In A Chess Game World Our President Plays Checkers

Think about it – The objective in checkers is to jump and take as many of your opponent’s pieces until you get to their side, then you say “KING ME” , and you get to move back across the board jumping and taking every one of your opponent’s pieces. Isn’t this what President Obama is doing? He jumped AIG, GM, Chrysler, the American people with the majority-opposed Obamacare, and he is set to jump all of us once again with the Cap and Trade Bill. Waiting in the wings is financial regulation. If these are enacted he will have essentially taken control of over 70% of the free market. Seventy percent (70%) of the free market under the control of the Federal Government! And he has been able to accomplish this in only 18 months since being sworn into office.

The latest crisis of the BP oil spill is a perfect example. Instead of understanding the urgency of acting quickly to ameliorate the extent of the damage, President Obama fails to act at all for several days. Maybe he was told by BP that they had the situation under control. That does not absolve him from the responsibility of sending experts to the scene to assess the problem. I would hate to opine that because of his cozy relationship with BP and all of the money that he received from them over the years, he failed to act because of their assurances that they would end the spill quickly. In the meantime he received 21 aid offers from 17 countries and 4 international groups, who offered to provide tankers and assistance to help us. He refused, deferring to The Jones Act, which limits ships allowed to go from port to port to U.S. flag flying ships only. He could easily, and I am sure with the support of each and every American, have waived that due to the emergency of the situation. President Bush did that during Hurricane Katrina for a two week period. I would hate to think his alliances with the labor unions took precedence over his responsibility as our Commander-in-Chief to protect our shores and waterways. Where exactly does his allegiance lie?

I am no scientist or expert, but my principal concern in the first 3 days was that we need to protect our shore lines, whatever it takes. Get booms in there several miles away from the shore line and post tankers outside of the booms and have them suck up all the oil they could, continually, until this gets resolved and the leak is repaired. Now that this mess has hit shore lines, the amount of damage has been dramatically increased. Our whole ecological system will be drastically altered, if not destroyed, for decades.

 Bobby Jindal Governor of Louisiana requested to build barrier islands to help keep the oil from coming ashore and into the marshlands.

Our President does nothing for days, and then orders a moratorium on all offshore drilling for 6 months. So on top of this already horrendous situation, he has in fact put hundreds of thousands of people out of work. And one thing this country does not need is more people unemployed. He appears unable to comprehend or calculate the effects of his decisions.

Under the new Health Care Reform Bill (which it is now obvious no one had read, but voted on anyway) they failed to understand what would happen as a result of the passage of the bill on private companies and individuals. When several large corporations (AT&T, Verizon,  Caterpillar, John Deere, and others) issued statements that their profits would be affected by up to One Billion Dollars, they were vilified by Congress, who were astounded that they could do such a thing. They were called to appear before a hearing to “explain themselves.” What they failed to remember is that under the Sarbanes Oxley Act of 2002  that they passed, in Section 409 a corporation is required to disclose to the public, on an urgent basis, when they become aware of material changes in their financial conditions or operations. When Henry Waxman realized what would happen if a hearing occurred he silently cancelled the hearing.

Effective leaders understand that the decisions they make are more akin to playing chess. Chess requires an extremely agile mind, one that can look at the whole board and with every move is able to foresee the resulting effect of that move on that and future possible moves by themselves and their opponent.

Every move this man makes causes an effect that he does not seem to be capable of anticipating.

• His “apology tour” has resulted in weakening our position in the eyes of the world and I fear has left us more vulnerable to our enemies. What could go wrong with that?

• His comments, and those of senior members of his administration (who apparently had not even read the bill), and allowing the President of Mexico to decry the actions of the state of Arizona in passing a law addressing their very serious immigration issue is another example of action without foresight. This resulted in increased violence and action on the part of illegal aliens and the bleeding heart liberals (many of whom are elected officials) who cannot seem to understand the importance of enforcing the immigration laws of this country and protecting the safety of our borders and citizens.

• His embarrassingly poor treatment of Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel during his visit to the White House, along with his obvious bypass of a visit there while on his Arab country tour. Now he is supporting the U. N. conducting an investigation into the Gaza flotilla violence. All of this has caused the world to look at what had been long understood as an unshakable alliance between our two countries as tenuous at best. What could go wrong with that?

• His new Nuclear Arms Control Treaty with Russia which will result in us giving up more of our nuclear stockpile. There was an impasse at one point with President Medvedev. The Russians were pushing for constraints on missile defense to be incorporated into the treaty. What could go wrong with that?

• His continuing insistence that he can persuade Iran out of their nuclear ambitions with his superior diplomatic ability. What could go wrong with that?

• He and his administration failing to publicly acknowledge that we are repeatedly being attacked by one particular faction – radical Islamic terrorists. They can not even say those words. What could go wrong with that?

But the biggest problem President Obama will soon be facing will be from the people who voted for him who were promised so much during his campaign. He promised “free” health care, which apparently will not be so free. He promised to bring our troops home from Iraq. He promised to close Guantanamo Bay. He promised to repeal don’t ask don’t tell in the military. He promised the creation of millions of jobs with the stimulus package.

I am not sure if President Obama is that unaware, or if this is all a calculated plan to tear down this beautiful country. We are now looking at potentially existential threats from without and from within.

My question is - At what point will he just say “KING ME”?