CBS’s Chip Reid took aim at Obama’s lack of leadership, proving it’s not just the conservatives who are noticing BigO’s tendency to vote “present” on the hard things:
Q Is the President satisfied to follow, not lead, on deciding whether to do it?
MR. CARNEY: I take issue with the characterization. We think it is precisely because the President believes that the best outcome in a situation like we see in Libya, as we have seen in different forms in other countries in the region, that the best outcome will come when the action taken by countries — third-party countries outside of the country where the unrest is happening — be done in consensus with international partners, precisely so that it is not viewed by those who oppose positive democratic reform as the dictate of the West or the United States.
Q But wouldn’t it be fair to say — accurate to say the United States is still sitting on the fence on this? Isn’t it time to make a decision, yes or no?
MR. CARNEY: Well, Chip, you tell me if as an American citizen would you want your President not to consider all the implications and ramifications of taking military action.
Q Doesn’t there come a point to make a — where you have to make a decision?
via The Gateway Pundit.
As Pete Schweizer pointed out this morning on Big Peace:
President Obama continues to believe that speeches and statements (“Gaddafi should step down”) are tantamount to a policy. Power politics is not a debating society and flowery speeches and expressions of “hope and change” mean nothing at the end of the day. When Obama sat in the Illinois State Senate, he had a habit of voting “present” on certain thorny political issues. When it comes to leading the Free World, ”present” won’t just cut it.