Where Does the Buck Stop?

On March 16, 2006 Senator Barack Obama spoke on the floor of the U.S. Senate as part of the Senate debate on increasing the limit on the national debt.

Senator Obama said, “The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure… Leadership means that ‘the buck stops here.’ Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren.”

The leadership that Senator Obama was criticizing in 2006 was that of President Bush.

On February 17, 2009 President Obama signed the $789 billion stimulus bill, which included an increase of the limit on the national debt to $12.1 trillion. Now, the Obama administration has asked Congress to raise the debt limit again, saying that the $12.1 trillion limit set in February could be reached by mid-October.

Can we expect to hear President Obama admit that the limit on our national debt needing to be raised twice during his first year in office is “a sign of leadership failure”? Will the buck stop at the office of this President?

I doubt it.