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January 20, 2009
So Far, New Politics Not so New
From President Obama's inaugural address:
On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.From the White House website:On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics.
President Obama will keep the broken promises made by President Bush to rebuild New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. He and Vice President Biden will take steps to ensure that the federal government will never again allow such catastrophic failures in emergency planning and response to occur.I guess he meant Republican recriminations.President Obama swiftly responded to Hurricane Katrina. Citing the Bush Administration's "unconscionable ineptitude" in responding to Hurricane Katrina, then-Senator Obama introduced legislation requiring disaster planners to take into account the specific needs of low-income hurricane victims.
When combined with a rather classless inaugural address that initially sounded good, but doesn't hold up on repeated readings. The speech was not shrill, but the new president took some unnecessary cheap shots at the outgoing president. So far, it looks as though an integral part of Obama's new politics will be to continue dumping on the Bush administration.
As I've said, I'm not going to mindlessly hate the new president, but so far, his version of reaching across the aisle is not all that impressive.
Compare and contrast. Bush's statement this evening - "A good man took the oath of office today, and we offer him our prayers for success."
Posted by slublog at January 20, 2009 07:11 PM
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