Colour me puzzled

I am beginning to think Barack Obama is not America’s first black president as much as he is its first chameleon president. His colours change with his background.

His supporters seem mystified by some of the things he is doing, like proposing to carry on the war in Afghanistan and leave a substantial number of troops in Iraq. These people must have been soaring on his rhetoric and not paying much attention to the devil (i.e. the details) because those are the things he said he would do, including attacking Pakistan.

But what puzzles me is some of this other stuff that seems to contradict what he stands for.

Colour me complacent

President”Hopey-Changey Guy” to borrow a conceit from Mark Steyn, was going to provide radically different government from his predecessor. Yet as this story shows, conservatives are really happy with the way he is handling the terrorist file, because he is not in any particular hurry to dismantle the operations set up by George Bush.

Colour me invisible

Not so happy are the tens of thousands of veterans, particularly those who have been physically or mentally damaged, from fighting their country’s battles. President “Fix the Health Care System” intends to offload the financing of their care on the private insurance industry. The problem with the U.S. health care system which he was supposed to fix is the private insurance industry.

Colour me red (either with anger or embarrassment, take your pick)

Then we find that President “Outraged” has instructed his minions to do everything possible to demand that AIG not pay bonuses to its managers. That seems to be a very principled stance, on behalf of U.S. taxpayers. Left off the table, however, is the more than $100,000 AIG contributed to Obama’s election campaign. Some outrage is good, but too much outrage would be over the top, I guess.