Ahead of SOTU, Obama makes "Giant Leap" to the Right

In what appears to be an historic defeat of Obama's radical leftism, the past few days have been witness to, perhaps, the greatest lurch toward the center from the far reaches of the radical left. Obama, the same President who believes that the Auto industry, Healthcare industry, Banking industry, etc have no place in a capitalist free market has proposed a very radical idea in regards to human space exploration - Give it to the free market.

The White House has decided to begin funding private companies to carry NASA astronauts into space, but the proposal faces major political and budget hurdles, according to people familiar with the matter.
The controversial proposal, expected to be included in the Obama administration's next budget, would open a new chapter in the U.S. space program. The goal is to set up a multiyear, multi-billion-dollar initiative allowing private firms, including some start-ups, to compete to build and operate spacecraft capable of ferrying U.S. astronauts into orbit—and eventually deeper into the solar system.

As a veteran engineer in the aerospace industry, as well as a former employee of the NASA run Orion/Ares programs, I (for the first time since he has taken office) applaud the President. Where the Ares I rocket was nothing more than a money funnel and engineering disaster, private ventures like Space-X have developed and test flown the predecessor to their human rated launcher capable of servicing the ISS for about 1/10 the cost of NASA's Ares. Their Falcons are greener, cheaper, currently in production, and fully reusable. NASA has had one barely successful test of a mock-up Ares concept vehicle which revealed the further nightmare to follow (less about a Billion more dollars a year to fix), which is extremely inefficient, acoustically non-viable for human space flight, and economically impractical. The novel concept of eliminating governmental restrictions on human space flight, opening the frontier to start-ups which promotes innovation in space exploration technologies leaps and bounds above what the old dinosaur (NASA) could possibly conceive, is nothing short of Goldwater style governing.

This idea of privatization has already made heads explode at the "two liberal for Obama" (2L4O) lefties, such as BlueLyon (who can be found in my daily blog recommendations section). The left is up in arms that "The One", with the power of a near super majority and all his grace, has in one short year surrendered to the opposition on the fundamental philosophy of state run EVERYTHING. The very idea of private ventures taking governmental bureaucracies to task on ANYTHING is in direct contradiction to the Marxist values embraced by Obama and his ilk on the left, leading one to wonder - WHY?

Why has Obama endorsed a spending freeze for all federal government agencies except defense? Why has Obama endorsed a tax cut the likes of first term George W. Bush? Why this sudden lurch to the right?

The answer is clear - it is election year and a great number of Alinsky style leftists are positioned to lose their seats, losing power for the left in the final two years of the Obama presidency. Obama's power of persuasion has been met with defeat after defeat on everything from major elections, such as last week's MA Senate Race, to the simplest task of bringing the Olympics to America. He has quickly become the least popular president after his first year in office, setting the stage for being the least popular president in the history of the country. The implementation of a Socialist Empire in America is crumbling... As such, the spending freeze, tax cuts, and budget cuts are being proposed by a man eager to win back the hearts and minds of the independents ahead of the 2010 election with hopes that in two more years he can ram through socialist ideal after socialist ideal.

Is it enough to fool some people? Perhaps. Is it enough of a veil to mask a failed first year? Maybe for some. Is it enough to hid the fact that these proposals are merely a PR mirage to cover up his true agenda? Not likely. Congressional Democrats are going to eat this president alive for abandoning their core values on the public stage, their Alinsky/Marxist values, at a time when they have held more power than any party in history. Their disarray will be clear as the elections move closer, and without the "Blame Bush" message, the Democrats have nothing left to offer other than failed socialist policies... and the people are becoming well aware of this.

In the State of the Union speech tonight I have to wonder, will a teary eyed Democrat stand up and shout down the President with a resounding "You Lie(d)", as the hopes and dreams of the radical left are systematically renounced by the one who would "Fundamentally Change" America?