Who is Barak Obama?

I'm beginning to wonder: Who IS Barak Obama?

I know he lives in the White House; that's not the question.

It's how he is presiding that gives me pause.

Pressuring executives of private companies to resign or be fired is at best questionable.

On one hand, I have to agree that some of these managers who drove their companies to Washington DC with tin cup in hand deserve to be forced out. Still, even "public" companies are private - that is, not government owned.

I'll agree that if an organization gets federal funds, especially in the amounts currently being handed out, the government - us - SHOULD have a say in the organization's management. We, the citizens, are suddenly shareholders.

So, on the one hand, I can understand the government's - our - concern to toss out bad management.

And I know that elsewhere, government and private organizations are very much in bed with each other. This, however, is the US and government-commercial liaisons have always been looked at with a jaundiced eye; anyone remember the "military-industrial complex" on the Eisenhower era?

Still, the "camel has its nose in the tent" and I'm fearful that, sans strict controls, the tail (government) soon will be wagging the dog.

I am more disturbed by Obama's decision that North Korea violated some law by launching a ballistic missile.

I believe the North Korean leadership is as "crazy" as some in the middle east and that perhaps the launch was as much to provoke a stupid response on "our side" as it was to test a missile.

But North Korea, for all its leadership's madness, IS a sovereign nation, just like the U.S. or France, England, China, or any of the 100-plus other nations flying their flags around the world.

If North Korea were Hamas - a terrorist organization that ruthlessly rules in Gaza - it would be understandable that "civilized" nations would be concerned.

South Korea need not be concerned by North Korea's launch; the missile was long-range; if North Korea wants to target the southern part of the peninsula it could use some of the short-range missiles finding their way into Moslem hands in middle east.

Is North Korea a threat to the U.S.? Not really. The U.S. - and Canada - have anti-missile defenses that should be far superior to the North Korean weaponry - in other words, it is highly unlikely a missile launched in North Korea would arrive any where in the U.S. - Alaska and Hawaii included.

More disturbing than missiles are North Korean - and Iranian - nuclear programs. Both governments make promises to allow inspections or to disband programs then - after being paid off by the likes of Uncle Sam - renege on the promises. Rather like the Nazis.

I consider myself to be a fiscal conservative and social liberal, but I never considered myself a libertine.

I still don't.

I think my concerns with the Obama administration go back to a threat I perceive to individual and corporate freedoms.

I do not object to regulations to govern transactions; we have proven greed overrides decency so regulations are needed. On the other hand, who regulates the regulators? Our government is not known to be a paragon of virtue.

The Obama direction, frankly, scares me. Despite the rhetoric of "listening rather than telling," I think we will become the world's bully. Perhaps with a velvet glove - vs. the Bush ineptness - but a bully none-the-less. Will our neighbors tolerate it? Doubtful.

Should we continue to tolerate the Obama administration's take-over of American business?

It makes me nervous.

Yohanon
Yohanon.Glenn @ gmail.com