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- Obama now says he didn't campaign on the public option. The Google says he did, a lot.
- As President, Obama campaigned for the public option -- to some audiences anyway
- The irony is that DOD's pregnancy anti-pregnancy policy will probably lead to more abortions
- Obama doesn't think he compromised one bit on health care bill
- Gay marriage in Mexico City angers Catholic church and conservatives
He gave away rebulding every bridge in the country.... for some tax cuts.
little hussein's giveaways.... got him 3 votes in the senate and ZERO in the house. fucking dipshit moron.
He's like the abused partner going back for more. Seriously.
It's a psychological deficit of his. Even if he got intensive psychotherapy for it 3x a week AND cleaned out his administration to curb the destructive environmental inputs that feed it, he can't just magically transform himself.
His neoliberal economic team caused the problems we have in the first place. Hillary the warmonger is throwing her weight around overseas but also acting like a childish bully and a boor, totally unbecoming for a Secretary of State. Somebody needs to dress her down and tell her to straighten up and fly right, just from the perspective of protocol. Over 50% of Americans don't support Afghanistan anymore, and we are ramping up in South America now to bully democratically elected leaders simply because those leaders want to institute policies that help their people and are not in the best interests of U.S. capital.
I remember the day Obama made a speech about some journo being killed by the Iranian police during their protests and how horrifically the Iranian authorities were treating a human life. That same day, we dropped a drone in Pak and killed about 20 people. His hypocrisy is just stunning. I can't wrap my mind around the endless war and how Americans have become so accustomed to it and removed from it emotionally. Our military spending is sending us over a cliff economically and is the elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about. It is immoral to support a leader who does this kind of indiscriminate killing.
Capitalism is an irrational and immoral theory, but U.S. capitalism in particular is vile, vindictive, and extremely irrational. It will never be otherwise and should be eliminated.
Even people in public jobs will fuck people over just for the sport. If you give someone in the country the right to say yes or no... 99.9 % of the time they say NO. Even if it costs them nothings. I cant blame this on theoretical capitalism.
Europe is not nearly as cutthroat as we are. I
If it's a watered down piece of unpopular shit, the Republicans will be able to criticize and win converts who will say "the Democrats screwed it up, let's not try this again. " So Democrats will still lose in the end.
If he says "I'm going for this without Republican support" and keeps the bill the way it is with a phony b.s. public option that isn't worth anything, HE WILL STILL LOSE. DEMOCRATS WILL STILL LOSE.
It has to be really popular if he does it without Republican help. The only program that is popular enough is single payer.
Its time we admit he is a failure. I just hope we can kill this monster that Baucus & Company are creating. It will only make things worse.
If he wants to be a leader, he needs to actually lead.
But, that hope is getting harder and harder to hang on to.
So far he has basically thrown the glbt community under the bus, allowed Bush/Cheney to get away with abuses of power and possible criminal behavior (which opens the door up to future abuse), chosen to hold onto some of the excesses of Executive power that Bush/Cheney set as a precedent, let the inmates that created the mess run finance, and has misplayed the health care debate.
Yet, I cannot fathom what life would be like under McCain/Palin. THAT would have been a cartoonish nightmare.
So, I hold out hope that he gets it together. But, if this post-election Obama continues to treat the progressives in the party like pariahs, I hope the entire progressive base rallies around another Democratic candidate come 2012.
I know I will. My days of supporting anyone but progressive candidates is over.
But back to the president. Obama has got to get better than what he has shown us thus far.
Doesn't he?
At the very least we need to hope for that.
That was the one presidential decision he had to make during the campaign. And he invested no thought into the selection. He disqualified himself for higher office, in my opinion.
His campaign tactics were some of the worst in memory, on top of that.
Add to that who he would have replaced David Souter with, destroying the make-up of the Supreme Court.
Besides which, I cannot stand his politics.
I certainly hope that during the 2010 and 2012 elections, you remember what you wrote here about keeping your support for progressive candidates only. Because just as with the 2008 election, the 'other guy' (which is to say, whomever the Republican party decides to nominate) is going to look worse than their conservative Democratic party opponent. And you'll be in the voting booth asking 'Should I once again vote against my own interests, hold my nose, and pull the lever for the Democrats? Or am I really going to have the courage of my convictions?'
