Follow Up Post Regarding Wrong Track for Change
Author: Ken Coman
•3:27 PM
This article is another example of why we are not on course for change. Just look at the headline:

"Obama losing the stimulus message war"

Rather than having the media focus on the who is winning and who is losing the political game like it's some type of sports coverage, the media should focus on the facts, the policy, the motives, the possible outcomes, costs and benefits. The media has colluded with our elected officials to make our government little more than a horse race. One quick scan of this paragraph illustrates my point:

"At this crucial juncture in the push to pass an economic recovery package, President Obama finds himself in the most unlikely of places: He is losing the message war. Despite Obama’s sky high personal approval ratings, polls show support has declined for his stimulus bill since Republicans and their conservative talk-radio allies began railing against what they labeled as pork barrel spending within it. "

I think the media has this one wrong. They should inform the viewers - not give a play by play of the game of politics. In a way, the parties use this type of coverage to keep from doing what we need them to.

Some things fundamentally have to change for us to really progress and one way is to have the media force the politicians to talk about policy, motives, philosophy and purpose rather than who's on first and what's on second.

To read the who article on the political game, click here: http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20090205/pl_politico/18444
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Wrong Track for Change
Author: Ken Coman
•7:34 PM
As I read a few news articles on the stimulus package being debated in Congress and the President's response to the difficulty of getting it passed, I couldn't help but see some problems.

The two problems were: an ultimatum for Congress on the parameters of the stimulus bill and the President going to the media to sell his bill.

Why is that bad and wrong? It is fundamentally wrong in the following ways:

1. A president who campaigned on bringing an end to partisan politics should in no way be dictating to congress the parameters of the bill. Instead he should be governing towards the center and creating a bipartisan bill that reflects the needs of Americans. When not a single Republican votes for something there is a problem - telling them what to do certainly won't help. He was the one who said we are not red states or blue states but the United States. If so, then we need more statesmanship and less partisanship.

2. An add campaign to the American public is not the way the persuade congress. Rather than doing five interviews with the mainstream media on his bill, he should be holding almost constant meetings and interviews with the leaders of Congress. They too are the people's representatives. The side stepping of congress is just another evidence of the permanent campaigning that goes on in Washington and rather than seek to find good policy, the seek to win the campaign battles - battles that they begin for their own benefit.

3. The president is playing the same urgency card as our last president. Everything was in crisis in order to get Congress and the people to act. We have to act now to prevent Iraq from getting WMD, we have to act now to help our Seniors, we have to act now to save Social Security, we have to act now to pass the TARP bill or else, or else, or else. Rather than having a real national debate everything is constantly sold on a crisis basis when there is still time to discuss it. One week is not going to spell doom for the west. Not everything is a crisis and when they sell it as one, we the people should be sceptical.

These three errors are the fundamental errors we watched the Bush Administration commit time after time after time. If the next four years are like the last two weeks then we are in for some pretty bad politics that will really cripple Washington. If the President wants to bring change he needs to think really quickly about changing the fundamental style he has shown since being sworn in. I want to see change but so far, I have seen the exact same things I have seen for the past seven years (Bush's first year was really quite remarkebly bi-partisan).

I believe in change but unless we actually do change, it's just rhetoric.
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