CMYK
VIEWS
SECTION
timesleader.com
THE TIMES LEADER
E
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 2011
KEVIN BLAUM
CARL LEUBSDORF
IN THE ARENA
OPINION
Presidentially speaking, what have politics done?
Obama can tell Congress to ‘sow turnips’
“THEREFORE, I respectfully request the opportunity to address a joint session of Congress on Sept. 7, 2011 at 8 p.m.” The president of the United States then goes before the Congress and the world to deliver a message of import from the grand rostrum in front of the ornate chamber of the U.S. House of Representatives. That’s how it’s done. At least that is how it used to be orchestrated, prior to the onset of hateful politics and a paralyzed government which, were it occurring in another democracy, could accurately be described as a constitutional crisis. President Obama’s request for a joint session was hand-delivered to the Speaker of the House on Wednesday. Republican John Boehner, in a stunning and unprecedented snub, retorted this way: “It is my recommendation that your address be held on the following evening, when we can ensure there will be no parliamentary or logistical impediments that might detract from your remarks.” A Senate historian stated, “the Senate Historical Office knows of no instance in which Congress refused the president permission to speak before a Joint Session of Congress.” Such is the disgrace in Washington. From the idyllic confines of Martha’s Vineyard, Obama recently said he would unveil his “jobs plan” this week — after Labor Day. On Wednesday he indicated it would be nice to do so before a joint session of the Congress. Any plan put forward by the president to reduce American unemployment is, at best, a year past due and as such does not require the trappings of a State of the Union address. This week, after Labor Day? A dumb idea. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney moved to pre-empt Obama by announcing he will delineate his “jobs program” on Tuesday. A scheduled televised debate among contenders for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., is slated for Wednesday. On Thursday, the Super Bowl Champion Green Bay Packers host the New Orleans Saints in the first game of an NFL season that almost wasn’t. It will be televised live from the hallowed confines of Curly Lambeau Field, on Lombardi Avenue, in Wisconsin. Obama needs Wisconsin. Following the game America will begin focusing on Sunday, Sept. 11, 2011. President Obama should have chosen another week to deliver his jobs speech. GOP candidates and the voters interested in observing their debate deserve as much. And, if at all possible, a nationally televised event from the library of a former president need not be overshadowed by a sitting occupant of the White House. However, having made the request to address a joint session of Congress, no president should be rebuked by a speaker of the people’s House. Doing so diminishes both constitutional offices and, in this instance, Speaker Boehner especially. Not to be outdone, and upon learning of the speaker’s rebuff, Obama acquiesced yet again. Here’s hoping his jobs speech is a winner and competes favorably with ESPN’s buildup to NBC’s NFL broadcast. The football game and Wednesday’s Republican debate will appear in primetime. The president of the United States will not. Instead, Obama will pre-empt Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy beginning at 7 p.m. in the Eastern time zone, annoying another large demographic before the sun goes down. Faced with a similar slight, many people who have occupied the Oval Office, and certainly the president laid to rest in Simi Valley, would get in the car, travel the one mile to George Washington University and deliver that “jobs speech” on time and as scheduled — Sept. 7, 2011 at 8 p.m. But, of course, no speaker would dare refuse them. Kevin Blaum’s column on government, life and politics appears every Sunday. Contact him at kblaum@timesleader.com.
AN OPPOSITIONcontrolled Congress was giving the president fits. His job approval had dropped into the 30s. His reelection prospects looked increasingly
By RICHARD LARDNER Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The U.S. has lost billions of dollars to waste and fraud in Iraq and Afghanistan and stands to repeat that in future wars without big changes in how the government awards and manages contracts for battlefield support and reconstruction projects, independent investigators said Wednesday. The Wartime Contracting Commission urged Congress and the Obama administration to quickly put in place its recommendations to overhaul the contracting process and increase accountability. The commission even suggested that the joint House-Senate debt reduction committee take a close look at the proposals. “What you’re asking for is more of thesame,”saidDovZakheim,acommission member and the Pentagon comptroller during President George W. Bush’s first term. “More waste. More fraud. More abuse.” Thebipartisancommission,created by Congress in 2008, estimated that at least $31 billion and as much as $60 billion has been lost in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past dec-
AP PHOTO
Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., accompanied by the congressionally chartered Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan Co-Chairs Michael Thibault, left, and former Connecticut Rep. Christopher Shays, right, presents a final report that summarizes waste and fraud in war contracting during the commissions news conference on Capitol Hill.
