The Big Obama Administration Thread

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Exactly, BTA. I did applaud her and still do. I think she was off her game during the GWB years and perhaps, as Ziad points out, I was a bit unfiar, lumping her in with the rest of the press. My understanding is that people sometimes thought she was a bit "whacky" during Bush years, because she would sometimes ramble on, rather than ask the pointed questions that she seems to be doing now. Also, GWB made a special point of snubbing her, often just plain ignoring her. Sorry if I was confusing.

 

I must say I find much of the critique against Obama from the right to be incredibly amusing. It is nothing wrong with it by itself and many of the points brought up deserve criticism but man, Obama is being flamed for the same things from the right as Bush was by the left. The only difference I see is that the left actually seem to acknowladge and share much of that criticism while the right is completely blind, they cheered when Bush did X and cry foul murder when Obama does X. The level of hypocrasy is rather impressive.

The only valid and well founded criticism against "socialist" Obama seems to be coming from the left.

 

The reason is simple: Bush's overall objectives were things the conservatives liked (regine change in Iraq, silencing global warming debate, etc.). It's his methods that were objected to. For Obama, the conservatives are objecting to his methods while the liberals are objecting to his goals.

 

I think you may have gotten this one backwards. That said, I object to some of his methods...and some of his goals. Obama is a moderate, so liberals really aren't any more likely than conservatives to agree with everything he's trying to do.

 

No, I meant it. The conservatives object to his methods AND his goals, but the methods are jucier, so they're more vocal about that. The liberals object to his actual evident goals because few if any of them are what they all thought Obama would be.

And Drew, stop spewing this "Obama has always been a centrist Democrat" stuff. Obama put on an act for the election, and anyone looking at his history could tell it was an act. The only question was how much of his history was an act, too. He played to his potential constituents, in this case all the US, and he did a good job of it. Now we're seeing how much he really meant it.

 

No Nog, Drew is right. Obama is a moderate. Conservatives can't seem to handle that, but it's the truth. If he were anywhere near as radical as his detractors on the right claim, he'd have already legalized gay marriage and marijuana, re-instituted the fairness doctrine, greatly increased taxes on the rich, immediately ended the war, and whole host of other issues the far left is gagging for. He's largely left them out in the cold and focused on a far more reasonable platform that the middle of America is going to support. Which is what he's been saying all along, so I really have no idea where you get this "anyone could tell he was putting on an act" stuff. His policies so far have been very middle of the road and, since he's not an idiot, will likely continue to be.

 

Hasn't he been spending like a drunken sailor? That doesn't sound very moderate to me?

 

He's spending like a President saddled with an inherited recession and no good options. Nearly every respectable economist says he isn't spending nearly enough. Nearly every conservative - respectable or no - says he's spending way too much. If he does nothing, the recession gets worse. If he doesn't spend enough, the economy won't see enough stimulus to recover, and the recession gets worse. If he spends too much, he can wave bye-bye to a second term if it doesn't pan out. Drunken sailors have it easy.

 

Ding-Ding-Ding! Exactly. Those who argue that Obama is on the far left have apparently never looked at the far left. FOX "news" and crazies like Michelle Bachman calling you a liberal or a socialist doesn't make it so.

 

Spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spendins, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending, spending....

Hey, at least it's no longer:

Tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts....

They change them out about once every 6 months, just to keep us guessing.

 

You're right, it sounds quite Republican.

OH SNAP!

 

You're playing word games here.

I read that in the US it costs a billion dollar to be elected president. The McCain campaign burned about that in their losing bid; Obama did as well and he was elected. As for government spending, so far Bush still has a manifold lead over Obama as far as spending is concerned. I find the rediscovery of fiscal responsibility on the R side amusing, even more so after Bush's largely R rubber stamped (except by party renegades like Ron Paul) spending binge.

Interesting article about the origins current deficit in the US. When Clinton left office, calculations projected an expected surplus of more than $800 billion a year from 2009 to 2012. Well, that was then. This illustration is telling enough.

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I find it pathetic that Rs appear to want to have a strong, and especially large and expensive, military - but are unwilling to pay taxes for it, or if they do, they don't want to pay taxes for anything else. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are paid for with borrowed money, courtesy of China. Somebody will have to pay for that. Cut the defence budget to pay for the debt? Oh no, treason! America will be weak and open to attack! Raise taxes to raise the money? Heaven forbid, taxes are evil (especially when one oneself has to pay them), and bad for the economy (feels better already, it's not only about oneself)! Let's rather not be weak on defence and increase the defence budget even further, and not have health care, and cut public spending on schools, administration and (iirc underfunded) infrastructure. This is merely the expression of conservative reflexes or articles of faith. Well, the R's will have to die one death - so they better pick their poison now. And it's maybe time to re-examine whether the traditional R dogmas on tax, military spending and the economy hold up to scrutiny.

Viewed from a certain angle, it is not that the Republican approach is without attraction: Not cutting the defence budget and lowering taxes to repeat Reagan's marvelled voodoo economics in face of near unfathomable debt is simply tough love for the next generation, soft and hedonistic as they are. There is no better cure for frills and waste than hardship. They will have to work longer hours and harder, to the benefit of their character. That'll also rid them from all those liberal quirks. They simply won't have time for that between their three to four jobs, let alone have time for un-American and ungodly union or socialist activities. Then the permanent republican majority will eventually manifest itself. And America will be saved.

