Ron Christie

Listening to the president Tuesday evening I was struck by how little he has accomplished over the previous year. Call for an increase in the minimum wage? We heard that last year. Ditto also on calls for equality of pay between men and women, measures to address global climate change and reforming our immigration system. Same goes for his push to increase manufacturing hubs across the country.

Ironically, it took Mr. Obama nearly 40 minutes to reference what we were told was his signature legislative accomplishment: the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare. Once proud to tout the measure that bears his name, the president made only a passing reference to “insurance” reform during his State of the Union Address.

Put another way, the president was unable to account for any meaningful progress with any domestic or foreign policy objective he announced to the Congress the previous year. Why would the president offer a nearly identical set of priorities to the country in 2014 that he had largely done in 2013? He is unable to govern the country by working with the Congress.

Detractors will immediately decry “Republican Obstructionism” or “Tea Party instringence.” Nonsense. Please pick up and read a copy of the Constitution of the United States. Our Framers intended for there to be equality and parity amongst the three branches of government. This is particularly true in dealing with the Executive Branch—the notion of a monarch imposing their will over the populace was a horror they sought to avoid at all costs. Hence, the Constitution explicitly provides that the House of Representatives must untie the purse strings of the federal government—the chamber closest to the people themselves. Mr. Obama should realize by now that Republicans were swept into power in 2010 to put the brakes on what many Americans viewed as an over-reach by the president and his democratic allies in the Congress.

Accordingly, the president’s defiant statement that he had a pen and a telephone he intended to use to circumvent the Congress only illustrates how he has no idea how to govern effectively to enact his articulated priorities. Contrast this to his predecessor in office who Mr. Obama likes to blame for his own inadequacies.

Ask many prominent Democratic Congressmen and Senators in private and they will tell you that Mr. Obama only picks up the phone or sits down with them when he needs something. I have, and their reaction to Obama’s outreach to the Hill is revealing. A nice hand written note or drinks on the Truman Balcony to build and strengthen relationships? No. A weekend at Camp David with the Democratic Leadership and their families to break the ice? Negative.

Before Mr. Obama and his cheerleaders place the blame for his inadequacies at the hands of obstructing Republicans, they might face up to the reality that the president has little equity from which to draw upon from members of his own political party. Perhaps our aloof president should mend fences with Members of Congress by trying to get to know them better rather than demonize them. I suspect if he does, he might have something to speak about at the next State of the Union rather than repeat his promises from the year before.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/20...n-t-govern.html

Obama has all the traits of a salesperson who wants to sell but none of the skills and patience to work with people to reach common ground. Thus he simply campaigns and blames. Americans are plenty sick of it, even his supporters. Getting flack from opinion writers at the Daily Beast now? wow, he's fallen a long way.