WILL THE REAL OBAMA PLEASE STAND UP?

It is sure a good thing our new president is a people's president ready to return the White House to focusing on the needs of the "little people". Of course there are a few contradictions in what he has done to date that raise eyebrows but his loyal staff seem able to sugar coat these actions with the adoring media and thus deflect attention from the contradictions.

I mentioned in an earlier article how he vowed to keep lobbyists out of government and then violated his own executive order and hired lobbyists. There are the seven senior executive nominees who owed back taxes, quite significant sums in some cases. He promised to bring reform to campaign laws which are yet to be seen while his people's campaign shattered spending records more than doubling the most ever spent in a presidential campaign.

He has given no explanation to his secret relationship with Goldman Sachs other than to help them remain the dominant investment banking house in the world, keeping their stock value at a level far beyond their closest competitors, and even giving billions to AIG of which $30 billion were passed on to Goldman Sachs. That is quite a return on their investment of a few millions into his campaign. More important, in spite of his highly publicized ranting and raving about the greed of bankers and Wall Street, he has never mentioned the biggest and greediest of all Wall Street, Goldman Sachs.

This Ivy League by product, we are now in the 21st straight year of having an Ivy League president and will reach 24 straight years by the end of his first term, has little in common with the little people. He attended Columbia and Harvard, his wife attended Princeton and Harvard. Both spent under-graduate and graduate years in the Ivy League at the most expensive schools in the world. Today it would cost about $435,000 for the law degree, meaning Michelle and Barack spent nearly $1 million ($868,000 in today's dollars plus other expenses) for their Ivy League educations.

Since he entered public service as a community organizer and state senator, both quite low paying jobs, one wonders how all those education loans got paid. I don't remember anyone in the media asking who paid the million dollars during the campaign. Still, even with the huge debt they were able to spend another $1.6 million for a home when he was first elected to the US Senate. His close advisor who arranged that deal is now in jail, Tony Rezko, a Chicago multi-millionaire fixer who lived across the street.

Then Obama enters the White House promising to change things, clean out the old Washington and bring in new people. His top advisor is a hand-me-down investment banker from Clinton and his top five White House advisors are all multi-millionaires. Again it seems rather unusual for a people's president to be surrounded by millionaires. Of course when his daughters toured their new home in the White House and found the Jonas brothers recording stars in their bedroom, it once again seemed rather unusual for a populist.

Now that he has been in office a couple of months he has added a couple of trillion dollars to our budget and his first budget increased government cost by another trillion. At the rate he is spending he will double our national debt in about three years, twice as fast as Bush did in spite of 911 and two wars. In fact our taxes for his budget next year only pay for 44% of the cost. Where in the world is the rest coming from?

Okay, so there are a few conflicts, but what about the dog. After the election he promised his kids a dog and the family promptly decided to set an example by getting a pound pup. Three months later it turns out there will be no pound pup but a Portuguese Water Dog from one of the most exclusive breeders in the world where the dogs can cost over $2,500. Did I mention the Texas breeder where he is getting the dog is the same who breeds Portuguese Water Dogs for the Ted Kennedy family?

Tonight, Good Friday, one of the holiest days in Christianity, he is throwing a party for 140 of his closest friends at the White House and having Chicago deep dish pizza brought in from St. Louis, not Chicago, which I suppose is the Ivy League way of honoring the death of Jesus.

Finally there is the mysterious selection of Joe Biden, resident pit bull and bionic tongue and godfather to America's credit card companies and their insane interest charges as Vice President. You do understand he is a heartbeat away from the presidency? With his tongue he is the time bomb of the Obama team. Now to be fair, he did predict a major international crisis within a few months of Obama taking office. I guess the attempted hijacking of the American cargo ship by Somalia pirates and taking the captain hostage qualifies.

Does anybody know just who we elected to be president?