Have you seen my backbone lately?

I was printing some photographs for my friend Leven the other day when the call came in. "Hello, we are with the Barack Obama re-election campaign and we would like your support in order to re-elect the President." I laughed and visualized the lady blanching when I subsequently let her have it. "Why would I re-elect a guy who has screwed his constituency and base at every turn. I launched into a litany of failed promises and outright lies, Decriminalization, warrantless wiretapping, never ending wars, environment, the list obviously goes on and on. The caller nervously hung up after I said my piece. The truth is, the president has completely sold out his base and I would have to hold my nose before voting for him or any of his potential opponents for that matter.

I was thinking about our great leader last night, on the heels of his caving in to big business with his evisceration of the ozone standards in the Clean Air Act. He pretty much cut his EPA head Lisa Jackson off at the knees. The President directed the Environmental Protection Agency administrator to withdraw the Ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standards until a scheduled review in 2013, saying that while he remains committed to protecting the environment, he also wants to cut regulation on industry.

This will certainly make him more popular with industrial polluters and those that enjoy breathing dirty air but is not destined to have much traction with his forgotten base. A base that he has seen fit to attack of late, you know the "firebagger lefty blogosphere". Or should we say, the passionate people who actually believed the crap he was peddling on the campaign trail and who got him elected?

I was thinking about the great leader last night and had one question springing to mind; Is he actually a man without convictions or is he merely a man without the strength to fight for his convictions?

Obama was elected at a tough time and a prudent person should not expect much from a man grappling with an inherited recession of the magnitude we are witnessing. In retrospect the timing of his health care plan was probably ill advised and helped reinforce the paralysis of a divided America and electorate, at a time where neither competing vision for our country can ever be construed as a mandate.

I think that the folding up of NASA and the space station program is a horrible legacy for this president. And he has pretty much toppled on every issue facing this country, from repealing tax cuts, to his week attempts at helping rescue homeowners, preferring to throw in with his money support on Wall Street. Now clean air takes the hit. 

Republicans should be very happy.