We didn’t watch the Obama press conference, but from the reports of the event, an end game is near on health care, and Obama will say anything at all (much as he has been doing) — no matter how absurd or at odds with the facts — to win. We’ll start with this statement from the AP where the President once again says he is above all mundane concerns at a time when it is clearer than ever that the exact opposite is true:

“I understand how easy it is for this town to become consumed in the game of politics, to turn every issue into a running tally of who’s up or who’s down…This isn’t about me. I have great health insurance, and so does every member of Congress. This debate is about the letters I read when I sit in the Oval Office every day, and the stories I hear at town hall meetings.

This is about the woman in Colorado who paid $700 a month to her insurance company only to find out that they wouldn’t pay a dime for her cancer treatment…This is about every family, every business, and every taxpayer who continues to shoulder the burden of a problem that Washington has failed to solve for decades.

This statement contains Obama’s characteristic of being self-referential and self-aggrandizing combined with an apparently complete unawareness that he is in fact doing so. Obama is obviously consumed with the “game” and who is “up and who is down.” He wants to win at all costs, which is shown by his complete disregard for the economic facts of his plan. The “fictional quality” to his press conference isn’t simply politics; it’s personal. Further in the AP story, there’s this:

Obama reiterated his pledge that any bill he signs will not add to the nation’s soaring deficit. “And I mean it,” he said.

This comment, that Obama “means it” about not increasing the deficit, is so counterfactual that it is hard to know what to say. We’ve covered this in some detail, that a $634 billion increase in costs cannot be a decrease. You can’t increase services to 47 million people while keeping the supply constant at 800,000 doctors without substantial increases in costs. Can’t be done — even if if you ration care to the elderly and impose price controls on the “greedy” insurance industry and “greedy” doctors, which is clearly Obama’s real plan, as the transcript of his remarks makes clear. (Ace has more on some whoppers in the presser.)

Obama’s behavior is over the top. However, in some ways the media seem to be worse. The AP also said this: “Obama — like a modern-day father with a somewhat dysfunctional family — has tried to encourage, not criticize. With Congress, that doesn’t seem to be working.” Good grief! We have an aggressive, deceptive President and media that are even worse.

This entry was posted on Friday, July 24th, 2009 at 2:21 am and is filed under business, Democrats, General, MSM, New Media, Republicans. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.