It is not an easy decision to make, but the lesser-of-two-evils vote is the reason why Democrats won the past few election cycles and why progressives and their concerns continue to be ignored.
In the national elections, after the primaries have selected candidates, I will vote for the Democrat (unless there is an amazingly attractive 3rd party option that has a legitimate shot at winning).
A vote for a Republican has serious implications for the Supreme Court (as far as the Presidency and Senate, at least). So, yes, I would hold my nose, generally, and vote for the Democrat.
However, I am no longer giving money to the DNC. And. if Obama is the candidate, and we have had 3 more years of this, I would not give money or invest any time in his re-relection.
I will only contribute financially to progressive politicians. And they will be the only ones I will bother to take the time to advocate for.
But, it would be a nightmare to give the GOP power again.
I would prefer to work within our party to change it.
If you need to solve a problem, the first step is to use the Bully Pulpit to identify the problem, the specific solutions you're offering, why it will work, and meet any anticipated objections.
On both the economy and health care, Obama seemed to be more concerned with staying behind the scenes and being vague - only now has he gotten out on the stump for the thing, trying to drum up support.
By not being proactive, he allowed the Republicans to define the debate and create misinformation about what's actually happening. The result is that individual Senators and Representatives of his own party are taking the heat at town meetings - he laid no groundwork for them to work with.
There's a reason FDR did his "Fireside Chats". They weren't just about putting the nation at ease in tough times - it was the way his administration defined the debate and built a framework for the public to understand what his party was up to in Congress.
One would think Obama would have learned something from Bush - George W's drumbeat for war over several months was just a series of Fireside Chats to show the public what he was doing and talk them into it.
Having members of your party have to take heat in their own districts while you're squirreled away in the White House isn't a good way to keep Congress on your side.
It may be time to think of him as another Clinton but missing one ball. Maybe both. Not sure yet as he and Gibbs are a bit limp on taking a stand. Which leads to the public support of health insurance reform problem...
No balls Obama. I keep ending up there regardless of how many freak patriots he lets stand outside his town halls with AR-15 rifles or other weaponry. Allowing that is just another cave that GWB would not have tolerated. I'm thinking Obama will allow grenades at the rate it's going.
Keep on the House and pray Harry Reid finds his balls. Obama will not meet his campaign promise on this without the Congress delivering.
Obama is starting to disappear into the green belt rabbit hole of corporatism and elitism. With another 1,500,000 Americans falling into poverty, a Grand Canyon family vacation isn't exactly a demonstration of compassion for the families who are losing everything.
I support this kind of journalism, since it is productive and based off facts.
Sadly, even when he speaks out, the press does not cover him.
THERE ARE SEVERAL MEMOS THAT HAVE GONE OUT WITHIN INSURANCE COMPANIES.
Employees are being asked to use specially prepared “talking points” to try and disrupt conversation and debate on various Blog forums regarding Health-Care reform.
Generally their message will be centered on fear and/or anger.
They have been trained by insurance company Political linguists to “give a human voice” to the “personal opposition” of Health Care reform on various Health Care related Blogs.
Their scripts are updated daily: They are easy to distinguish by their inability to form any original or logical thought and by their aggressive and non-respectful tone.
YOU CAN SPOT THE INSURANCE COMPANY OPERATIVES FROM A LEGITIMITE “VOICE” BECAUSE THEY WILL QUICKLY USE PERSONAL ATTACKS OR SEEMINGLY UNRELATED ATTACKS WHEN CHALLENGED.
THEY ARE PLANTED BLOGGERS MEANT TO STOP DISCUSSION, REASON, LOGIC AND DEBATE AND ULTIMATELY PREVENT HEALTH CARE REFORM.
http://wordbloom.wordpress.com/
http://www.hillaryclintonquarterly.com/village/...
I'm so tired of your Monday morning quarterbacking. If only you spent half as much time attacking Republicans as you spent criticizing our President, this site would be tolerable. What's worse, your critiques are a carbon copy of the petty nagging you displayed last year during the campaign...you were WRONG then, and I'm sure that time will prove you're WRONG now.
