Yet even the pessimists among us are alarmed by the cloud of uncertainty and confusion hanging over the White House. Less than a year on the job, President Obama seems to have run out of both charm and ideas.
The biggest issues facing a president are the economy and national security. They are the whole ballgame. Everything else is detail.
It is now frighteningly obvious Obama doesn't have a clear, understandable strategy on either.
Helayne Seidman
Robert Morgenthau
He began his hokey job summit by conceding many viewed it as a gimmick, then promptly confirmed those suspicions by saying it was time to put aside partisanship. This from the guy who gives blank checks and high praise to Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, the most partisan congressional leaders in recent memory.
Obama also said he was open to new ideas, then shot down a corporate executive who complained too many big-government initiatives were creating uncertainty and leading employers to hold off hiring.
The president said it was a "legitimate concern," then plunged ahead by rote to defend health care, carbon taxes and massive education spending -- the very things the exec said were the problem.
Why bother telling him anything? He doesn't listen to what he doesn't want to hear.
He certainly didn't listen to the advisers who warned him his Afghanistan speech would come off as a muddle. It was clear to some in his endless war council that sending 30,000 more troops to fight a war he called vital, then slapping an 18-month limit was by definition a contradiction.
Predictably, liberals blasted the escalation, under which Obama has tripled the American troop presence from about 35,000 to over 100,000. Conservatives blasted the deadline as dangerous to those troops and their mission.
As a fuming Sen. John McCain memorably declared, "You can't have it both ways."
Apparently, you can if you are Barack Obama. At least you think you can.
He is probably taking comfort in a common political conceit. To wit, that bipartisan criticism proves the policy is the sound middle between extremes.
Not this time. This time, the middle path reflects a transparent effort at political compromise that has nothing to do with sound policy. After three months of deliberation, he punted on the central question.
Either the war is vital, or it's not. It can't be vital until an arbitrary deadline.
Two days of hearings on Capitol Hill didn't clarify the issue. Top aides alternately called the deadline flexible and important, leaving the muddle in place.
If Obama has any sense of the dimensions of the doubts he faces, he's keeping it well hidden. He's going to Copenhagen to push for global emissions rules, even as the science consensus he touts was arrived at by cooking the books and squelching dissent.
If he actually succeeded getting the rules in place at home, they would add another burden to job creation and economic growth. Still he plunges forward, unmolested by inconvenient facts.
Facts schmacts, reality is what the White House says it is.
Take the $787 billion stimulus bill, the economic equivalent of an empty suit. Just in time for the jobs summit, Vice President Joe Biden suddenly declared it saved or created up to 1.6 million jobs. That was a cool million jobs more than claimed before.
Poof. A million more jobs. That was easy.
Manhattan DA Robert Morgenthau appears determined to end his long career on a sour note -- and a questionable one at that. City Hall found 68 bank accounts it didn't know existed containing $83 million Morgenthau deposited from settlements. The city's insistence he turn the money over led him to accuse the mayor's office of a "power grab" and "chickens- - - comments."
Good thing the 90-year-old prosecutor is retiring. It's clearly time to go.
Pols finally chipping away at pension costs
Finally, good news on the gloom-and-doom deficit front, with the Legislature ratifying deals Gov. Paterson and Mayor Bloomberg struck with unions to reduce soaring pension costs.
Paterson estimates the state will save billions over the long haul, with a new pension tier raising the minimum age for civilians to retire from 55 to 62 and the minimum years required for a pension from five to 10. The provisions, which apply only to employees hired after Jan. 1, also cap the amount of overtime used to calculate benefits. Slightly different terms apply to state teachers.
The city deal, covering only its teachers so far, will save $100 million a year, Bloomy says. New employees will contribute more to their pensions and, as in the state, will need to work at least 10 years to get one.
In truth, the changes are modest, given the huge deficits and the fact that many of the taxpayers who foot the bill for government workers are losing their jobs and nest eggs completely.
Still, this is a good first step in paring back the outrageous cost of labor, with each city worker averaging $107, 000 annually.
Keep the cuts coming.
Noose is tightening for Hevesi
The central mystery in the state pension-fund scandal was whether disgraced Democratic former Comptroller Alan Hevesi got a cut of the gusher of payoffs involved. Although his political consultant, Hank Morris, allegedly got $24 million in fees, outside fixer Ray Harding took $800,000, and Hevesi's top deputies reportedly pocketed hundreds of thousands, probers were not able to confirm suspicions Hevesi benefited from the scam run out of his office.
Until now.
The announcement by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo that investment manager Elliott Broidy had admitted paying $1 million in bribes to officials included at least $75,000 spent on lavish trips and other benefits for Hevesi. In return, Broidy got $250 million of state pension money to invest, which earned him $18 million in fees.
