OF COURSE NOT: Obama Has 'Absolutely' No Regrets For Ignoring Economy During His First Term

As if you needed more proof that Barack Obama cares for only one thing -- amassing more and more power over you, the individual -- I simply point to this interview with the Des Moines Register. It was originally off-the-record, perhaps because of his comment about ignoring the economy, but the Register was able to shame the campaign into removing the embargo through a very public lashing.

The Obama campaign has finally released the transcript of his endorsement interview with the Des Moines Register--and it is clear why they were reluctant to do so: the President says he has "absolutely" no regrets about ignoring the economy during the first two years of his term, when Democrats controlled Congress.
Here is the key part of the exchange:

Q: Yes, that begs a question from us, Mr. President. Some say you had a super majority in your first two years and had this incredible opportunity, but because of what you were talking about, as you were running, you had to go to get Obamacare done. Do you have any regrets taking on some of the economic issues, some of the issues that we're talking about for your second term, that when you had the chance, so to speak, during your first -- do you have any regrets that you didn’t do that at that time?

THE PRESIDENT: Absolutely not, Laura. Remember the context. First of all, Mitch McConnell has imposed an ironclad filibuster from the first day I was in office. And that's not speculation. I mean, this is -- it’s amply recorded. He gave a speech saying, my task is to defeat the President. So we were able to pass emergency action with the stimulus, but we had to get two votes from Republicans...

Obama's response is misleading. Republicans made no such filibuster threat at the outset of his first term. He refers to remarks made by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in late 2010, not in late 2008 or early 2009. Republicans in fact attempted to work together with the then-popular Obama before being rebuffed ("I won").

In addition, as journalist Bob Woodward points out in The Price of Politics, McConnell's remark about his "top priority" being to deny Obama a second term was taken out of context (McConnell had stressed a desire to work with Obama if he changed his approach). Even MSNBC ... felt compelled to apologize on the air for misreporting McConnell's remark. Obama has no such scruples, and simply repeats the lie as an excuse.

You mean Obama lied?

I'll alert the media.

Meanwhile, the president has released his jobs plan after just four short years, and I'm guessing it could really turn things around. Or it could just be another useless campaign gimmick loaded with dozens of lies about the economy accompanied by glam photos of Obama.

Exactly which it is I'll leave as an exercise for the reader.

Shockingly, grassroots support for RINOs evaporates, leaving Dick Lugar grasping at straws (and Leftists)

Four days before the GOP primary, six-term incumbent Dick Lugar (R-IN) is in serious trouble, trailing Tea Party favorite Richard Mourdock by 10 points. Lugar, in his desperation to cling to power, has now turned to insulting Republicans and begging Democrats for support.

But, if he loses the primary, perhaps Lugar can run in the general as a Democrat:

The leftward drift of Democrats in the past couple of decades makes compromise increasingly untenable. Whatever basis there remained for genuine bipartisanship in Congress died during the second Bush term. The 2006 election brought into office a crowd of Democrats beholden to the far left, demanding radical measures on every issue from gay rights to global warming to health care. This was bad news for the Arlen Specter/Mike Castle type of “centrist” Republicans, just as it was for the Rick Boucher/Barron Hill type of “Blue Dog” Democrats, who were all but wiped out in 2010.

Liberal media types, always sympathetic to GOP moderates, like to portray the primary defeats of guys like Lugar as indicative of right-wing extremism among the Republican electorate, but the exact opposite it true: The problem is that the Democratic Party’s agenda is now so extreme that any Republican who tries to compromise with the opposition ends up embracing policies rejected by common-sense GOP primary voters.

Worse still, the establishment GOP -- the pretend conservatives like Eric Cantor -- have spent significant dollars trying to shore up Lugar's support. Why? Because they appear to be so out-of-touch with mainstream America and so addicted to power, that they have become infected with the same disease that has poisoned so many politicians.

They are in love with power, not serving the will of the people.

The questions Cantor and Boehner have to ask themselves are obvious:

• Is there some mystical grassroots support for RINOism that I've somehow missed all of these years?

• Has RINOism worked to stop the insane deficit spending of the radical Left?

• Is RINOism going to attract the base that helped orchestrate the 2010 wipeout of the Statist Left?

• Does RINOism address America's most crippling problems, from entitlement reform to a mandatory overhaul of the tax code?

No. No. No. And. No.

Compromise with people who want to "fundamentally transform" America -- i.e., destroy it -- is impossible if we are to honor our highest law, our institutions and traditions.

We must be resolute. We must continue to overthrow the RINOs in the Republican Party and to return the GOP -- and the country -- to its lawful roots. We must force this government to revere the Constitution, above their own petty whims. We must force this government to serve the people, not the other way around.

In November, Messrs. Cantor, Boehner, McConnell and the rest of the RINO panty-waists must be relegated to the back-bencher status they so richly deserve. Their foolhardy maneuvers, cowardice in the face of radical Leftists, and attacks on conservatives are all worthy of utter disdain by Republican voters.