Inhofe lays long list of nation’s ills at Obama’s feet
BY RANDY KREHBIEL World Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
BROKEN ARROW — President
Barack Obama alone is
to blame for the nation’s budget
deficit – and just about
everything else, U.S. Sen. Jim
Inhofe told the Broken Arrow
Chamber of Commerce
on Tuesday.
“We now have a president,
and I don’t mean this disrespectfully,
who is destroying
these very institutions that
made America great,” Inhofe,
R-Okla., said.
Inhofe went on to say the
Obama administration has
“disarmed America,” is solely
responsible for the federal
budget deficit, mostly
responsible for the nation’s
dependence on imported oil
and suffocating business with
regulations.
He also said Obama engineered
the House Republicans’
ban on earmarks in
order to give himself more
control of the budget.
“When they came along
with this moratorium, you
have to let the president run
everything,” Inhofe said.
“They conceded that authority
to the president of the
United States, so that’s why
the president was behind the
whole earmark thing."
Inhofe said the earmark
ban allowed the administration
to block a new $10 million
control tower scheduled
for Tinker Air Force Base.
He said military spending,
as a share of gross domestic
product, has declined during
the Obama administration
and criticized unflattering
descriptions of the prison
at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba,
where terror suspects are
held, saying, “You know the
biggest problem for prisoners
when they get to Gitmo?
Obesity."
Inhofe said the idea that
prisoners have been tortured
there was invented by Obama
and others “to make you think
something bad is happening
in America — the same thing
he does and others do when
they go around talking about
how bad America is."
Inhofe said the deficit is
Obama’s fault because “it’s
the president’s budget. Period.
That’s the end of it."
He said the recent debtlimit
agreement is a sham
that does little or nothing to
reduce overall spending.
One solution, he continued,
would be to repeal the
health-care reform law,
which he said is an example
of “social engineering” designed
to make Americans
more dependent on the federal
government.
Inhofe also cited extended
unemployment benefits,
saying he saw no reason for
them in Oklahoma because
the state has “virtually full
employment."
Inhofe laid out a long list
of regulatory steps he said
would cost taxpayers and
employers billions of dollars
in taxes and lost productivity,
and said the country could
be “totally independent from
the Middle East in a matter
of weeks, not years,” if the
administration allowed unfettered
oil and gas development
on public lands.
Noting that he will not be
up for re-election until 2014,
Inhofe said, “Don’t misunderstand,
(nothing) I’m saying
now is for political purposes."
Randy Krehbiel 918-581-8365
randy.krehbiel@tulsaworld.com
Associated Images:
BLAME GAME
U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe: He said Obama is at fault for the
U.S. debt problem.
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