OBAMA SCRAMBLES HERE AND THERE

President Obama seems particularly 'at sixes and sevens' these past few weeks, as the Brits like to say. He suffers from an inability to focus on one issue sufficiently to bring it to a decision. It feels like drifting.

ITEM 1: WHO SHALL WRITE THE HEALTH CARE BILL?

Bill Clinton entered the White House with universal health care high on his agenda, so high in fact that he gave the task of crafting this legislation to his wife. Nine months later Hillary's Health Care Program had collapsed under Republican attack. Learning from this, Barack Obama decided it might be safer to let others take responsibility for drafting a new health care bill. After 9 months of talk, we are left with a leaderless tangle of proposals ranging from Universal Medicare for All to letting the insurance industry and Big Pharma just give us more of the same expensive and inequitable treatment to which we have all become accustomed.

We still do not know what it is that President Obama recommends nor what priorities he has established. The Democratic leadership in the House and the Senate is just as weak and spineless on Medicare as it has been on the war in Iraq since assuming the majority back in 2006. Leaving the job to them seems foolish at best and downright deceitful at worst, if we are to trust in Obama's early support for real health care reform. For a while recently it almost looked as if he wanted Republican Senator Olympia Snowe to craft the legislation, although no one knows exactly what she wants nor whether she could attract other Repubs to her position. Harry Reid is just as coy as Obama when it comes to revealing his preferences on the issue. Nancy Pelosi sometimes speaks as if she wants an real Medicare-type option but then again seems quite willing to take an even weaker position on the public option if it would get her a few Blue Dog votes.

Meanwhile, we have all become bored and confused while watching the well-funded insurance lobby continue to distribute their gifts on Capital Hill. We will probably end up with a weak gruel rather than the strong medicine that our health care crisis needs. However, you can be sure the President will point to it as a wonderful break-through and the health insurance and drug industries remain in charge of our health. (Is this the policy of a decisive President?)

ITEM 2: SHALL WE JUST STAY IN AFGHANISTAN FOREVER?

President Obama and his Secretary of Defense Gates have allowed General McChrystal and his press agents free reign to tout a program involving the dispatch of perhaps 60,000 more troops to Afghanistan and a dedicated counter-insurgency program lasting up to ten years. Obama insists he has made no final decision as to the number of additional troops he will ask for and insists that he is taking his time because he wants to get it right. Leaders of the key Congressional Committees have been pressing for McCrystal to present his strategy for two months now but Gates had kept him out of Washington. McCrystal speaks to Obama on video and even has time to appear remotely on 60 Minutes and to fly to London for a BBC Television interview, but there seems no point in his coming to Washington where the decision must be made, for the President just isn't ready to decide.

According to George Freidman, senior military analyst for STRATFOR 10/20/09, McCrystal's new plan calls for the increased use of conventional infantry in close proximity to the Afghan people so as to protect those willing to cooperate with us. They would be positioned in the more populated areas of Kabul, Kandahar, Helmand and Khost Provinces and eventually make regional alliances as locals see that we are there to provide them with safety and a peaceful life. Aerial bombardments, heavy artillery and drone attacks would be cut way back to avoid alienating the civilian populace in cities and town. Air attacks would be used to attack those Taliban hiding outside of populated areas. The US and NATO infantry forces could win battles against the Taliban, in McCrystal's view, because their superior training will be a counterweight to the Taliban's larger numbers of battle-hardened warriors. Many military analysts seriously question McChrystal's thinking.

“If, as our President has repeatedly emphasized, our main enemy is Al Qaeda and our task is to deny them sanctuary, then expanded US infantry presence in Afghanistan seems to have no relevance, for what forces Al Qaeda still have are mainly located across the border in Pakistan, and where we are not free to engage them on the ground”, Freidman states. He then observes that “Obama's decision depends not upon choosing between McCrystal's strategy and others, but upon how to manage the consequences of our eventual withdrawal from Afghanistan. While this is not the time to leave Afghanistan, the idea that securing it will hobble Al Qaeda is simply wrong. U.S. Afghan policy will not stop a global terrorist organization: terrorists will just go elsewhere.” Freidman then concludes that: “The McCrystal proposal is a good one for a strategy of 'hold until relieved' . We suspect that Obama will hold to show that he is giving the strategy a chance, but that the decision to leave won't be too far off”. (Is this the policy of a decisive President?)

ITEM 3: THE SWINE FLU SCARE STUMBLES ON

People who get the seasonal flu shot are twice as likely to catch swine flu, according to studies just completed in Canada. These studies await peer review and have not as yet been released for publication. Yet here in Ukiah California, the druggists at the Safeway Pharmacy have been giving out the seasonal influenza vaccine in advance of the normal spring schedule while awaiting delivery of the H1N1 vaccine and assuring customers that the CDC approves of this two-punch approach. CDC has never made the necessary tests and has actually never made its position clear on the interaction amongst various flu vaccines. On October 23rd, Obama declared the H1N1 virus to be a National Emergency.

In the meantime, a suit has been filed in Washington DC Court to halt further distribution of the H1N1 vaccine. plaintiffs state that the hasty FDA approval of four swine flu vaccines so far violates its own regulations and federal laws calling for proper safety and efficacy tests before release to the public. No studies nor clinical trials have been published demonstrating that safety testing has been carried out. Pressure from manufacturers of the Swine Flu vaccine seems to have driven this panic.

In Europe, health care professionals are not impressed by the H1N1 vaccine: one third of French doctors and other health care providers, 29% of Germans health care professionals, and over 50% of those in the UK will not take the vaccine despite pressure from their peers because of their high risks of exposure. Even with the brain wash we Americans receive every day from drug industry TV ads, the latest AOL poll shows that amongst the general public some 61% do not plan to take the vaccine!

ITEM 4: THE ECONOMY LANGUISHES - BANKSTERS FROLICK

Last February, Obama committed $787 billion to an economic stimulus program designed to create 3.5 million new jobs. Yet nine months later we have one in six out of work (9.8% for less than 6 months plus 7% more without full time work for longer periods) and no sign of new jobs forthcoming. We have 21.1 million unemployed if those out of work more than 6 months (6.6 million) are added to the 14.5 million still getting unemployment checks. When we add the 3 million new jobs needed just to keep up with population growth over the next 2 years, we are really in need of 24.1 million new jobs. Obama's program for 3.5 million new jobs would hardly make a dent in the need, even if it were successful. Yet, Obama refuses to put together a 2nd Stimulus Program even after the Republicans have derided his First Stimulus as basically worthless. (Money Morning 10/20/09).

Obama thought he should squelch public anger over the personal bonuses that the biggest banksters have handing out, using Federal funds that we taxpayers actually put in their accounts. So he asked his new Compensation Czar Feinberg to slice the pay checks of the top 25 executives of firms who received TARP funds last year. While we don't know the final 'savings' we taxpayers will receive from this not very impressive bit of bravado, rest assured that if won't have much impact upon the 24 million new jobs that are needed now to get out of this depressive slump.