10 Reasons Why the Death of Bin Laden Won't Help Obama In the Long RunThe question already being widely asked by political junkies after the killing of Usama bin Laden: will the immediate bump in the polls for President Obama last? Should we, as "The View" co-host Joy Behar suggested Monday, “just skip the next election?â€
The answer in a word: no. In fact, it’s easy to come up with ten reasons why:
1. Who Gets Credit? Within a couple news cycles, the airwaves were already buzzing with controversy over whether President Obama had taken too much credit for the success of the operation. >>>
2. It’s the Economy, Stupid. Past election cycles have demonstrated that, short of world war, short-term foreign-policy successes won’t overcome a prolonged economic downturn. Today’s headlines can’t obscure the prospect of $5 per gallon gas, rising food prices, continued high unemployment, a potential double-dip recession and trillions of dollars in deficit spending that will produce an extended budget battle.
3. Déjà Vu 1991: >>>
4. Attacks from the Left: The very success of the Usama bin Laden initiative is already raising questions from the Moveon.org set. The White House is already on the defensive on how and why Bin Laden was killed, especially with its delayed admission that the terrorist was unarmed when he was assassinated. Plus the mission has already revived attention to his stepped-up use of drones and reversal on closing Guantanamo and led to calls from the left to expedite America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.
5. Biting the Hand that Feeds Him: President Obama is exulting over an operation carried out by elite troops with expensive technology. Yet the president has called for severe defense cuts >>>
6. The Real Foreign Policy Story of Coming Months? Libya: >>>
7. UBL Doesn’t Undo ObamaCare: >>>
8. Culture Wars: Tracking down Bin Laden doesn’t change the fact that President Obama represents values far out of step with mainstream America’s. >>>
9. BHO, Tax-Hiker: The compromise President Obama closed with Republicans last year to avoid the expiration of the Bush tax cuts runs out in 2012, and the president has pledged he will not extend the cuts. Explicitly running as a tax-hiker has not proved a winning strategy in the past –
10. Tea, Anyone? The Tea Party, conservative talk TV and radio and the blogosphere – >>>
So my advice to prospective GOP candidates: take a deep breath, and keep focused on November 2012. These days, a week in politics is a lifetime.
=============================================
So, who's afraid of the Big Bad Mussie/ Commie/ Marxist? Judging by the 1st Republican debates ... not many.