Obama has built his campaign on promises and hope. Promises to change politics, to change America, to change the world. Hope that he actually knows what he’s talking about and is telling the truth. Research has shown that he’s offering false hope through lies and deception, and his promises don’t hold water.
One of his favorite talking points is change in politics; he claims that he is bipartisan, that he thinks about what is best for the country rather than what is best for his career or his party. Unfortunately, this is not supported by his record.
If this is what the Democratic party truly wanted, they would be voting for John McCain, a man who has bucked his party on major issues, such as immigration. John McCain is not popular with many conservatives because of his willingness to bend over for the liberals on these issues. His bipartisan work has included bills that are controversial, and brought heat from his own party. One of the few times Obama has crossed the aisle was to work with Tom Coburn on an ethics reform bill. According to Tom, the work was “the nature of the ethics reform bill that he and Obama sponsored was easy and popular. After all, it passed the Senate 98-2.” Tom had good things to say about Barack, but he also said the following.
“It’s easy to work across the aisle on consensus items. It’s when you demonstrate that you’ll stand in between — in no man’s land between the two trenches of the Democratic and Republican base, and you’ll take the heat,” he said. “We haven’t seen that from Barack. As much as I like him, he’s not ever rejected anything of his party to be able to stand in the middle.”
The Washington Times recently examined both McCain’s and Obama’s records regarding bipartisanship, and Obama comes up lacking.
Whether looking at bills they have led on or bills they have signed onto, Mr. McCain has reached across the aisle far more frequently and with more members than Mr. Obama since the latter came to the Senate in 2005.
Next comes the part that has put McCain under scrutiny from his own party:
In fact, by several measures, Mr. McCain has been more likely to team up with Democrats than with members of his own party. Democrats made up 55 percent of his political partners over the last two Congresses, including on the tough issues of campaign finance and global warming.
Obama’s bipartisan efforts? Not only were they significantly fewer, but they were on easy issues, things that no one would oppose, and wouldn’t upset his party.
For Mr. Obama, Republicans were only 13 percent of his co-sponsors during his time in the Senate, and he had his biggest bipartisan successes on noncontroversial measures, such as issuing a postage stamp in honor of civil rights icon Rosa Parks.
When we consider voting, who is reaching out and crossing party lines? Surely Obama’s fancy talk of cooperation and “one America” must be backed up by his voting, since his work on bills certainly doesn’t support it? Nope, his voting history can’t help him here either.
The Times study didn’t look at voting, but Congressional Quarterly conducts annual studies of senators’ voting records.
Over his Senate career, Mr. McCain has voted with the majority of Senate Republicans about 85 percent of the time, while in his three years in the Senate Mr. Obama has voted with his party 97 percent of the time.
Seems like what Barack and the liberals really mean is that they want the conservatives to bend over backwards, vote against their ethics and beliefs, and turn liberal, because the liberals have no intention of giving an inch.
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