My Little Pony
Okay. I get accused of wanting a pony. Of being down on Obama, because this is not the Bobby Kennedy presidency that he suggested it was going to be back in 2008. People say that I’m ignoring all the accomplishments and stomping my little feet simple because Obama is not the “man the barricades” Democratic champion of the disenfranchised or even the Joe Montana of the hapless Democratic 49ers.
All true. I’m a baby. I pout when I feel cheated. Guilty as charged. But c’mon. Can people who don’t care about the politics of the Presidency but fixate on the legislation, allow that Obama has been terrible at leading the Democratic Party? Can we all agree that Obama (yes Obama not Congressional Republicans) squandered a real mandate and turned last year’s enthusiasm gap into this year’s enthusiasm canyon?
If you can’t admit that, try reading this Steve Singiser diary at kos, and allow reality to intrude:
PPP, as a matter of clarifying their samples, asks a question that few pollsters ask, but is incredibly useful: they ask respondents for their 2008 presidential preference.
As a result, we are able to note that one of the most consistent characteristics of the samples of PPP polls in this cycle is an electorate that was far less pro-Obama than 2008.
And, as Tom Jensen spelled out earlier this week:
If the folks planning to turn out this year matched the 2008 electorate:
*Alex Sink running for Governor in Florida and Alexi Giannoulias running for the Senate in Illinois would have double digit leads.
*Elaine Marshall running for Senate in North Carolina and Pat Quinn running for Governor in Illinois would have small leads instead of trailing.
*Ted Strickland running for Governor in Ohio, Lee Fisher running for Senate in Ohio, Joe Sestak running for Senate in Pennsylvania, and Robin Carnahan running for Senate in Missouri would all be within three points rather than trailing by 7-10 as they do now.
This year isn’t getting away from the Democrats because voters are moving toward the Republicans en masse. But the enthusiasm gap is turning races that would otherwise be lean Democratic into toss ups, turning toss ups into leaning Republican, and turning leaning Republican into solid Republican.
When I say , “Barack Obama doesn’t seem to give a fuck about the Republicans wining legislative majorities,” What I mean is, Barack Obama doesn’t seem to give a fuck about the Republicans winning legislative majorities.
“When I say , “Barack Obama doesn’t seem to give a fuck about the Republicans wining legislative majorities,” What I mean is, Barack Obama doesn’t seem to give a fuck about the Republicans winning legislative majorities.”
Duh.
Jason,
I fear they have drunk their own Cool-Aid down in DC. Which is why it becomes so crucial for the locals to pick up the slack. Stamping our feet about Obama being politically tone-deaf isn’t going to get Coons elected.
You are entitled to your disappointment, but that doesn’t alter the desired outcome. It just shifts the load.
Jason – if I am reading this right, the PPP poll is asking likely 2010 voters these questions. The point, I believe, is that Obama’s voters aren’t coming out in the midterms. This is, in no way, news. There are a ton of voters that only show up for Presidential elections.
So if your point is that Obama hasn’t activated his campaign team for the mid-terms, fine, I think you have a point. Locally. I think people on the left are disappointed that Beau doesn’t have an opponent, since he is a GOTV monster.
Shorter Liberalgeek: *shrug*
Obama’s popular mandate was murdered in its cradle by the Senate. Democrats had the rare opportunity to pass legislation that would be good policy and also good politics. But instead they passed a pile of mush that didn’t help the economy much and didn’t help the Democrats at all.
As Lincoln said to McClellan: “If General McClellan does not want to use the army, I would like to borrow it for a time.”
But Obama never found his inner Lincoln to say something like that to Harry Reid. Which leads me to believe that the pile of mush was Obama’s plan all along.
Now it seems like Democrats can’t wait to get back to their comfortable minority offices.
If Obama, Democrats, and the economy do not recover, Obama will be remembered only as the president who delivered public health care into the hands of private corporations as his main accomplishment.
“Now it seems like Democrats can’t wait to get back to their comfortable minority offices.” I think that is literally true. There is just a sense on the left (how odd to use that term, as if there is a “left” in American politics) that Republicans and Blue Dogs calling the shots is the natural state of nature.
Given his campaign themes, I had hoped that Obama’s leadership was going to turn around that mindset, but I guess I was being unreasonable.
