Obama's Double Bind

Nobody likes the bailouts. Conservatives hate them because, for us, they are a lurch towards socialism. But now the Wall Street Journal has discovered that the left hates the bailouts too.

The Journal's Laura Meckler writes about local government worker Laura Zamora. She's worried about losing her job, and she doesn't like to see money going to corporations.

"He's bailing out the private sector. He's putting all kinds of money into the private sector," says Mrs. Zamora. "The money should be going to social programs, not to bailing out banks and GM. It should go to people who are unemployed."

Even the jaunty Rush Limbaugh has noticed. Obama supporters are calling up his program and complaining about Obama throwing money at corporations. As an economic conservative, Rush deplores the bailouts because they put the government in control of more of the economy.

But the Obama supporters see money going to corporations that they thought was going to be spent on them. And they are mad. What's the point of Hope and Change if all the change ends up in the pockets of corporate greed?

You have to feel sorry for the president. Here he is spending all his political capital on, e.g., saving all those union jobs at GM and Chrysler, not to mention keeping Wall Street afloat so that it can push all that government debt out into the world.

So what does he get? His supporters are mad at him. Don't they realize that he is helping Democratic constituencies all over America with his policies?

Well, it serves the politicians right. They have been making hay for over a century blaming business for everything. It's hardly surprising that the American people actually believe their lies about corporations.

The truth is that corporations are the geese that lay the golden eggs that politicians then get to spend on buying votes. So it really matters that the private sector should be healthy.

Too bad that politicians have been telling their supporters otherwise.

But don't worry. They'll think of some way of pinning the blame on someone else. How about Bush, Cheney, and the evil right-wing extremists? They tricked Obama into all these bailouts!

Yes. If they hadn't let Wall Street bankers run riot with outrageous bonuses there would have been plenty of money for social programs.

Meanwhile, the president's approval numbers keep nudging lower, and this week everyone was shocked, shocked, when they found out how much health reform was going to cost.