Twice in one week Obama has had to give speeches that he shouldn't have had to make. It is always a sign of trouble when the top guy has to intervene to try to salvage a project that a subordinate should have handled. Obama last week tried to save the health plan in a speech to congress and the nation, and to save the reorganization of financial regulation in a speech on Wall Street.
Both projects are high priority for the cryptocracy and both are stumbling badly. So bad that Obama is trying to make a last desperate gamble to save them. Especially with the health issue Obama is staking his political capital. His prospects for success are not great.
The health reform is now tied up in a myriad of disputes, objections, partisan politics, public opposition, and you name it. About all that Obama and the cryptocracy can hope for is to pass something that gets the health reform off the ground.
Obama's speech on Wall Street yesterday appealed for support for his plan to transfer powers to the Fed. Not one CEO of a top bank attended his talk in an amazing display of opposition and lack of respect!! That dramatic rudeness just about says all that needs to be said about Obama's prospects on financial regulation reform.
The cryptocracy precipitated the economic crisis in part to establish an atmosphere that would better enable adoption of the health reform and the financial re-regulation. Both reforms are crucial for the cryptocracy to ensure the security of their wealth-producing set-up. Obama's failure to shepherd these projects to a successful conclusion has to cause pause for thought about Obama among the cryptocrats.
Obama's difficulties are complicated by two other situations: Afghanistan and Iran. Very soon Obama will have to make a decision on how to salvage the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan. Any decision he makes will increase his problems. If he sends in more troops the American people and the left of his own party will object. If he leaves the situation to its own devices, he faces the possibility of a soviet-type debacle in Afghanistan.
The cryptocracy would very much like to see Iran brought to its knees so that the cryptocracy's mother country, Israel, will have dominance in the middle east. While the US and Israel both agree on what should be done to Iran in the long run, some tactical differences have emerged under the Obama regime. Probably what has happened is that Obama has far too many central projects to be able to spend time and effort on Iran. Thus he has consistently pushed for negotiations to gain some time.
Israel, on the other, hand is becoming quite impatient. Israel has, in effect, given the US until spring 2010 to do something or Israel itself will militarily attack Iran. Today's Wall Street Journal has a column by Bret Stephens, "Obama is Pushing Israel Toward War." Stephens diligently puts together all the Israeli threats to the US if the US doesn't act. The column is meant as a shot-across-the-bow for Obama.
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Incidentally, Obama's speech on Wall Street contains a quote that is pure bluster and also almost a declaration of war on the street. "Hear my words: We will not go back to the days of reckless behavior and unchecked excess at the heart of this crisis, where too many were motivated only by the appetite for quick kills and bloated bonuses."
One can almost hear the central bankers thinking, "Who the hell does guy think he is? 'Hear my words.' Give me a break!!!!"
Behind the bluster, though, Obama is asserting that he is more powerful than the street, and he intends to exert that power. One wonders how he thinks he can carry this threat out. At the very minimum he has made permanent enemies of the financial chiefs, and he will face a stupendous political fight.
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