If You Don't Create Change, Change Will Create You

A funny thing happened once Barack Obama moved into the White House - politics reared its ugly head once more. The Republicans, with no sound ideology, principles or effective track record, began to cherry pick the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. You've never heard of this piece of legislation? That's because the left-wing media, the group of reporters that right-wing commentators accuse of having slobbering affection for Obama, call it the stimulus bill.

This bill was not written for the sole purpose of getting the economy working again. This bill was written to protect people who have lost their jobs, save existing jobs, create new jobs and move our country in a new direction in the areas of health care, energy technology, education and transportation. Unfortunately, that message has been lost.

Sound bites about birth control, home weatherization, and poor vetting of cabinet candidates have dominated the headlines in a supposed infatuated and smitten media. A political party that has had control of Washington for almost three decades (yes, Clinton was just a Republican who was smarter than everybody else in the room) and failed to do anything with it but start unnecessary wars, restrict our freedom and rack up a huge debt is actually standing on the Hill and grandstanding. That's rich.

Obama and his team ran a great campaign on change, but Washington hasn't changed. Senator Lindsay Graham said that Obama is not providing leadership on this issue, but what he was really saying is that Obama isn't playing ball with the Republicans on this issue. And he won't.

He hit them hard with an essay in the Washington Post and he will bang the drum even louder when he addresses the nation. There may be compromise, but there will be no politics as usual. There won't be any backroom dealings and secret handshakes. This bill is going to pass and it will pass soon.