People who accuse others of “wanting a pony” seem to be forever happy with whatever horse poop is handed to them.
And people who “want a pony” never seem willing to clean out the stable and shovel the hay. A pony is work.
It’s a smart pony that gets you to work for him even when he won’t pull the cart.
It’s not smart to work for your pony, when your pony is pulling your opponents cart.
pandora, you can put your “never seem willing” to work generalization away. I contribute to campaigns I support, write letters, sometimes make calls, hand -out flyers, and take work off almost every election day to do GOTV work.
So stop it. Many of us who did do the work are pissed off because we were flat-out lied to and we don’t appreciate being told that we must be on drugs by the White House or that our parents are sucking the tits of the social security cow.
Jason,
Here’s Bobby Kennedy’s money quote. Hat-tip to Daily Kos and Alan Grayson:
“Too much and too long, we seem to have surrendered community excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our gross national product … if we should judge America by that – counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for those who break them. It counts the destruction of our redwoods and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and the cost of a nuclear warhead, and armored cars for police who fight riots in our streets. It counts Whitman’s rifle and Speck’s knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children.
“Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages; the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country; it measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it tells us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.”
“And people who “want a pony” never seem willing to clean out the stable and shovel the hay. A pony is work.”
1. At first blush, that sounds like an indictment of our welfare and social services system.
2. That’s why Daddy’s little Princess didn’t get that pony. She turned out to be quite conservative.
3. My other little Princess (by my first wife, the lawyer) got the pony. They hired a legal immigrant to take care of the pony. She turned out to be a liberal, but she’s starting to come around as she matures.
because this is not the Bobby Kennedy presidency that he suggested it was going to be back in 2008
And when — exactly — did he suggest that? Because my recollection is that the Bobby Kennedy comparisons came close to the end of the primary. And not from Obama or his camp. But from breathless pundits caught up in the idea of just how far Obama had come; caught up in the soaring rhetoric, but not in the policy proposals.
Much of the disappointment in not getting a *pony* comes from your expectation that a *pony* was on offer. You can largely trace it directly to President Obama’s inauguration speech — a real call to action that some of the left never, ever heard. They just heard the call to sit back watch this President do all of the work, while they get to sit back and grade the effort.
Contrast that to the support that the right gave to BushCo throughout his term. It really only failed him in the effort to privatize Social Security. They understood that they had to defend him against us while they kept pushing him rightward. They did *not* sit on their blogs and whinge.
You know, I’ve been bringing up this point for quite some time now. NO ONE wants to engage on it. You guys just want to bitch and complain that you still want your Magic Negro. Granted, that is alot easier than joining a canvass or organizing a rally or a phone bank. But you already know how this model works, because you’ve seen it. It is plenty odd to me that you want to complain about not getting something that you quite utterly refuse to work for.
And locally, Tom Carper is square in the cadre of Senators who murdered the mandate. Ask yourselves why he isn’t a very worried Senator.
Cassandra,
“You can largely trace it directly to President Obama’s inauguration speech — a real call to action that some of the left never, ever heard.”
The left who heard and answered the real call for real healthcare reform at Senate hearings were given the bums rush, with no objection from Obomba.
So we’re supposed to “defend him” against them, when he’s on their side?
When Democrats don’t deliver the pony, we end up with the Republican pig every time.
Democrats 1980: “The work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.”
Democrats 2010: “We never promised you a pony.” “Those people ought to be drug tested”
…and Democrats wonder why they are behind in the polls.
*sarcastic slow clapping* Very good Cassandra. I’m the dummy for buying the hype. That used to be called, “energizing the base” What a dolt I was. I promise to be more mature in the future and not believe people who are trying to get elected to stuff.
As for Bush, good point, His base stayed with him. I wonder if was because of all the red meat they were getting? Hmmm?
So Jason — you are basically going to do what A1 does here, then? Completely bypass a complex argument (which you engage with not one point of) by pretending that there wasn’t one there in the first place.
And as for Bush, what was it about this (from my own damn post) that you did not understand?
They understood that they had to defend him against us while they kept pushing him rightward. They did *not* sit on their blogs and whinge.
You show me where so-called progressives have been doing *that* in some sustained way that moves the conversation and you may find yourself with a point.
