Obama betting 2008 no fluke - Americans really are stupid

Obama is betting that Americans are really as stupid as his 2008 presidential campaign seemed to bear out, and that they will fall for the soaring rhetoric, and ignore his incompetency and failed policies to reelect him in 2012.

He has thrown any pretense of governing the nation out the window and has switched to full campaign mode, not even making the slightest attempt to be truthful, or to try and work the legislative levers to get anything done.

Obama's constant haranguing to pass his jobs bill is more about his power to persuade the American people to vote for him in 2012, then it is about passing legislation or creating jobs. He knows it won't pass, but wants to make sure that Congress gets the blame, not him. And when Obama says "Congress" he means Republicans.

It is all about Obama, he is willing to use his failed jobs bill as a campaign message against the Republicans for his reelection. The people, the economy, the country be damned, its all a campaign stunt.

"He knows it's not going to pass. He's betting that voters won't pick up on it, or even if they do they will blame Congress and he can run against the 'do-nothing Congress,'" said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a senior fellow at the University of Southern California's School of Policy, Planning and Development.

When Obama accuses Republicans of standing in the way of his nearly $450 billion plan, he ignores the fact that his own party has refused to unite behind the proposal either.

When Obama says Republicans haven't explained what they oppose in the plan, he ignores the fact that Republicans who control the House actually have done that in detail.

And when he calls on Congress to "pass this bill now," he slides past the point that Democrats control the Senate and were never prepared to move immediately, given other priorities. Senators are expected to vote Tuesday on opening debate on the bill, a month after the president unveiled it with a call for its immediate passage.

To be sure, Obama is only engaging in rhetorical excesses. But he is the president, and as such, his constant remarks on the bill draw the most attention and scrutiny.

The disconnect between what Obama says about his jobs bill and what stands as the political reality flow from his broader aim: to rally the public behind his cause and get Congress to act, or, if not, to pin blame on Republicans.

This is all about campaigning, not governing, and all about the success of Obama, not America.