It's no secret that the President's had a disastrous month. Healthcare.gov is in shambles, the program that spawned it is deeply unpopular, and - according to both the AP and Gallup - his poll numbers are tanking. So what is Barack Obama to do? Apologize? No, not really. Acknowledge that no one likes his signature law? Of course not. Reverse course in a vain effort to preserve his legacy? Please.
No, when the going gets tough, Obama does what he always does. He "pivots to the economy."
This time, he'll do it via a speech at one of America's busiest ports. During his remarks, he's expected to refocus the nation's attention on his belief that we need to spend more on roads, bridges, and ports in an effort to increase employment and shore up American businesses. While this is
obviously new territory for President Obama, someone - and I can't remember who - used to call this sort of thing "shovel ready jobs."
Today's appearance will mark the first time that The President has felt the need to pivot to the economy during any of the 8 days in November. That's actually a pretty impressive streak, considering that Obama has "pivoted to the economy" at least 20 times during his tenure in the White House.
Maybe that's why it all seems so familiar ...and so hollow. Here's a laundry list of previous pivots:
On September 16th,
CBS News reported that Obama would "pivot to the economy" in an effort to distract people from his embarrassing Syria debacle.
Back in
July of this year, he appeared in Illinois, where he "pivoted to the economy" in an effort to attack Republicans with harsh, but ultimately empty, rhetoric.
Two months earlier,
ABC news Reported his May "pivot" happened in Baltimore. It was designed to distract from revelations about the Obama IRS and the Benghazi scandal.
In April, the
Wall Street News informed us that Obama wanted to "pivot" from security to the economy during a trip to Mexico.
In February, the
Christian Science Monitor made sure we knew that Obama's State of the Union Address would represent a strong "pivot back to the economy."
It was necessary, because the "pivot" contained in his
January inauguration speech was considered by many in the press to be too tepid and too burdened by left-wing social engeineering agenda items.
In July of 2012,
MSNBC reported that he was "pivoting" to jobs.
A month earlier,
The Wall Street Journal made sure we knew he was "pivoting" to focus on the economic debate.
In Spetember 2011,
The Politico claimed that Obama was daring the GOP to join his "jobs pivot"
Strangely, he'd done the same thing just one month prior, and both
Zsa Zsa Huffington and
Yahoo News reported on it.
In April 2011,
USA Today covered Obama's "jobs pivot" which came hot on the heels of his illegal attack on Libya.
And, in January & February of 2011, Obama began the year with what
NBC News called a "quick jobs pivot" after his State of the Union address.
In December of 2010, the President gave
a news conference where he claimed “We now have to pivot and focus on jobs and growth.”
In September, his pivot took the form of what the Miami Herald called a "hail-Mary pass to stimulate the economy and create new jobs."
That hail-Mary was necessary, because in June,
the Politico had reported he'd launched the epic failure known as "recovery summer."
In May of 2010, the
New York Times was feverishly reporting on one of his pivots....
....while in April it was
Bloomberg's turn.
In January Obama told the
House Democratic Caucus retreat that he would be turning all of his attention to jobs and the economy.
And that brings us all the way back to December of 2009, when the
Politico announced Obama's plan "to make a very hard pivot to jobs in the run-up to the State of the Union."
Given that we've enjoyed at least four years of Obama's trademark “pivoting,” you'd think he'd stop to ask himself why it's still necessary. He's either "pivoting" wrong, or he's just doing the same thing again and again, never interested in realizing that his hare-brained schemes aren't yielding any results.
For that matter, if we're now on his 20
th such “pivot,” why does he keep “pivoting” away? Shouldn't he just
stick with one of these "pivots" until it works?
We're anxiously awaiting his next economic pivot, which we expect sometime just before Christmas. No one knows
what he'll be trying to distract us from by then, but it's sure to be a doozy.