Hey, guess what...Barack Obama is on our side! Real progressive know not to form a circular firing squad. If you don't like it, get another liberal elected President.
No? Well, what has he done, then?
Rick Warren,... compared gay relationships to incest and child-rape... defends DOMA...won't employ stop-loss to keep GLBT servicemembers from getting discharged....keeps pandering to the Right when his base is to the Left....
Hmmm.
No, I don't think Barack Obama is on our side, Ian.
As Hillary said... I don't know if he is a Muslim or not...
Remember John sticking his neck out for Obama???? How many fucking fights did john and the rest of us ablogers get into defending this guy... And now BO spits in our faces.
ianpriest, you need to look around the web and read the reaction. Obama's supporters and friends are hurt and angry at his behavior. It's springing up everywhere, not just on AMERICABlog.
Hey, I'm not afraid to criticize John; check my past posts, but getting mad at him and accusing him of petty stupidity is way off the mark, this time. I reserve the right to call him a horse's ass in the future, but on this one he's just reporting the news.
It strikes me this Obama guy is shallow. Maybe the message should be, "why is Obama not reaching for greatness?" That might get to him.
I think you are being unfair to John, and, by extension, the rest of us who are voicing some of the same concerns.
First of all, nobody on here is suggesting that life would have been better under McCain/Palin. We all know the reality of what the GOP stands for. Had the GOP won, a Scalia clone would have been added to the Supreme Court and permanently tipped the ideological balance in a very bad direction.
However, it is now pretty clear that Obama has an incredibly bad game plan.
Because he has pandered to a party that has no desire to work together in a bipartisan fashion, he has diluted what he stands for and lost much credibility.
I would like you to please point to one area where he has done something progressives can be proud of.
I'll tell you what, I will give you Justice Sotomayor. Even if she is not demonstrably an ideological progressive, appointing an extremely-qualified latina is something that I think we can all get behind. It also muted GOP criticism, which could have been far worse than it was. And, still, we do not know exactly how that is going to turn out. However, there is no way, Obama would have nominated someone who was blatantly progressive.
In the following areas, Obama has shown progressives zilch:
1) Appointing financial czars that were part of the financial fiasco to begin with.
2) Refusing to investigate the excessess and possible criminal behavior of the Bush regime, thereby leaving open the likelihood another president committing further abuses.
3) Accepting for his own presidency, some of the new, excessive Executive privileges claimed by Bush/Cheney.
4) Wiretapping.
5) Every single glbt issue that he allegedly was going to 'fix.'
(DOMA/DADT top the list...he fixed things all right).
There is much more to add to this list, but this is just for starters. If you can point me to a list of what he has done to inspire the confidence of progressives, I am all ears.
All I know is that he seems far more concerned with the input of Baucus and Grassley, than he is in the advice of those like Feingold, or any other progressive.
I am not suggesting we defeat the Democrats in a national election. The GOP does not deserve that.
But I, for one, will support any Democrat who chooses to run against a Blue Cross Democrat in the primaries.
And, barring a magical transformation from what we are now seeing, I will work for whatever progressive candidate plans on challenging Obama in the 2012 primaries.
Lobbying money has corrupted the Democratic party. The Blue Crossers are bought and paid for. It is hardly cause to celebrate.
Black liberation theology is not some voodoo or violent theory; it's rooted in 1960s civil rights activism and is simply a perspective for those who live under the burden of white oppression to understand the teachings of Jesus. ( I'm not a magical thinker myself, but for those who are, I don't see how this particular "theory" is any more or less offensive than any other religious teaching. Hell, even Sarah Palin's chanting religion seemed more extreme than black liberation theology.)
But Obama distanced himself from this man who was apparently a huge influence in his life. That alone speaks volumes about Obama's lack of a moral compass.
However bad Obama may be (and just now, I'm going with Greenwald's theory that they were planning to sell out all along), he's not got Ms Quitburger as his VP.
In other words, we were f**ked!
1) fewer campaign contributions
2) less positive 'buzz'
3) less canvassing (the more formal version of #2)
I think too many elected Dems take #2 & #3 for granted. Oddly enough, it seems to be the Blue Dogs, whose marginal seats would be the most affected by a decrease in support.