A Man Of No Substance

During the run-up to the election, I stated repeatedly that Obama, with the help of a left wing media in lust and in love, presented a wholly false persona belied by the reality of his associations. His many pronouncements and promises had not the substance of the wind necessary to utter them. One of those promises - indeed, one of the central promises - was to refrain from taxing people making less than $250,000. Yet having added more than a trillion dollars to our debt and preparing to add much more, he has now decided that he is "agnostic" on the issue of raising taxes on the middle class.

This latest change in yet another core issue has led Victor Davis Hanson at the NRO to opine:

The problem with Obama’s new hedging on taxing those who make below $250,000, or his administration’s taking credit for victory in the Iraq war that they so once fervently tried to abort, or the flip-flop on renditions and tribunals, or the embarrassments over closing Guantanamo and trying KSM in New York or Mirandizing the Christmas Day bomber,or trashing/praising Wall Street grandees, is not that presidents cannot change their minds as circumstances warrant, or even that all politicians are at times hypocritical. No, the rub is that Obama is not merely flipping and triangulating on issues in a desperate attempt to shadow the polls, but he is doing so on matters that he once swore were absolutely central to his entire candidacy and his signature hope-and-change agenda, critical to the future of the U.S., and proof of his opponents’ either ignorance or disingenuousness. . . .

Many are comparing this to Bush I's "read my lips, no new taxes" pledge. Ed Driscoll asks if Obama has decided four years are enough? And are we about to witness the "revenge of Joe the Plumber?"