Obama's Weakness Is a Problem for the Global Economy
By Gregor Peter Schmitz in Washington
Der Spiegel
A new financial crisis has gripped the US, Asia and Europe, but Barack Obama can only respond with catchphrases. The United States will remain a "triple-A country," the US president insisted Monday, as stock markets crashed. The most powerful man in the world seems strangely paralyzed.
America's president, as the political scientist Richard Neustadt once noted, may be the most powerful man in the world, but he has only one real power: the power of persuasion.
That's why US presidents are so keen to get in front of the TV cameras and address the nation from what Americans refer to as the "presidential pulpit." Barack Obama was back at the pulpit on Monday afternoon, as the world's stock exchanges plummeted. "No matter what some agency may say, we've always been and always will be a triple-A country," asserted the president. It had taken Obama three days to make a statement on Standard & Poor's decision to strip the United States of its top credit rating.
But Obama convinced no one. Even while the president was speaking, the Dow fell below 11,000 for the first time in nine months. This is certainly a problem for Obama, but more than that, it is a problem for America.
(More here.)
Der Spiegel
A new financial crisis has gripped the US, Asia and Europe, but Barack Obama can only respond with catchphrases. The United States will remain a "triple-A country," the US president insisted Monday, as stock markets crashed. The most powerful man in the world seems strangely paralyzed.
America's president, as the political scientist Richard Neustadt once noted, may be the most powerful man in the world, but he has only one real power: the power of persuasion.
That's why US presidents are so keen to get in front of the TV cameras and address the nation from what Americans refer to as the "presidential pulpit." Barack Obama was back at the pulpit on Monday afternoon, as the world's stock exchanges plummeted. "No matter what some agency may say, we've always been and always will be a triple-A country," asserted the president. It had taken Obama three days to make a statement on Standard & Poor's decision to strip the United States of its top credit rating.
But Obama convinced no one. Even while the president was speaking, the Dow fell below 11,000 for the first time in nine months. This is certainly a problem for Obama, but more than that, it is a problem for America.
(More here.)
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1 Comments:
Obama is weak and so is our government. Individual liberty and freedom will save us; more bureaucratic programs will lead to increased misery.
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