By now, many voters know that the promises made on the campaign trail have little to do with the realities of the political landscape the winner finds himself or herself having to navigate. More simply, many well-intentioned promises are swept aside by the harsh realities of political forces opposed to them. We understand that.
But when a winning candidate back-steps from promises for the sake of convenience, that’s a whole different story. So far, Mr Obama is not doing well in my opinion.
He promised a more open and transparent regime… I mean, administration. And on taking the oath of office a second time, there were no video cameras allowed, only one digital voice recorder, and a handful of hastily gathered reporters who were still in the White House for other reasons.
Today, AOL—yes, that paragon of reputable news and gossip—has an article discussing the Lobbyist promises of Candidate Obama. Here, in part, is the article:
On Jan. 21, the day after his inauguration, Obama issued an executive order barring any former lobbyists who join his administration from dealing with matters or agencies related to their lobbying work. Nor could they join agencies they had lobbied in the previous two years.
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Do the exceptions to the lobbying reforms reflect badly on the president? Of 24,775 responses at the time of this writing, 74% said “Yes, a lot”, while 17% said “Yes, a little”, and 9% said “No”. So less than 2,478 people who responded are OK with this.
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Do you think President Barack Obama promised more change than he can deliver? There were 25,541 responses with 88% saying “Yes”, 7% saying “No”, and 5% saying “I’m not sure.
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In general, how much stock do you place in campaign promises? With 20,924 responses, 63% say “None”, while 27% said “A little”. There was a 10% response for “A lot”, which I found surprising. Seems there are gullible people all over the place. Of course, gullible isn’t a real word and isn’t in the dictionary…
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In general, what rating would you give to Obama as president? The tally consists of 21,400 votes and breaks out like this: Poor – 40%; Fair – 35%; Good – 15%; Excellent – 10%. That’s a whopping 75% of the vote coming in as “less than good” and he’s been in office less than 3 weeks! So much for those who said we can only go up from the days of George Bush!
Well, let’s stress again that this is a non-scientific survey, but I find the numbers interesting for the trend it shows. People seem to expect campaign promises whether or not they are kept. But let the promises be blatantly ignored or broken and you will have some very disappointed people to deal with.
I have just two things to say about your comment…
1. Nice to know you’re still reading and commenting, and
2. Hear! Hear!
Of course, regarding Mr Obama, I am dissappointed that he sees fit to send American tax money to international agencies for the spreading of “Choice”. As if there is an abundance of tax dollars to go around?
MORE:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/01/23/obama.abortion/
There are some instances where I am glad that Pres. Obabma “over-promised.” One in particular is the promise he made in a speech on 17 Jul 07 (to the Planned Parenthood Action Fund) when he said “The first thing I’d do, as president, is sign the Freedom of Choice Act. That’s the first thing that I’d do.” It wasn’t the “first thing”, and I can only hope it is one of the things he doesn’t deliver on.