But I’m comforted that you are amused with your sarcastic clapping.
I think I addressed your point. For me, the Obama campaign set up certain expectations. You did not have those expectations. We can resolve that by stipulating that one of us was wrong. I guess it was me. Was I unrealistic to think that Obama could have the RFK Presidency that we were deprived of by a mad man’s bullet? Clearly I was.
But can we at least have a little political leadership from the white house? I come back to my original point – Barack Obama squandered a real mandate and turned last year’s enthusiasm gap into this year’s enthusiasm canyon. We can all pretend that it was John Boehner or Joe Lieberman, but I think we all know who was sitting in the Oval Office.
Unless you are some kind of religious huckster, I don’t see the point in denying reality. Whether you are a teabagger who is convinced that Obama was born in Kenya – or a Democrat ho thinks that Obama has been an effective party leader, I just don’t get the point get the point of living in fantasyland.
You didn’t address anything. Just that you want to hold on to the idea that Barack Obama is solely responsible for everything that you are disappointed in. Either you get everything that you want or you are having a tantrum because reality isn’t nearly as much fun as the wanting. And you’ll do that at the expense of even throwing away the whole reality that we have a tripartite government. It was noted earlier that Obama’s mandate got murdered in the Senate and yet all you are capable of doing is pretending that some special sauce would have made Tom Carper get behind a public option.
And here we have *you* denying reality:
or a Democrat ho thinks that Obama has been an effective party leader
And who is making that claim, exactly? Certainly I am not, and if you think so, you can produce some links to that effect.
But if the only way that you can see the past two years is in the binary way that you put it(and by sidestepping serious questions that get posed to you) then you have WAY more in common with the teabaggers than you think. And making your argument on claims that aren’t even made is definitely page 1 of the DP Wingnut Argument Book.
So enjoy your fantasyland. Call me when you can stop arguing about stuff I haven’t even said.
Sorry, cassandra_m, the argument is not complex as you would like to paint it. Obama has flat-out lied and done the opposite about key promises that he made during his campaign, particularly regarding healthcare reform and economic recovery. There is nothing complex, subtle, or nuanced about that. Those are the facts.
He has failed to lead the movement of “hope and change” that he started, either because of incompetence, negligence, willfulness, or all of the these. The successful 50-state political strategy built by Howard Dean is being actively dismantled. The current head of the DNC is largely absent from the national scene. The Democratic party is not united or excited – it is becoming everyone for themselves. Again, that’s the fact.
Your criticism of “They just heard the call to sit back watch this President do all of the work, while they get to sit back and grade the effort” is nonsense. President Obama did virtually nothing to inspire or rally his progressive base, instead, his White House has treated them with open disdain and ridicule, disregarding the fact (as you do) that the progressives were the people who worked their butts off to win the nomination against Clinton and ultimately the White House. Those are more facts.
So you can try to fog the issue by saying that it is “complex,” but the facts are that many many hardworking progressives who believed in Obama the candidate’s promises realize now that they have been betrayed and openly dismissed by Obama the President. And that is a bitter pill to swallow.
By the way, cassandra_m, ascribing the “magic negro” phrase to progressives, as if any of us think like that, is pure race-baiting. This discussion has nothing to do with race, and I don’t know why you feel that you have to bring that kind of inflammatory language into the it.
By the way, since you made the comparison to Bush, Bush was constantly rallying his base to his cause and he had political advisors who understood that this was important. Thus, Bush’s party gained seats in his first mid-term election. Contrast this to Obama who has shown open disdain for and ignored his progressive base.
1) ” It was noted earlier that Obama’s mandate got murdered in the Senate ” I simple don’t buy that argument. The Republicans and Blue Dogs exploited a lack of will to fight – but the lack of will to fight was the catalyst. I didn’t respond to that directly because it is not a very strong argument and not really worthy of much time.
2) You are saying Obama has been a weak party leader? Well shit! Common ground at last. Was that so hard? Up until now the entire defense of Obama has been that he has been a great leader, but dumb fucks like me don’t see it.
3) I have way more in common with teabaggers… Not an argument. Also, way to easy, but if it gets you through the night…
When I look back at the Senate agenda I think: “Doesn’t anybody here know how to play this game?”
