Caroline Baum, one of my favorite Bloomberg columnists has an interesting article today that's worth a read.
Please consider Wanted: Middle-Class Tweeters for White House Event.
Who were these people, gathered on the afternoon of New Year's Eve to fete the president as a deal to avert the fiscal cliff was hanging in the balance?
They were "middle-class Americans" who had tweeted their way to a staged White House event, according to Politico.
The crowd gathered at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on Monday looked fairly young, which makes their cheering even more disconcerting. Don't they understand that the president has done nothing to protect future generations from a crushing debt burden? Nothing about deficit reduction other than to talk about it? Nothing about preserving Medicare other than to demagogue any changes to the program?
A president truly interested in the issues he claims to be would have used this opportunity to educate younger Americans. Explain to them that the government has made promises to the elderly that it can't keep. Tell them they have choices to make on the benefits they want and the price they'll have to pay.
You won, Mr. President. You won re-election. You got your promised tax increases on the rich. But we lost. And if we lose, then ultimately you lose.
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Politico notes Obama's staged event, jokes draw McCain rebuke
The crowd was nothing if not adoring. ("Thank you for having us!" Two standing ovations.) And the president did seem in a good mood. (Cracking jokes about showing up at an audience member's house to ring in the new year.)
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), for one, took to the Senate floor and slammed the president for "antagonizing" Republicans during a White House event "with that group of people that he was talking to who were laughing and cheering and applauding as we are on the brink of this, of this collapse."
The audience members, billed by the White House as "middle-class Americans," were drawn from Obama supporters who responded to the White House's #my2k hashtag campaign and tweeted what a $2,000 tax hike would mean to them. Being invited to the White House based on a tweet, it would seem, doesn't make for a dour audience.
Tweet Irony
- Young Americans like Obama because he gives them student loans making them debt-slaves for life
- Young Americans like Obama because of a promise for "free" health-care for everyone. Little do they realize, nothing is "free", and they are the ones overpaying.
The fact of the matter is youth overpay for health-care as the benefits primarily go to the elderly. Obama needed a pool of fresh suckers to overpay for health-care costs to keep the system solvent for a bit longer.
Since nothing was done to contain costs, Obama will be asking for more and more money in the future.
Baum asked "Don't they understand that the president has done nothing to protect future generations from a crushing debt burden? Nothing about deficit reduction other than to talk about it?"
Obviously not.
The crowd [of fools] was adoring.
Young Americans tweeted Obama and they got an invite to bow down to the person making them debt-slaves to union educators as well as debt-slaves to the ungrateful elderly.
By the time they are old enough to collect benefits, the system will be bankrupt, with no benefits to be had. In the meantime, Republicans Prepare to Wave White Flag Again, This Time On Debt Ceiling, proving that neither party is capable of a remotely honest discussion.
The sad irony in this mess is youth have gotten nothing out of Obama but a big screw job. And for that screw job, they offer adoring praise.
