{Political_Views} Morning Examiner: Obama abandons Jobs Act push

 

Morning Examiner: Obama abandons Jobs Act push

By Conn Carroll

Last week, it was a bust tour in North Carolina and Virginia specifically pushing the aid-to-states portion of his second stimulus at the same time that Democrats were pushing for a vote in the Senate. That failed. This week, while Senate Dems push the infrastructure portion of his jobs plan, Obama will ignore Congress and launch a "We can't wait" campaign highlighting executive orders he is making to turn the economy around.

Today, in Las Vegas, Obama will focus on new rules he is initiating, that will make it easier for homeowners with little to negative equity in their homes to refinance through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Then, after fundraisers in Las Vegas, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Denver, Obama will make a second speech in Colorado announcing a program that will make it easier for borrowers to pay off their student loans. In the weeks thereafter, the White House plans to announce one new initiative a week. But don't expect too much, the NYT also reports: "[O]fficials acknowledge that the coming policy changes, executive orders and agency actions are generally less far-reaching than the legislative proposals now before Congress."

Which makes Obama look less weak? Continually failing to get even a majority of Democrats to vote for his second stimulus, or continually announcing a series of measures that no one believes will help the economy?

Around the Bigs
Associated Press, Occupy Chicago: 130 arrested in city park protest: One hundred and thirty would-be occupiers of Grant Park were arrested early Sunday after they refused to leave the park after curfew. "We're not going anywhere. There are still plenty of us," Kaunert told The Associated Press after the arrests, which took police more than an hour to complete.

The Washington Post, Obama's efforts to aid homeowners, boost housing market fall far short of goals: Obama had promised to spend $50 billion helping Americans avoid foreclosures. Three years later, only $2.4 billion has been spent helping only 1.7 million people. Worse, the housing market is still clogged with millions of Americans who owe more on their homes than they are worth.

The Washington Post, Libya declares liberation with an Islamic tone: Mustafa Abdel Ja­lil, head of Libya's Transitional National Council, said the country would now be ruled under a strictly Islamic system.

The Hill, Most voters say the United States is in decline: Pessimism has become the norm in the Obama era. More than two-thirds of voters, 69 percent, told The Hill the United States is declining. And a majority, 57 percent predicted today's kids won't lie better lives than their parents.

Politico, Lobbyists swarm supercommittee: According to a Politico review of lobbying forms, almost 200 lobbyists have reported lobbying the 12 member Super Congress in just the six weeks it has been in existence.

Righty Playbook
At The Wall Street Journal, Hillsdale College professor Paul Moreno predicts Obama will implement a anti-business reelection strategy modeled on FDR.

RedState's Erick Erickson details all of the false biography details The Washington Post let Obama get away with while attacking Marco Rubio because he may have gotten a date in his parent's biography wrong.

Ed Morrissey flags The Washington Post's ombudsman admitting that the paper's coverage of Koch Industries was unfair.

Lefty Playbook
Grist's David Roberts defends the Energy Department's $529 million loan guarantee to Fisker Automotive: "The DOE loan is specifically earmarked for spending inside the U.S. None of it will be spent in Finland. And, again: Fisker is in the process of upgrading a plant in Delaware to manufacture its next car."

Former Obama economic adviser Lawrence Summers explains how to solve the foreclosure crisis: "The central irony of a financial crisis is that while it is caused by too much confidence, borrowing and lending, and spending, it can be resolved only with more confidence, borrowing and lending, and spending."

Atrios explains how to solve the Greek debt crisis: "It isn't totally my preferred solution, but we should remember that the crisis and problems are fake, that there is a simple solution. Cancel Greece's debts and have the ECB give free money to the banks."

 

Sign up to receive Morning Examiner here Follow Conn Carroll on Twitter Click here to unsubscribe from this newsletter

The Washington Examiner | 1015 15th St. NW | Suite 500 | Washington, DC | DC | 20005
Click here to unsubscribe from this newsletter