Over Promise, Under Deliver

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.

However, William J. Lynn III, his choice to become the No. 2 official at the Defense Department, recently lobbied for military contractor Raytheon. And William Corr, tapped as deputy secretary at Health and Human Services, lobbied through most of last year as an anti-tobacco advocate. Corr says he will take no part in tobacco matters in the new administration.

The article goes on to report:  “Sometimes you can over promise,” said former Sen. Warren Rudman, a Republican from New Hampshire.

Of course, such contradiction does little for the official’s credibility.  AOL’s non-scientific poll shows that few people who responded are happy about this.

1. 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.
2. 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.
3. 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…
4. 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.

MORE: 

 http://news.aol.com/main/obama-presidency/article/obama-campaign-promises/326169

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