The First Year of the Obama Administration: Facts, Opinions and Discussions

I agree with Brett_Bass that there should be an Obama thread, so I'll start one myself. I'll start with a couple of posts from the The Future of the Republican Party thread.

 

I see this an impartial and unbiased thread. Truly a spectacle to behold.

 

So Obama is doing what he's always done. Let's look at the healthcare issue:

While the idea of reform is popular, his plan is not. Yet he goes around talking to groups of supporters acting as if the whole nation wants his plan and the evil Republicans are paying people to protest.

This is psychotic behavior. I think he actually believes that we all want his plan and the people at the townhall meetings and tea parties are a bunch of paid actors. Hugo Chavez and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad tend to speak with more candor on the popularity of their ideas than Obama does about the popularity of his reform plan. "You'll take this plan because you want it whether you like it or not!" How does that make any sense?

Gitmo, the NSA wiretapping, Iraq, Afghanistan...all of these silent reversals are just further demonstrations of his lack of understanding prior to being in charge. It has to suck to learn the hard way that so many things you believed in were flat out wrong, naive and or dangerous.

But we had already told him that.

And to top it all off we will all get a great big wonderful tax hike.

But we had already to the voters that.

 

Quible: None of those are the issues where he changed his position.

 

No, you see I had no problem with the view. It's just that in discussing these things it's very slanted toward the negative spectrum of things and not balanced. Plus it hasn't even been a year yet.

 

There has been alot of flip-flopping...Don't you think that I can find quotes from Obama that the wiretapping he now seems to support was unconstitutional? Or that Iraq, where he's already claimed victory, was unwinnable? Or that Afghanistan, where his administration is now backpeddling expectaions, was winnable? (It certainly is, BTW)

And what about his backpeddling on Gitmo? The administration has hinted at the possiblity of not being able to close it in a year's time.

 

Flip-flopping: changing one's mind on an issue when presented with new evidence. That's surely a bad thing, because not changing your mind is considered a good thing. I have my issues with Obama, specifically on Gitmo where he won't be closing it any time soon, with the wiretapping, etc. But I'd hardly consider these things worthy of ridicule from people on the right. Unless they just want to whine, which seems to be their MO as of late.

 

His policy was to stop illegal NSA wiretapping (i.e. tapping U.S. citizens without a court order), withdraw from Iraq, refocus and build up in Afghanistan, and to close Guantanamo Bay. He is doing all that.

In my view, the places where you can claim he reversed himself are prosecution for those who authorized torture and his attempts to continue to implement preventative detention.

 

I dunno Flyer, it seems to me that the Obama Administration has a new look for the legality of wiretapping.

And all things being equal FIDo when you "change your mind" immiediately after the election it's called "a lack of sincerity." And while we may point out Obama's shortcommings in sincerity we aren't arguing against some of the outcomes, such as his newer view on wiretapping. We are just blown away by the pass he gets for doing exactly that same things as my boy G.W.

In a debate I had at work I noted that my co-worker didn't care what Obama does so long as it's Obama that's doing it. He basicly agreed with me that he is more comfortable with Obama wiretapping than Bush.

 

Obviously he couldn't change his mind before he was president. That'd be rather silly. Now re: your coworker, that's what successful branding can do for you. Obama has built up this image of competence and affability whether or not he's actually either of those things. The point is that he's earned the public's trust on things and he can articulate his points better than a lot of our presidents could. That makes him almost beyond reproach to his supporters. So, what's happening now is the right wing equivalent of FUD. The thing is, though, that the only people are going to despise him and believe the right wing FUD are already predisposed to not liking him in the first place. Which means it's being largely unsuccessful.


And that's really all this is. One big marketing campaign for or against Obama. Either way I think his brand will stand up to scrutiny.

 

I´ve been getting commentary from all sides here in Austria in the last few days. In general Austrians seem to like Obama a lot and are amused by his decline in popularity in the U.S., if that´s what´s happening. They haven´t really felt the recession here so far and don´t understand the effect of increasing unemployment and the collapse of the residential real estate market.

But they have really high expectations here about the Israel-Palestine issue, and I have a feeling Obama is going to disappoint them on that front. In the meantime, however their newspaper editorials were doing backflips over the Clinton trip to North Korea. From "Die Presse" for example "It is impossible to overestimate the importance of Clinton´s meeting with Kim Song Il."