There was a complete inability or unwillingness to use good legislation for political advantage. Hell, the Republicans won over and over again by introducing Constitutional amendments that never even passed, and using them as wedge issues. If I recall correctly, they won the Presidency in Ohio in 2004 on a gay marriage referendum.
By the end of the first term there will be memoirs and tell-all interviews so we can find out what the hell was going on while Democrats allowed Baucus and Enzi and Grassley to fiddle with the health care bill for months until Ted Kennedy died, and meanwhile the teabaggers were building their organization and testing their themes during the Summer of Spittle.
The Republicans and Blue Dogs exploited a lack of will to fight –
Wrong — they exploited a lack of will on the behalf of Obama’s supporters to fight. And again — I’ll point to Tom Carper as Exhibit A. And in this state — Exhibit B would be Mike Castle. In a state this blue there is no way these guys should feel like the could be see in broad daylight. But hey — if a legislator doesn’t have to feel the heat at home why would they ever support a President’s agenda.
But of course, you would understand this if in fact the wingnuts were back in charge. You would rather just dishonestly argue in order to hang on a a vision of the world that utterly absolves you of any civic citizenship.
Up until now the entire defense of Obama has been that he has been a great leader, but dumb fucks like me don’t see it.
This is complete bullshit and a complete lie. So now you’ve sunk to A1 levels of argument simply because you will not bother to talk about what I specifically asked. So rather than deal with that you’ve made up an argument I never made, just made up a claim so that you can get your superior avoidance behavior on. So until you can find some links to prove it — Fuck You, Jason.
It was noted earlier that Obama’s mandate got murdered in the Senate and yet all you are capable of doing is pretending that some special sauce would have made Tom Carper get behind a public option.
Tom Carper has no principles; he would respond to pressure or rewards. He never got pushed to support a public option, because there was no will for it in the White House. Even Harry Reid made some faint noises for a public option; he ran it up the flagpole but nobody in the White House saluted.
And what exactly stopped Democrats from introducing a bill to extend the Bush tax cuts for everybody under $250K? that would be a fight worth having in an election year – assuming somebody here “knows how to play this game.” But the Obama team decided not to do it before the election, so the US doesn’t even have a budget bill passed.
Oh – does the health insurance industry still have its anti-trust exemption?
it is not bullshit. Get in a tizzy all you want but it does not change the fact that this post was about Obama supporters not being honest about how terrible Obama has been at leading the Democratic Party. Where do you stand on that question? Now I’m not sure with all the mixed messages. If you think he is doing a great job in that role, we’ll have to agree to disagree.
As for me not pulling my civic weight there are people even further down the activist continuum then me. These people are called voters. Hmm…. I wonder if yelling at them that they are lazy will work?
Your cognitive dissonance is showing Cassandra. You are better than this.
In a state this blue there is no way these guys should feel like the could be see in broad daylight.
Much as working people in red states vote for Republicans against their own economic interests – so do Delawareans vote for Tom Carper. It goes with the territory of being a low-information voter.
I had this on my own site:
Well put. Of course, it is my fault for not clapping hard enough.
anon wrote:
So, do you think that it’s possible that your favorite community organizer has been Peter Principled?
We Republicans were deathly afraid that he’d turn out to be a radical socialist who would ruin our great country. But there’s a silver lining on every dark cloud, and the one we see now is that, whether Mr Obama is a socialist or not, he’s not enough of a leader to get much done.
As for the tax cut extension, I don’t think that President Obama ever meant it when he promised it; I think that he was lying through his scummy teeth. It would have been simple legislation: the Democrats ran on it, and have huge majorities; at one point they had a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. But no one even tried to put what would have been a very popular bill up for a vote.
The Congress will be in session for roughly three weeks, and it’s unlikely that they’ll get much done; you’d think that, if there were any support for the extension among the Democrats, they’d want to get it done and take credit for it before the election.
Speaking of better than this:
Get in a tizzy all you want but it does not change the fact that this post was about Obama supporters not being honest about how terrible Obama has been at leading the Democratic Party. Where do you stand on that question?
