Desperation? With his second term in ruins, Obama calls up Podesta

The disastrous launch of Healthcare.gov cost the President the trust of even his faithful followers. This led to increased scrutiny of the Affordable Care Act implementation as a whole, revealing not only several years of presidential lies, but also the unworkable, impractical, and unsustainable nature of the law itself. Conservatives had known all of this for a long time, but the low-info folks took a long time to catch on. Now that they have, the President's second term has twisted itself into a lame duck meltdown from which the Commander in Chief seems incapable of recovering.

So it's time to bring back the big guns. Namely, John Podesta - President Bill Clinton's one-time chief of staff, and leader of the far-left "Center for American Progress" think tank. He even worked with Barack Obama once before, guiding his "transition team" back in 2008. According to the New York Times:

Mr. Podesta will help [Obama’s chief of staff, Denis] McDonough on matters related to the health care law, administration organization and executive actions, said a person familiar with the plans, and will focus in particular on climate change issues, a personal priority of Mr. Podesta’s.

Given that the 2014 mid-terms are starting to look like them may turn into a Democrat bloodbath, it's the "executive actions" portion of that description that should raise a few eyebrows. If the New York Times is right, it sounds

---

like President Obama is preparing for a situation in which he has either lost the Senate or is (at best) laboring with diminished Congressional influence. The President's new adviser has long urged Obama to ignore Congress in favor of issuing executive action edicts. As TownHall points out, In 2010, after Dems took a midterm "shellacking," Podesta wrote:

Concentrating on executive powers presents a real opportunity for the Obama administration to turn its focus away from a divided Congress and the unappetizing process of making legislative sausage. ... It would be a welcome relief from watching legislative maneuvering to see the work of a strong executive who is managing the business of the country through troubled times.

During the dark days of the Clinton administration, Podesta was seen as largely responsible for turning around the administration's post-impeachment fortunes. Today, Dems are presenting his hire as simply a "smart choice" since he's a man who's obviously had some experience in handling business in a deeply troubled White House. They claim that this is just President Obama wisely calling upon the "best man for the job." However, the point remains. Whether he's being brought in to deal with the aftermath of a potential 2014 GOP victory, or to resuscitate the remains of a deeply damaged administration, his return to the White House is a clear acknowledgement that Obama's 2nd term agenda is in very dire straits. Obama would have no need for a "best man for the job" had he not botched things so badly.