced him to withdraw. Immediately, stock markets around the world soared as investors rejoiced.

So cheer up, life could be worse. You could be Larry Summers.