Absent-In-Chief

The Story of Stuff is a very frightening animated documentary about the product life cycle by political activist Annie Leonard. The video was sponsored by the Tides Center, a non-profit group that provides sponsorship for progressive projects. The documentary is being shown in elementary schools, although it has been banned in some school districts. The video criticizes excessive consumerism which in it self doesn't sound so bad. After all I do think we are a little too materialistic sometimes. Annie introduces the government with the image of a tank "Some people think we should use a tank to represent the government. After all the government spends half our tax dollars on the military. It's the government's job to watch out for us, take care of us; that's their job." (The figure she presents is very inaccurate. She got the figure from the War Resistors League website. The figure is more accurately ranged at 20-25% which I feel is way too low).
 
What!? Last time I checked the job of the government was to protect us. In specific, it's the job of the federal government is to protect us from foreign and domestic enemies. Last time I checked, the job of the president was commander-in-chief, not a spokesman for a government run health care program. So far Obama is doing a pretty good job of getting his voice out there. He's made appearances on David Letterman, ESPN, The Obama Channel (MSNBC), and every Sunday news morning political talk show except Fox News. Fox News is the cable news network with the highest ratings by the way, but that's beside the point. His voice is sure getting out there although the public by a majority is against his proposed government run health care option.

Now when it comes to Obama's job as president, absent-in chief seems more fitting. So far our "commander-in-chief" has managed to have time to schedule t.v. appearances, but was only able to speak with Stanley McChrystal once since his inauguration in January. So far he has cut the defense budget, abandoned our Eastern-European allies with the missile defense shield, tried to close Guantanamo, and has demoralized the CIA. Some how we are suppose to believe we are more safe? When it comes to Obama's most sacred responsibility he clearly is failing.