Obama contemplating power …

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“He’s a con man. I have no use for him.” Ralph Nader

The famous painting above is by Salvador Dali, Gala Contemplating the Mediterranean Sea. I saw the original at the Dali Museum in Figueres, Spain. It’s a beautiful image of a nude looking over the sea, but from twenty meters away you realize that it is actually a portrait of Abraham Lincoln. (I have to stand about twenty feet back from my computer screen for that effect to kick in.)

Clever, I suppose, like those Bev Doolitte paintings so popular in the west – eagles and bears concealed right out in the open among trees and snow banks.

Concealed in plain view … read here how the Obama Administration is now actually negotiating with his opponents, decorating a Christmas tree with goodies to sell tax cuts for the wealthy. They have a myriad of ways to make people vote their way. The open and obvious ones are the bribes – ethanol is the biggest scam going on right now. Underneath that and not discussed are threats – elected officials are told that their funding will dry up, that they will face a primary opponent or well-funded candidate from the other party. Committee positions are auctioned off and earmarks are used as carrots.

And then … one level below that … do you really think that wiretaps are benign, that call girls camped out on Capitol Hill are just for fun, that a little cash bribe here and there can’t be brought back to form a scandal? (When you see an abrupt resignation on Capitol Hill, it is a safe bet that someone has been cornered and threatened with exposure.)

But the point is that Obama could use all of these tools to pass bills favorable to the left. He has them all at his disposal. But with the Public Option … not done. With EFCA, not even introduced. But when a bad health care bill was finally on the docket, and now with tax cuts, the power is there, and he is flexing his muscles.

He’s negotiating with his opposition. Who are his opposition? Democrats.

He’s a con man. I bristle when I hear Democrats and others say that Obama is actually a “centrist” or a “moderate.” He is nothing like that – he is a right wing Republican. And it is right there, out in the open. All you have to do is take a view from twenty meters back.