 

You missed my point, DR. My point was that Obama is an actor. He was liberal when he needed the support of the liberal crowd (and he got pretty liberal there) and centrist when he needed the support of everyone. Now, I'm not sure what he is.

What I meant by "anyone could tell" was simple: his history and record were radically different from what he was currently claiming durring his campaign, so either he went through a massive and totally unseen soul change before he started his campaign, or he was acting.

I agree here. Obama needs to spend, and a lot, to fix anything. The problem I see isn't how much he's spending, but how.

As a senator, he said he would support legislation to ban all guns in the US, or something like that, I don't remember the exact wording or situation, but that's pretty far left. Now, I never said he was in the extremist-wacko-far left, but then I can't think of any senators who are.

Rags, that looks like it's only a record of acual spending so far, not authorized spending or future planned spending.

 

I don't necessarily agree with that assessment, but even if I did, I'm not sure how that makes him different from any other politician. Of course he's going to play up his liberal bona fides in front of liberals. Of course he's going to emphasize bi-partisanship and shared values when speaking to conservatives. He's not dumb. This doesn't make him an "actor," it makes him a pragmatist. It also makes him a centrist; he obviously cares about working with conservatives. If he didn't he wouldn't have courted and appointed so many of them. His agenda so far has been throwing bones to everyone, without giving anyone the farm. That some groups have chosen to throw the bones back in his face isn't really his fault.

I'd like you to substantiate that. I'd also like you to research your claim about his wanting to get rid of all the guns, since it seems to be a major sticking point for you re: your opposition to Obama, yet by your own admission you don't even know exactly when or what he actually said.

 

He's a liberal turning towards the center, which is what most politicians wind up doing (except for the last one, who dug his heels in the sand). Most national politicians feel comfortable and like governing from the center. The problem is that he's not stopping at the center, but appears to be moving right of center on the issues centering around the notion of the imperial presidency. It's almost like GWB 2.0 in that regards. It's very annoying.

 

The devil's in the details, as usual. I agree that the programs he is spending for should be under more scrutiny; however, he is often criticized from the right because he does spend too much, period. I find this rather hypocritical as one of the most dubious programs - the bailouts - was practically started during Bush's tenure, and keeping the budget out of the red wasn't exactly a high-priority issue then. If McCain were president right now, he would most probably be ratcheting deficits as well, and putting money in programs not much more reliable. That is why I tend to take comments such as "spending like a drunken sailor" (no offense to you personally, I just took issue with the phrase) or, for that matter "tax and spend democrats" with a grain of salt. No, Obama's team knows what it's doing, or at least thinks it does. However, I'm not seeing a lot of constructive criticism coming their way.

As for Obama undergoing a radical change since his campaign, well there has been some change - but I don't think it is all that drastic. I considered him to the right of Edwards and, for the most part, Clinton. As far as I can remember, unlike most of his competitors in the primary he never went so far as to support universal healthcare, limiting his proposal only to children. Troop reductions in Iraq would be accompanied by increasing presence in Afghanistan. On the economy, his program struck me as fairly moderate - left of center, perhaps, but not overly so. He has moved somewhat to the right since, and I'm not that happy with some of this (i.e. embracing military commissions - with some changes, sure - for Gitmo detainees, dragging his feet on Gitmo and Iraq, expanding the bailouts for the large corporations) - but some of that is actually to be expected. Once you are out of the campaign the real world is seldom so easy as you make it seem, and he will have to deal with, one way or another, with people on the other side of the aisle. Personally, I think he has so far been trying to be more bipartisan than Bush, and that does mean making compromises. It's just that I can't agree with some of those he has made .

 

I do agree that Obama was slightly to the right of Hillary and Edwards. However, I do have to disagree with one thing you said - I'm pretty sure all three of the major candidates campaigned on health care reform that would make insurance available to everyone. I think the only difference between Hillary and Obama is that Obama's plan would allow anyone who wanted insurance to be able to buy the public option (some people who lack insurance don't have it because they have been turned down by the insurance companies due to a pre-existing condition), whereas under Hillary's plan health insurance for all would be obligatory.

And while I further agree that he has been more bipartisan than Bush (especially considering many of his political appointments) that comment does not set the bipartizan bar particularly high.

 

Regardless, it'd be fair to characterize accumulating a trillion dollars in debt as "spending like a drunken sailor." Not so?

 

No. There have been several (de-bunked) chain e-mails circulating claiming he said words to this effect or similar*, but he never said anything of the sort. He did say that he supports re-instating the Federal Assault Weapons Ban that GW allowed to expire, but that is a far cry from banning all guns. It's also worth noting that Obama hasn't done a damn thing about the Assault Weapons Ban yet. The far left is, predictably, not happy about this either.

That said, it's been fairly obvious to the far left that Obama wasn't one of them from the get-go. From what I can tell, the only people who seriously thought Obama was on the far left were, in fact, on the far right.

* Including a downright hilarious one claiming that Obama planned to increase the Federal excise tax on Ammo by 500%....

 

That seems to be about the cost of 1 war in Iraq.