I wrote an entire post responding to this and you stiull have no idea that I did that — much less even done anything to understand what I wrote or where I was coming from. Which is increasingly fine, since the Tantrum Brigade isn;t interested in the hard stuff, which you so quickly demonstrated. And it isn’t as though this is the first time I’ve made those points, either. You and the A1s of the world just run right by that avoiding the possibility that someone might actually have hard questions for your stamping feet. But instead of dealing with a damn thing I wrote, you just decided to make up something that I never said to try to argue with.
I don’t take that stupidity from David Anderson when he shows up to wield it and I’m certainly not taking it from you. If you just want people to say Fuck Yeah to one of your posts, then make sure you make it a Dissent Free Zone. No Questions that Disturb My Worldview Here signs. Or better — If I Don’t Want to Engage With You I Will Be Making Shit Up to Argue Against.
I’m pretty clear as a bell — and awfully consistent — about what I’m talking about. It is the symptom of people in clear avoidance of questions that might disturb their worldview to make up stuff to argue against. Which is what you persistently as soon as you started your pretense of a response to my post.
Why you didn’t think I wouldn’t catch that — or even object to it–, I’ll never know.
Fail.
I’ve been away all day, but allow me to respond to the stupid shrug comment.
Jason may be right, but you’d never know it with the quote that he put up there. If fewer Democrats vote in the midterm, then the electorate will be more conservative.
Or try this old gem, if EVERYONE in America voted, Democrats would sweep into almost every office throughout the land. I don’t know how true it is, but it seems to be an old standby that makes my point.
Jason’s point is that the Democratic base isn’t energized, I guess. Probably true. Could President Obama energize that base and get people to the polls? Perhaps. And it is actually still possible that he will, but I doubt it. His governing in prose seems to have taken precedence over campaigning in poetry.
It’s not about doing the hard stuff, Cassandra. It’s about winning over the undecided middle, and he hasn’t done it — and you and your phone bank won’t do it, either.
Bill Clinton had his flaws, but by God, he fought against these people. When Newt threatened to shut down government he called the GOP’s bluff over and over again, and was popular for it. Obama backs down over and over again, and his poll numbers keep slipping.
The one whose worldview is being disturbed here isn’t Jason, it’s you. You can say “it’s hard” over and over again, but it won’t change the facts on the ground — his lack of passion and unwillingness to fight have lost him the middle, and that’s about to lose him Congress.
For the record, note that cassandra_m did not respond at all to my comment even though I addressed her points specifically and directly. This is her modus operandi. She will complain that you didn’t respond to her points, except when you do, and then she’ll ignore you or just get angry. Now it is “lack of will on the behalf of Obama’s supporters to fight” that are the cause of Obama’s problems, never mind the fact that he has lied and backstabbed them while always asking them for more contributions. And today he complained that special Interests “talk about me like a dog.” Not very presidential or inspiring to voters.
Sadly for her, it is anger at anybody but Obama that she uses to vent the cognitive dissonance and denial about the political train wreck of his presidency.
And when — exactly — did he suggest that? Because my recollection is that the Bobby Kennedy comparisons came close to the end of the primary. And not from Obama or his camp. But from breathless pundits caught up in the idea of just how far Obama had come; caught up in the soaring rhetoric, but not in the policy proposals.
Fine. I was duped by the media. I conceded that point. In the following comment.
Okay. Your point is that Obama is not effective because I have not pushed him hard enough. My view is that the President was elected to do a job.
Yes. Contrast away. Bush GOT that part of his job was political. Infact – I think we can agree that he overdid the politcal stuff. What does that have to do with the fact that Obama hasn’t paid ANY attention to the Party stuff?
Again. The President was elected to do a job. Part of that job is political. He either doesn’t want to or can’t get that part of the job done.
And I still don;t know what Cassandra thinks about the job Obama is doing as the the leader of the Democratic Party.
Thank you. You too Geezer. Jesus H. Christ I thought I was getting the gas light treatment.
I thought The Pres. was strong in Wisconsin today. He tested some themes and ‘ They call me a dog” line could resonate and grow. When Bush was pres if you called him anything the R’s went nuts with words like “treason” my how things change. Obama may be on to something…
His governing in prose seems to have taken precedence over campaigning in poetry.
It’s his writer’s block that concerns me.
and
and
It is a start. He is calling out Republicans directly, at last.
Bill Clinton had his flaws, but by God, he fought against these people.