He is giving the money back and is cooperating with Cuomo, as are several others. All of which means Hevesi ought to squirm.
His pattern was to tell people seeking investment money to see Morris, who didn't even work for the government. After Morris received large finder fees, Hevesi, with sole authority for the pension funds, would turn over hundreds of millions for the investors to manage.
The belief that Hevesi was getting a cut of Morris' fees was based in part on the fact he wasn't against stealing. He had pleaded guilty and resigned after being caught using a state employee as a chauffeur and servant for his wife, so prosecutors had reason to think he was getting something for his pension decisions.
Now they have evidence. My bet is there's more to come. Plenty more.
Quite a party trick
Thanks to Tiger Woods, we've learned of a new occu pation. One of the women in volved, Rachel Uchitel, is in variably called a "party girl." Then again, maybe it's just a new way of describing the world's oldest occupation.
Two days of hearings on Capitol Hill didn't clarify the issue. Top aides alternately called the deadline flexible and important, leaving the muddle in place.
If Obama has any sense of the dimensions of the doubts he faces, he's keeping it well hidden. He's going to Copenhagen to push for global emissions rules, even as the science consensus he touts was arrived at by cooking the books and squelching dissent.
If he actually succeeded getting the rules in place at home, they would add another burden to job creation and economic growth. Still he plunges forward, unmolested by inconvenient facts.
Facts schmacts, reality is what the White House says it is.
Take the $787 billion stimulus bill, the economic equivalent of an empty suit. Just in time for the jobs summit, Vice President Joe Biden suddenly declared it saved or created up to 1.6 million jobs. That was a cool million jobs more than claimed before.
Poof. A million more jobs. That was easy.
Manhattan DA Robert Morgenthau appears determined to end his long career on a sour note -- and a questionable one at that. City Hall found 68 bank accounts it didn't know existed containing $83 million Morgenthau deposited from settlements. The city's insistence he turn the money over led him to accuse the mayor's office of a "power grab" and "chickens- - - comments."
Good thing the 90-year-old prosecutor is retiring. It's clearly time to go.
Pols finally chipping away at pension costs
Finally, good news on the gloom-and-doom deficit front, with the Legislature ratifying deals Gov. Paterson and Mayor Bloomberg struck with unions to reduce soaring pension costs.
Paterson estimates the state will save billions over the long haul, with a new pension tier raising the minimum age for civilians to retire from 55 to 62 and the minimum years required for a pension from five to 10. The provisions, which apply only to employees hired after Jan. 1, also cap the amount of overtime used to calculate benefits. Slightly different terms apply to state teachers.
The city deal, covering only its teachers so far, will save $100 million a year, Bloomy says. New employees will contribute more to their pensions and, as in the state, will need to work at least 10 years to get one.
In truth, the changes are modest, given the huge deficits and the fact that many of the taxpayers who foot the bill for government workers are losing their jobs and nest eggs completely.
Still, this is a good first step in paring back the outrageous cost of labor, with each city worker averaging $107, 000 annually.
Keep the cuts coming.
Noose is tightening for Hevesi
The central mystery in the state pension-fund scandal was whether disgraced Democratic former Comptroller Alan Hevesi got a cut of the gusher of payoffs involved. Although his political consultant, Hank Morris, allegedly got $24 million in fees, outside fixer Ray Harding took $800,000, and Hevesi's top deputies reportedly pocketed hundreds of thousands, probers were not able to confirm suspicions Hevesi benefited from the scam run out of his office.
Until now.
The announcement by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo that investment manager Elliott Broidy had admitted paying $1 million in bribes to officials included at least $75,000 spent on lavish trips and other benefits for Hevesi. In return, Broidy got $250 million of state pension money to invest, which earned him $18 million in fees.
He is giving the money back and is cooperating with Cuomo, as are several others. All of which means Hevesi ought to squirm.
His pattern was to tell people seeking investment money to see Morris, who didn't even work for the government. After Morris received large finder fees, Hevesi, with sole authority for the pension funds, would turn over hundreds of millions for the investors to manage.
The belief that Hevesi was getting a cut of Morris' fees was based in part on the fact he wasn't against stealing. He had pleaded guilty and resigned after being caught using a state employee as a chauffeur and servant for his wife, so prosecutors had reason to think he was getting something for his pension decisions.
Now they have evidence. My bet is there's more to come. Plenty more.
Quite a party trick
Thanks to Tiger Woods, we've learned of a new occu pation. One of the women in volved, Rachel Uchitel, is in variably called a "party girl." Then again, maybe it's just a new way of describing the world's oldest occupation.
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