Politicizing Crisis

It'll be interesting to see if the reality-based community contingent now ripping Limbaugh for accusing the Obama folks of wanting to profit politically from Haiti will direct their wrath on the former first black president for tying Haiti to a Martha Coakley victory.

Or whether they develop Katrina-like outrage over the fact a Clinton is heading down to Haiti but it's not the UN special envoy to Haiti Clinton, who's instead campaigning in Massachusetts saying that a victory for Coakley is like helping rebuild Haiti.

Or the president remaining at home to use his Saturday address not to outline our response to the Haiti crisis but rather to outline his plan to go after the banks. The address really must be seen to be believed. He blamed Bush for the financial collapse, of course, then praised him for TARP (Obama was in favor as well), then said everyone never expected to see the money repaid but it only happened due to his administration's tough policies. Stunning BS.

He's probably right about one thing--the bankers did find a way to repay TARP once they realized how Marxist-leaning the incoming government was, so in a way it was an incentive. But surely this had to torque the White House since it meant they couldn't use the crisis to properly socialize the financial system and decided to enact punishment taxes as a response. Even some liberals have noted the rank populism while applauding.

Shockingly, while there was subtle mention of how dangerous a Scott Brown election could be (since he opposes the bankers punishment tax) there was no mention whatsoever of the shared blame main street holds for the crisis.

Which explains why there is currently no demand that certain politicians return ALL the money Fannie and Freddie provided them in campaign donations before going bankrupt. Or no calls for punishing those still in power who ensured Americans that both organizations looked good 'going forward' when they knew damn well they didn't. And no mention of punishing executives of those same entities for giving bonuses while their taxpayer-funded organizations remain in default.

Obama told reporters at the G20 summit he was through playing the blame game and just wanted to fix the problem. Apparently that only applies to friendlies.