View From The Middle

President Barack Obama deserves a lot of credit for trying to fulfill so many of his campaign promises so fast. However, he has been in office for precisely 51 days now and, sadly, he has not conquered the world (something he actually wanted to do, but the time just crept up on him).

Kidding aside, it was astounding to watch this man win the presidency by using those tactics that, yes, cajoled most of us into thinking we would have a man of change in the White House. Here was a classy guy with a smooth tongue and smooth ways who would be able to crunch the naysayers with just a few rhetorical phrases and then have his way with them; a man who would be able to talk his way into situations presenting the direst of conclusions and then, just as easily, talk his way out.

Sounds like a con man, doesn't it? Instead, though, we have here a clever, articulate, smart person with sincerity of purpose; something you don't see nowadays on the right side of the law.

No, we wouldn't have been happy with Obama's opponent, John McCain — or any other Republican, for that matter. McCain, first of all, would have just generally followed the policies of the previous eight years, and it was obvious we couldn't do that. My God, how far down the pit could we have fallen?

With that said, though, it was therefore refreshing to see this shrewd Obama person oratorically shoot down all comers and become what we'd hoped would be an unparalleled leader. With his smooth talk, it seemed he actually might be able to overcome so many obstacles at one time. At the outset, his popularity rating around the country was 67 percent, and it's now 58 percent — that's extremely high, even with new problem after new problem cropping up daily. And, yes, it's only half of those first one hundred days.

However, Mr. Obama's plate is just too full to take on crisis after crisis at this time. Word came last Friday that the unemployment rate is now 8.1 percent nationwide, with 650,000 jobs having been lost last month alone. While we read about that in the Wall Street Journal, on the very same day the President was holding a "summit" meeting regarding the future of health care. And earlier this week another seminar, with the president on board, was being held on education and what we're going to do about it.

You can believe there were other, similar meetings, seminars, "summits," if you will, and assemblies recently attended by him just as necessary and important in nature....but he's like a Prince Valiant, wielding a heavy sword and slashing wildly at any and every opponent that comes his way. Next, we'll hear about the Global Warming crisis; then Nuclear Proliferation, not to forget the dilemmas of Iraq and, mostly, Afghanistan.

Obviously, they are all important, but obviously we cannot address them all with the same force at the same time.

It's easy to ask, rhetorically, "Then what do we do?" because we know what comes first at this time: unfortunately, it seems to be the economy (with the only reverse being if the wars heat up). We must concentrate on one issue — and see that conquering it is our prime responsibility. The President has got to stop floundering as if he just got to the White House — which he did (sorry, fella. It's your cake; now eat it!). One must visualize a mechanical figure that, when it's fully wound up, runs to the wall on one side of the room and stops with its legs still running, then turns to the right and runs to the wall on the other side, stops, turns and runs to the wall on the other side, etc., etc., until it winds down, at which time the family dog picks it up and scampers away with it. There is no end until the Department of the Treasury devises a plan to get us out of the predicament; and right now the Secretary of the Treasury, Timothy Geithner, can't get anybody qualified (or honest) enough to work for him.

Meanwhile, Obama is working on how he's going to finance a fund raiser for the Little Sisters of the Poor Foundation or whatever other crisis he can come up with. And our capitalists are starting to get itchy and scared we're turning into a Socialistic country by taking over the banks, so they're putting their cash under the mattress.

I'm afraid there's so much on the president's plate that he — and the American people — just won't be able to digest it.

Then what?