Chamblee54

The first part of this feature is a rerun of a post from November 5, 2008. BHO had just been elected POTUS. (An anagram of POTUS BHO is boot push.) After some pictures from The Library of Congress , part two will be a thumbsucker piece on how things look on November 9, 2011.
The comparison PG makes is to 1932.The nation was in economic tumult. The repubs had been in power too long, and were ready for a vacation. Franklin Roosevelt was the man chosen to lead America. FDR was crippled, and he smoked cigarettes. The cigarette holder was one of his trademarks. The public was well aware of the cigarette holder, but was clueless about the leg braces. Such were the times…smoking was profitable to the advertisers, but polio was not talked about.
At a point in the fifties, a vaccine for polio was discovered. The disease became something for the medical textbooks, instead of a horror for families. At roughly the same time…very roughly… reports started to come out about the health hazards of smoking. Bit by bit, smoking came to be seen as a bad thing. The print media paid lip service to this, while accepting advertising from the tobacco mongers.
By the time BHO became a national figure, politicians were careful not to be photographed smoking. The tobacco habit of BHO was whispered about, but the visual confirmation will not be seen. Not even the scandal magazines have pictures of BHO lighting up. And yes, BHO plays basketball, and is not remotely crippled. If he hobbled on a cane, while wearing braces, the media would have been all over it. Is this right or wrong, or just different?
There are lots of postmortems today, and PG might as well join the fun. He is not overjoyed at the election of BHO. The man has a lot of flaws. PG questions his commitment to the basic constitutional rights. Mr.Bush has done damage to many of our rights in his “War on Terror”. PG is concerned that BHO is going to use this opening to create a police state.
BHO faces a lot of challenges. PG remembers the reception given Bill Clinton in 1993. The wingnut media fought him tooth and nail for eight years. Finally, in his second term, they caught Slick Willie in an improper situation. America wasted a year trying to impeach the President. None of this fighting helped to achieve energy independence. This business of buying oil from hostile foreign powers is at the root of the tumult in the middle east, and today’s financial crisis. America has known this was a problem since Richard Nixon was President. The media spent more time fussing about Bill Clinton’s zipper problem.
PG has two hopes for the new administration. One is that the opposition maintains the watchdog status, but gives BHO the chance to perform. This simply did not happen with Bill Clinton. The second is that BHO doesn’t get caught in any scandal, but remains focused on solving the problems of this age.
It might help if BHO were to quit smoking.

Picking up where we left off, the question is, does BHO still smoke? If you go to google, and type in “does Barack Obam”, the suggested answers are smoke, have a facebook, have a law license, and smoke cigarettes. According to the Huffington Post , as of February 28, 2010 he was puffing on the coffin nails. He is reputed to be a Marlboro man.
As for the concerns about our rights, many of us are worried sick. BHO says that the government has the right to kill an American citizen abroad, if this person is a “terrorist”. It is probably a matter of time before this is extended into our borders, and the qualifications are expanded.
The much needed health care reform, aka Obamacare, is a work in progress. The Republican party made a political football out of this issue, putting their lust for power over the health of the American people. We are probably not much better off than we were before, even if what we have now is better than what we can expect from a Republican government.
As some have noted, the economy is terrible. BHO started out in a deep hole. It is tough to see how John McCain would have done any better. (Unless the stress of the job killed him, and Sarah Palin became POTUS.) The economy probably won’t be much better in another year. It remains to be seen if the mental midgets of the GOP can exploit this, and get elected.
In foreign policy, BHO has killed hundreds of women and children with drone strikes. He has given Israel every thing she wants, only to be accused of throwing Israel under the bus. The situation in Afghanistan is worse. The situation in Iraq is about the same, with the Status of Forces agreement reluctantly being followed. The air slaughter of women and children has been extended to Yemen, Pakistan, Somalia, and no telling where else.
In energy, the carbon based tipping points are probably tumbling down. (We will not know for sure until it is too late.) The gulf of Mexico was poisoned. There is talk about building an oil sands pipeline through the aquifers of the midwest. We are sending billions of dollars a day to foreign oil producers. Renewable energy sources are not getting enough support to make a difference. We are hopelessly addicted to petroleum as an energy source. The people who donated megabucks to the BHO election campaign are smiling.
As far as the show business part of office goes, BHO is fair. He is not as good a showman as Ronald Reagan. BHO, great campaigner, is not an inspiring leader. The only thing that might save him is the total putridity of the Republicans.
As far as sex scandals go, BHO has not gotten caught.