The Great Bait and Switch of 2009

[Embar Angylwrath]

I just find it odd that some very smart people on this board aren't asking themselves why Obama chose to abandon this promise. Hey, a promise is a promise, and he just decided he didn't need to keep it anymore.

No explanation, no "Hey, we tried, but this is why it isn't working", just an abandonment of a promise and a bunch of smiling faces on the left. And you also have to ask yourself.. why abandon this one.. its sooo easy to keep. Did five days inconvenience Obama too much? If so, why not come out and say so? Why not say.. "Hey.. this isn't working, I thought I could do it, but the pressures of the office don't allow me the flexibility of signing bills 5 days after I get them."

But we hear nothing... actually we hear from the press secrertary that posting of the final committee report is good enough.. but that's not what Obama promised.

A broken promis is a broken promise, big, small, medium sized, whatever. And a broken promise without an explanation and an apology is.. well.. an entitlement whore.

[Harlowe]

It's a ridiculous thing to get riled up about. No politician lives in a vacuum where they make all the decisions. If they make the effort and generally live up to their agenda, then good. I think most sensible people vote for the person they feel will do the best job, not for individual campaign promises.

There are bigger things to worry about then nitpicking every little stupid thing like this to go after the guy for something. If this is the best you can do, it's pretty whiny, unrealistic and smells like desperation.

[Lurker]

You don't think listing all the popular legislation Obama signed and then complaining that he broke his promise to post them on whitehouse.gov for five days is a winning strategy?

[Embar Angylwrath]

Both of those posts evade the questions.

Why won't he keep the promise he made?

And why won't he explain to Americans the reasons behind the abandonment of that promise?

[Lurker]

An update was posted on the White House blog in February.

Gibbs answered questions about it at a May 22nd press briefing.

Q Robert, on the signings today, I'm wondering, the President had pledged to put bills up on the Web for five days before he signed legislation. And is that just pretty much out the window?

MR. BURTON: It's been five days.

MR. GIBBS: I think we posted conference reports several days in advance. I can get you the exact days.

Q The conference reports?

MR. GIBBS: The conference reports that after they've voted on become the gross legislation that's delivered here that the President ultimately signs that becomes public law.

Q So you're -- is that a finalized version of it that went out or --

MR. GIBBS: Well, a conference report, as you know, is an unamendable piece of legislation that has to be approved by both Houses, language has to be simultaneous, it gets sent down here, and we sign it. So if a conference report is -- if something is delineated as a conference report or if there's not a conference committee and there's a separate piece of legislation, if the Senate passes a bill -- if the House and Senate pass different versions of a bill and the House agrees to accede to the Senate version, then the Senate version might be put up before the House votes on it. Once they vote on it, both Houses have passed identical legislation, and it comes down here.

Q So it's effectively a finalized version. It just hasn't --

MR. GIBBS: It's not effectively -- it legally is, yes.

Q Okay.

So the White House is not following the exact letter of the pledge but is trying to follow the intent. The few people that have siezed on this "broken promise" as an issue are left complaining that the White House is linking to the legislation instead of posting it like they promised! It's sort of sad.

You aren't likely to see a prime time Obama press conference addressing this serious issue anytime soon.

[Embar Angylwrath]

Gibbs had the opportunity to state why Obama wasn't holding up his pledge, instead, he tried to spin it. Why?

[Harlowe]

You know this would be interesting (and more credible) if the same people had shown this kind of veracity towards Bush, because you had the mother load of spinning and lies during that administration and yet ....it was pretty quiet on the western front.

[Lurker]

It would be more credible but no more interesting.

Obama promised to post legislation on whitehouse.gov for five days of public review, but instead of posting the legislation he's just linking to it. And sometimes not even for five days! What will we tell the children?

[Mukik]

I am sorry..but compared to the other bait and switch, a fucking car tax is the least of our problems. What about incentives to stop offshoring? We still have customers signing up for service over at the great black scrotum sack called india.