What might be considered 'federal assistance' in the future? Tax breaks? Roads? National security?

I hear that Goldman-Sachs wants to give the government bailout money back. I hope others follow suit.

Maybe Obama could have actually done some vetting of Daschle before he nominated him, like the near impossibility of – finding out where Daschle worked (a lobbying firm in the health care industry). I guess that would have been asking too much.

As for what Obama should have done, larry already answered – Obama should have revoked Geithner's nomination rather than let him be confirmed. Instead, Obama proved his own words about new ethics in government to be false.

Maybe somebody should tell our prez that the funding for his SCHIP program (62 cent tax on a pack of cigarettes) DEPENDS on the creation of 24 million new smokers. If Obama successfully attacks smoking, there is no funding for SCHIP. Duh.

And it almost made me puke when Obama portrayed his $900 billion pork bill as being "for the children." I guess Obama has a point, if you consider bankrupting your children before they reach adulthood a good thing.

Obama also seems to plan to send a couple brigades to Afghanistan without any plan or goal as to what to do with them. That could go worse than Iraq.

Obama appoints corrupt politicians, and seems to think it's okay if they cheat on their taxes. If he wants to make me think he seriously believes he screwed up he needs to fire the other tax cheat he appointed to head up the IRS, of all things.

Then he rails about executive pay. Does it bother anyone else that the president wants to control a citizen's compensation in the marketplace?

I've always had strong reservations about Obama but after the election tried to tell myself maybe he's a pragmatist who will do all right. But so far he's a nightmare.

What should he have done, slashed his wrists on primetime teevee?

Before Obama even took office the usual wingnuts began smearing and biting at him. We're in to his administration two weeks, Obama has accomplished a lot of good stuff already, but dishonest brokers, like my Kansas buddy, roysoldboy, are piling on stuff that he doesn't even know anything about.

Same old.

The question I have is this….Why do conservatives, motivated by their Dear Leader Limbaugh, want America to fail? Why do Boner and Steele believers want America to experience a more severe Depression than in the 30's?

Why?

Remember when Bush appointees (ie Harriet Meyers, Bernard Kerik) were examples of poor judgement? Oh those were the days. Now its nothing to see here, please move along. This president can do no wrong and his judgement is unquestionable.

Daschle had to step down, probably because he didn't want any further investigations to lead to a lengthy jail term for himself. Obama's just offering us more crooks. You're right. Total double standards from the guy who encouraged us to keep our thermostats low during the election so he could crank the thermostat in the White House up a few more notches. Unimaginable, I know.

I am very tired of hearing the sound bite in which Obama told Anderson Cooper, "I screwed up". CNN has run it over and over all morning. I know that Saint Barack screwed up in that appointment and, I, like anybody else know that he appointed Daschle for one reason and only one reason. He wanted to see his universal system of one payer health care instituted and Daschle had been one of those people for many years.

Lets say that the minute he made the appointment Daschle remembered what he had not done but even The Man thought he could slip this appointment by the voters. Of course he screwed up, but he did that when he continued to be for Dashcle for the job not in appointing him. There is a double standard here and Obama is willing to use it to get his way with all things.

Now that he is president and we see the decisions he is making, do the Dems still trust him? He made poor decisions before the elections, with his associations and now with his appointments. He reminds me of the kid in school who was really nice, but because of his childhood home life he tends to drift toward friends that are less than reputable and wanted to please that crowd with favors.