Lame Blame

All presidential Administrations talk down their predecessors, both to lay blame for problems inherited and – it’s usually helpful if you have this part too – to show forward progress by contrast to what came before. But never in my lifetime have I seen a president so fixated on his predecessor as Barack Obama. Megan McArdle, who has been given more than enough reason by now to regret voting for the man, asks in the context of the massive expansion of the budget deficit when enough is enough:

[A]t some point, Obama has to take responsibility. Listening to his defenders reminds me of those people who sit around whining about how their Dad was really distant and critical . . . I mean, fine, you apparently had a rotten childhood, but Dad can’t get come and get you off the couch and find you a girlfriend and a better job. Girls and employers get really creeped out if they try.
Whatever George W. Bush did or did not do, he’s no longer in office, and doesn’t have the power to do a damn thing about the budget. Obama is the one who is president with the really humongous deficits. Deficits of the size Bush ran are basically sustainable indefinitely; deficits of the size that Obama is apparently planning to run, aren’t. If he doesn’t change those plans, he will be the one who led the government into fiscal crisis, even if changing them would be [sob!] politically difficult.

13 thoughts on “Lame Blame”

  1. If every bad thing about Obama’s presidency has been the fault of his predecessor, does that mean George H.W. Bush gets all the credit for Clinton’s successes as well?

  2. “But never in my lifetime have I seen a president so fixated on his predecessor as Barack Obama.”
    Never in your lifetime has there been a president as terrible as Bush, hence the importance/need to remind people WHY things are so bad now. The lesson? Maybe people won’t vote for idiots like Bush — twice.
    Stick to baseball…

  3. Wait. Bush left him the worst economy since Hoover and you wing nuts think it should be all better in a year? Take a look at how long Reagan lived off Carter. Grow up. Oh, and get a brain.

  4. Isn’t it amazing that Bush inherited a resession too and yet managed to stay on the high road and not take shots at the wide open target left by by Clinton. In addition, he endured 9/11 and the financial turmoil it created. Even with that, all we hear about is the housing bubble meltdown that was created in the Clinton administration. Sure lets play the blame game some more.
    George Bush left a lot to be desired as a President, but we were MUCH better off under his leadership then we will ever be under Obama. The ’10 election can not get here soon enough. Maybe then we can get some REAL hope and change.

  5. Crank,
    This would be the best political point you’ve made on your blog, except that the GOP has been (and still is) running against Jimmy Carter.
    Way to keep that batting average at .000.

  6. This was a pretty weak effort and the below post lauding free markets (which Republicans actually are not for) is also sad and humorous at the same time.

  7. Not a single substantive contrary response to the post. Not one. And every single lefty thinks blaming Bush is not only operative but to be encouraged.
    What a bunch of sniveling, finger-pointing pillow-biters. George Bush probably laughs himself to sleep thinking about how miserable you people are. I’m sure Dick Cheney does.

  8. There’s nothing here to be substantial about. There’s nothing of note written here. The usual, “GOP is great, we have principles, we believe in this or that, liberals hate Bush, yada, yada, yada.” Does anyone really need to account for y’all how free market talk only goes so far as the rubber hitting the road? Do we really, really need to rehash the dead and beaten horse that is the disparity between peoples’ views on the previous administration? Yawn. There was more substantial and interesting analysis on the sorry state of the Mets’ firstbase situation.

  9. I forgot to mention how much I enjoyed the little “those guys are homos” reference. How 21st century of you. Been to the Minneapolis airport lately?

  10. The dirty fu**in’ hippies said it would take a large number of years to fix the problems caused by the Bush Administration.
    Conservatives thought it would take less than a year.
    Here’s a quiz: Are those dirty fu**in’ hippies EVER wrong about anything?
    Clue: The answer is only two letters wrong, begins with “N” and ends with “O”.
    Good luck.

  11. What a bunch of red herrings. You can’t dispute at all that Obama’s going to take Bush’s fiscal irresponsibility and multiple it exponentially. You can’t deny that Obama promised the stimulus would save jobs and there is no end in sight to unemployment. And whatever blame game Obama wants to play, and whatever blame “progressives” (what a joke of a term) think they can deservedly put on Bush, you can’t deny that the tactic is stupid politically. Americans, and especially independents, are turned off by it and it’s not helping him one iota.

  12. Well, at least we know why conservative thought is so simple-minded — Palin has to be able to scrawl the highlights on the palm of her hand.

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