Michael Barone, Washington Examiner Columnist, Says President Obama's "Thuggery" Useless in Fighting BP Oil Spill

Washington Examiner columnist, Michael Barone, says President Obama's "thuggery" has been largely ineffective in fighting the BP Gulf oil spill.

So, now President Obama is being described as a thug? Wow. Washington Examiner columnist Michael Barone wrote in his column, entitled "Obama's Thuggery is Useless in Fighting Spill," that thuggery is unattractive and that ineffective thuggery is even moreso unattractive, which may be one reason why so many Americans have been reacting negatively to the president's response to the BP Gulf oil spill. Really? Is this the same level of thuggery displayed by President George W. Bush and his response to the destruction leveled in the Gulf Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina? Or could this be the same level of thuggery displayed by  President George W. Bush and his invasion of Iraq on a lie?

Take Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's remark that he would keep his "boot on the neck" of BP, which brings to mind George Orwell's definition of totalitarianism as "a boot stamping on a human face -- forever." Except that Salazar's boot hasn't gotten much in the way of results yet.

Or consider Obama's undoubtedly carefully considered statement to Matt Lauer that he was consulting with experts "so I know whose ass to kick." Attacking others is a standard campaign tactic when you're in political trouble, and certainly BP, which appears to have taken unwise shortcuts in the Gulf, is an attractive target. But you don't always win arguments that way. The Obama White House gleefully took on Dick Cheney on the issue of terrorist interrogations. It turned out that more Americans agreed with Cheney's stand, despite his low poll numbers, than Obama's.

Obama doesn't. "If he sees any impropriety in politicians ordering executives about, upstaging the courts and threatening confiscation, he has not said so," write the editors of the Economist, who then suggest that markets see Obama as "an American version of Vladimir Putin." Except that Putin is an effective thug. Source: Washington Examiner

Er, I beg to differ on the Dick Cheney issue. The vast majority of Americans couldn't trust one word from Cheney. It is also ironic that Michael Barone should invoke Dick Cheney's position on terrorist interrogations, while ignoring his obvious connections to oil and Halliburton. I guess it's safe to say that Michael Barone would rather have a marine apocalypse giving big business carte blanche to do as they please, all the while holding innocent citizens hostage to a lengthy court process to obtain redress for their financial losses. I guess it's okay for big businesses to literally have their boots on the necks of innocent people caught in the crosshairs of their mess. With that said, I guess I have to ask, who's the real thug in this equation?