ade due to lax oversight of contractors, poor planning, inadequate competition and corruption. “I personally believe that the number is much, much closer to $60 billion,” Zakheim said. Yet new legislation incorporating the changes could prove difficult with Republicans and Democrats di-
videdoverthebestwaytoreducethe deficit. Several of the proposals would require new spending, the commission acknowledged, and that would be a hard sell in an election year when reducing the size of governSee SPENDING, Page 6E
MCT ILLUSTRATION
First lady plays big role in Obama’s re-election bid By KATHERINE SKIBA Chicago Tribune
WASHINGTON—FirstladyMichelle Obamawasonceareluctantcampaigner, but there are plenty of reasons why she’s primed to play a major role in her husband’s re-election bid. She’smorepopularthanthepresident. She’s seasoned now. And she’s so careful in her public remarks that even at campaign fundraisers, she sometimes relies on a teleprompter. Observers said her top causes — getting kids fit and embracing the nation’s troops — were shrewd political choices, ones that have given her allies from coast to coast. Experts say that a candidate’s wife — likethevicepresidentialpick—islargely irrelevant when voters choose a president, but Michelle Obama is already playing a key part in Campaign 2012 as a
leader Cecile Richards and EMILY’s List president Stephanie Schriock. Tickets range from $500 to $35,800. That night in New York, the president will join the first lady and mingle with donors at a gala dinner with a special performance by singer Alicia Keys. Tickets are going for $2,500 to $15,000. The first lady averaged one fundraiser a week during an11-week span ending in July, with events from New England to California. AP FILE PHOTO The Obama campaign, which released First lady Michelle Obama boards her details about her upcoming fundraisers, declined to say what her precise role in plane, in Gaborone, Botswana in June. Experts say she will likely play the re-election drive will be. a key role in the 2012 Campaign. Some GOP officials argue that her work will be irrelevant to voters. “In the end, no matter how strong a surrogate is, fundraiser for Barack Obama. On Sept. 20, she’ll be guest of honor at it all comes down to the candidate’s rea Manhattan lunch featuring feminist Gloria Steinem, Planned Parenthood See FIRST LADY, Page 6E
dubious. So President Harry S. Truman summoned lawmakers back to act on measures they had previously failed to pass, setting the special session for “what we in Missouri call ‘Turnip Day,’ taken from the old Missouri saying, ‘On the twenty-fifth of July, sow your turnips, wet or dry.’” Truman’s blatantly political ploy in his post-midnight 1948 convention acceptance speech delighted Democrats and provoked more Republican derision than action. But it also set up his successful campaign against a “Do Nothing” Republican Congress. Faced today with similarly resistant Republicans who run the House and can hamstring him in the Senate — plus a clearly unhappy public — President Barack Obama resisted the temptation to bring lawmakers back from their August recess. His style is far more cerebral and a lot less blatantly political than Truman’s. But, like Truman, Obama will basically ask lawmakers next week to “sow your turnips, wet or dry” when he lays out his latest proposals to spur the lagging economy. The contrast between his proposals — and the likely Republican reaction — will help to define the choice Americans will face in November 2012. Obama will be most effective if he resists an overly cautious approach tailored to what he believes Republicans might accept. Instead, he should lay out a broad agenda that includes a form of the long-term debt reduction plan he floated during the debt-ceiling talks and press his message in a clear and consistent way. After all, a GOP convinced it is on the way to making Obama a one-term president seems unlikely to break out of the ideological constraints that have marked its approach since he took office. This week’s memo from House Majority Leader Eric Cantor indicates the Republicans’ approach will continue to reflect the questionable view that the best way to create jobs is to ease the restraints on the private sector through tax cuts and regulatory relief. For example, Cantor cited a proposal to give small businesses a 20 percent tax deduction to enable them to hire more workers. Interestingly, news reports on measures Obama is considering say he would condition such tax relief on actual hiring, which would seem more prudent. Those reports also indicate Obama is considering measures that would go well beyond the GOP’s plans in providing direct government support designed to create jobs for unemployed workers. One is a proposal floated in June by former President Bill Clinton to put unemployed construction workers back to work at retrofitting buildings to make them energy efficient. Others would increase loans for job creating public-private partnerships and maintain current levels of funding for highway construction at a time GOP lawmakers are considering significant cuts. Judging from the National Republican Congressional Committee’s news releases, the GOP will criticize almost any Obama proposal to spend more federal funds as akin to what it calls his “failed, job-destroying” 2009 stimulus plan. Obama’s speech almost certainly will provoke sharply partisan responses, including possible resistance to even such broadly acceptable measures as three pending trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia and Panama. But it also gives him another opportunity to shape the debate that will play a big role in determining his political future. Carl P. Leubsdorf is the former Washington bureau chief of the Dallas Morning News. Readers may write to him via e-mail at carl.p.leubsdorf@gmail.com.