Yes he did. And he accomplished NOTHING legislatively on the scale of the health reform just done. Even Bill Clinton will tell you that. Bill Clinton was much better at the theater no doubt. But so was BushCo and alot of us voted for Obama because we wanted more than theater. Which I guess when the chips are down the theater is what is comforting.
Right now the other side is energized precisely because this administration has had a few too many legislative successes. And there are people here who refuse to see any of that just because they haven’t gotten their oompa loopas now.
And this is complete bullshit:
and you and your phone bank won’t do it, either
I know you’ve seen the organizing efforts by the right to get their legislation passed or their judges in and it is a no holds barred effort to call legislators, to send letters or emails, to write LTE or call radio stations, fundraising , the whole nine yards. When asked to get behind an idea, they just do it. Then they complain about not getting everything. This is called giving your leadership room to maneuver. And we did little of that.
He may be loosing the middle (but mostly the R leaning middle), but that is not because is isn’t the best political party leader ever — but because the economics for the middle class are for shit. And they are going to be for shit for a long time. They should have been paying attention to middle class balance sheets rather than banking ones, but no one will remember me making *that* argument.
Bill Colley
BumpColley
bumpcolley Michele Rollins needs to drop out. Using a charity for sick children as a campaign prop is despicable.
3 hours ago reply
Now here we have a guy doing great work for John Carney, Go Bill!
Fine that Obama is going after Republicans with rhetoric. I’ll take that any day. But when will Obama make conservadems pay a price for weakening his administration and the party? Answer: Probably never.
Bill Clinton only gave us the greatest economic expansion and a balanced budget in the last 60 years. I guess peace and prosperity don’t count much with you. The Obama healthcare bill is a ticking time bomb that is going to explode on household economies in the next few years like you can’t imagine.
With Obomba, what do we have? War and high unemployment. But Wall Street is still handing out their big bonuses.
A1 in 1996:
Bill Clinton has just “reformed” welfare, dooming millions of children to suffer in poverty. Why is he such a failure? Peace and prosperity for who? The rich are getting richer and we are sending people to die in Kosovo! And Clinton passes a welfare reform bill that is a ticking timebomb!
A1 in 2010:
See above
I look forward to 2024 when A1 will extol the skills of Obama to prove what a loser the Democratic President is.
LOL, LG! I have a lot of criticisms of Clinton, as I did throughout his term. I refer to him as the “Best Republican President” in my lifetime because he wasn’t really a liberal. My comment was in response to cassandra_m’s statement that Clinton “accomplished NOTHING legislatively on the scale of the health reform.” That is simply utter nonsense, particularly since the HCR bill passed has very little actual health care reform in it, and Clinton’s first budget set the stage for the incredible growth in the 90’s.
So please tell me how Bill Clinton differs from the Blue Dogs? I agree that Clinton wasn’t liberal enough. Maybe that was just him. We may never know, because of the witch hunt that plagued the rest of his presidency.
An interesting side note, the Wikipedia article for the welfare reform law has an interesting person standing just one person away from Clinton at the signing ceremony.
Clinton actually got a lot of good stuff done, too, like the FMLA. Other things that he didn’t get done, like HCR and ending discrimination against gays in the military, he at least fought hard for. Obama doesn’t fight and lose, he doesn’t even try.
Yes, he didn’t try on ARRA. He didn’t try on HCR. He didn’t try on FinReg. He didn’t try on the Lilly Ledbetter Act.
Oh wait, he DID get those things passed. Not too shabby for 8 years…
Oh wait, he got that done in less than 2 years? Oh snap!
And really, Bill Clinton was the ultimate example of compromising to get stuff passed, yet he didn’t get anything done on Healthcare reform. Nothing.
So Obama got more done on HCR, without even trying, in two years than Clinton did in 8 years of trying.
One thing baffles me about Obama and ARRA: ARRA actually includes the middle-class tax cuts that Bill Clinton campaigned on but never delivered.
Yet I haven’t heard one Democrat take credit, or hold Republicans responsible for voting against those tax cuts. Instead, the White House and Congressional Dems have allowed Republicans to paint ARRA as nothing more than a spending boondoggle.
Where are the Dem campaign ads with the bad black-and-white photo of the Republican, and the sneering narrator saying “My Republican opponent voted against the largest tax cut in history…”
Never has so much money been spent for so little political return.
