After being slammed against the ropes by the tag team combination of the Republicans and the tea party — and even sustaining hard body shots from the Congressional Black Caucus and other African American personalities — President Obama finally mounted an offensive by accusing the GOP-led Congress of purposely blocking strategies that would lead to an economic recovery.
Obama charges that Congress has stymied a desperately needed economic rebirth by orchestrating a formidable roadblock to his legislation and measures he said would create jobs and economic growth.
The comments were made late last week while on a bus tour through his home state of Illinois but were not aired until he took vacation off the Cape Cod island of Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts on Saturday, Aug. 20.
“The only thing preventing us from passing these bills is the refusal by some in Congress to put country ahead of party. That’s the problem right now. That’s what’s holding this country back,” the president said.
The Obama administration has taken heavy hits even from allies lately — especially from the Tavis Smiley-Cornel West duo as well as Congressional Black Caucus members, most particularly Reps. Maxine Waters, D-Calif.; and John Conyers, D-Mich., because they believe Obama has not done enough to stem the rising tide of black unemployment as well as hold banks, Wall Street and mortgage companies accountable for the machinations that placed the country in this precarious position in the first place.
“The one mistake that I will not make again, and the Congressional Black Caucus will not make again, is giving bailout money to the big banks without having any strings attached,” Waters said at the CBC job fair in Atlanta recently.
Obama is definitely in defensive mode right now. He has taken some hard jabs of late on the weekend of Aug. 20-21 for vacationing in Martha’s Vineyard, a famous aristocratic playground near Boston, when more than 14 million Americans are out of work. Despite the fact that U.S. presidents usually take haven there — and that Obamas also took vacations in Martha’s Vineyard in August of 2010 and 2009 — Obama’s actions are under greater scrutiny because the marketplace has apparently stalled.
The White House has said the president would spend much of his nine-day absence from Washington working on the job and growth package he will unveil in an early September speech. That statement alone may do much to stem the tide of angst and embitterment rising up against his administration and give hope to his supporters.
–terry shropshire