“Michele Rollins needs to drop out. Using a charity for sick children as a campaign prop is despicable.”
Colley was so histrionic in his feigned outrage, I thought he was on the verge of artificial tears. That was right after his ‘interview’ with Eric Bodenwiser, during which he solicited questions from callers for the candidate, and then berated and insulted the only caller who had a valid question.
Theater of the Absurd, right here in Sussex County.
The HCR bill is “HCR” in name only. Healthcare costs and insurance costs continue to rise at double digit rates with no controls in the HCR bill, only mandated payments to private health insurers. The financial reform bill, while better, is still missing major regulations that would be necessary to prevent the crisis we are currently experiencing (ask Russ Feingold). The ARRA was too little and contained too many tax cuts and not enough spending to be effective (as many dirty fucking hippies and members of the “professional left” said at the time). Hence, we have sustained high unemployment, not the 7.5% that the Obama administration predicted as a result of the stimulus.
But, since Obama has accomplished so much, he must be massively popular, right? Oh, and I saw the head of the DNC on my milk carton this morning. Anybody seen him?
‘Magic Negro’? Really? Is that the best you’ve got? Is that your go-to argument when you don’t like what you hear? Talk about the Tantrum Brigade.
I can’t stand Obama – always saw him for the weak, pathetic fraud he is, but the liberals on this board that you so bitterly attack with your ultimate trump card truly believed in him. Maybe you should stop taking it personally and give them a break for venting about their disappointment. God knows it’s justified.
He is being attacked by everyone because he set an expectation and hasn’t even tried to live up to it. Sure, you can blame the media and (lamely) claim that they set the expectation and No-Fault Obama did nothing but mind his own business and humbly run his campaign, but that would be complete bullshit. He rode that wave of hysteria all the White House and with great power comes great responsibility. Only problem is, it turns out he wasn’t all that interested in either. He sure did like the positive media attention, tho. Got a bit caught up in his own hype, even. It makes my skin crawl when I see him trying to relive his campaign now – acting all clever and cute at those campaign events ‘I mean, c’mon, guys!’ with that shit-eating grin on his face. Vomit.
From where I’m sitting he escalated a no-win war, passed HCR that will cost us dearly and benefit very few, passed a stimulus package that has had no measurable impact on the economy (except, of course, all those jobs that allegedly ‘would have been lost’ had it not been passed – how convenient…maybe Bush should have claimed that as one of the benefits of his tax cut) and managed to alienate his base and turn the country against him in less than two years. He’s actually a lot like Bush in a lot of ways. I knew he would suck, but I didn’t see that one coming at all.
He has about six months to do something to spark the economy or he will be (thankfully) packing his bags in 2012. You should be licking the asses of the GOP for being too lame to put forth a viable opponent as of yet. It’s about the only thing that may help Obama squeak into a second term. Unless, of course, Chris Christie manages to drop 100lbs in the next year or so. Until then, they’ll have to replace the ‘Yes We Can’ placards with ‘They Suck More’. And that’s pretty freaking lame for someone who came in with such promise.
@ liberalgeek–
Bill Clinton has just “reformed” welfare, dooming millions of children to suffer in poverty
No, not really. A fair amount of their moms transferred from the Welfare rolls to the SSI rolls. They were apparently afflicted with a vicious case of “The Asthma” the day after Clinton’s welfare reform bill went into effect. “The Asthma” prevents them from working but doesn’t prevent them from smoking Newports or Maverick Menthols & marijuana on the corner all day while they ignore their children…
Marijuana is great, but smoke it after work, not in lieu of work, and not when you should be looking out for your kids!
Delusional attitudes like yours FUEL the morons who cling to the Tea Party bullshit.
I invite you to spend some time in the city. OBSERVE and EXPERIENCE these people for a few months, then draw your own conclusions based on your OBSERVATIONS, not your preconceived notions.
Clinton actually got a lot of good stuff done, too, like the FMLA
GHWB signed the ADA. My next door neighbor at the time was on the White House lawn for the signing. I have pictures.
GHWB also signed the 1990 amendments to the Clean Air Act.
I have no problem with Clinton’s Presidency, but your examples are lame.