 

On health care: someone said it in the other thread, it's not Obama's fault that the Democrats and Republicans can't stand each other, that nobody (except for most of us) seems to be capable of a civil conversation on the topic, and that some people's idea of "expressing an opinion" is to shout down the opposition and beat up members of the opposition. And yes, there are guilty people on the liberal side as well. Commentary on which side is doing more of the shouting and assaulting people misses the point. People are still shouting and assaulting other people. I think Obama did try to be bipartisan initially and he's probably given up, because he's seen what I have: that bipartisanship is impossible in this country.

I voted for Obama and campaigned for him, both in the general election and the North Carolina primary. I plan to vote for him again in 2012, at least as things stand right now. Generally speaking I'm fairly happy with his handling of issues. My biggest disappointment is that he has promised to "change Washington" and kick out the PACs and special interest lobbyists, and he has not done so. Obamacare includes a lot of back-scratching for the pharmaceutical industry.

The Patriot Act, not closing Gitmo--I wasn't all that pleased but I'm willing to let that go. I can only assume that he got hold of some classified information that we aren't privy to, which said that these things could not be done without other provisions being in place first. Afghanistan: unless we know that Bin Laden is there, I don't think we need to be there. We need to do what George W. Bush should have done in the first place (or should I say, what he should have finished in the first place, after Tora Bora): directly pursue Osama Bin Laden. If it isn't too late.

If Obama is not being bipartisan or conciliatory, maybe it's time, because as someone also mentioned in the other thread, there are people who were determined to hate him simply because he's a Democrat, so bipartisanship is a waste of time with those people.

 

For the war on terror related things, I was willing to submit that some level of security measures would have to be taken, but when it came down to it, I just flat out did not trust Bush and Cheney to prosecute the war on terror. I'm well aware that Obama's taken most of the same programs and put it in different packaging, but that packaging is important. The terrorists we fight against are a volunteer force, and George Bush ensured that Al-Qaeda wouldn't need to spend a nickel on recruiting efforts. No amount of effective counterinsurgency tactics offsets the fact that your commander-in-chief is an ignorant anti-diplomatic megalomaniac.

 

It seems to me that the Obama administration never had the intention of being bipartian. Look, he was in office for one month. One month! He was rushing through the most important piece of legislation, in my opinion, since Congress authorised Bush to use military force in Iraq, and he excludes all but three Republicans? One of whom, it must be pointed out, is now a Democrat.

That ain't bipartisian by any stretch! He wanted to ram home a bill with lots of spending that had more to do with a leftist agenda than economic stimulus. He hasn't been very bipartisian at all! Then ABC News does the same exclusionary tactics in their coverage of Obama's healthcare plan, in hopes that we'll believe Obama when he says that we want the plan whether we like it or not.

Scary crap!

Do we want to talk about the transparancy to the Obama Administration next? 'Cause that's another big fat hollow promise.

 

We can talk about it, but I'm not going to argue that he hasn't broken that one big time.

I'll also agree that they shouldn't rush through health care legislation. I read one of the bills (maybe the only bill?) that is now in the House. Agreed with most of it, disagreed with a few parts.

Since whitehouse.gov isn't doing this , I will:

The text of H.R. 3200

 

anakin_girl, do you still feel that the Obama Administration tried to be bipartisian given the way debate was handled for the stimulus package?

 

There are two sides to this, and I'm interested in seeing which side's story is more accurate.

On the one hand, we have the Republicans saying that they were "shut out" of the process.

On the other hand, we have the Democrats saying that Pelosi invited them and they refused to participate. I even had a conservative friend confirm this, saying that they refused to participate because they felt that the invitation to come to the table was just for show, that their input was not really welcome.

So I don't know whether the administration was bipartisan or not. It depends on who you believe. At the moment I think both side's stories are just that, one-sided.

 

Republicans completely shut Democrats out when they were in full control of Congress.

Turnabout is fair play, and I only laugh harder knowing that it's going to be like this for awhile. Republicans are utterly and shamelessly pandering to their base, which is becoming one large fringe element these days. The party gets older and whiter as the country gets more diverse and also as my generation starts to assume real power in the workplace, with years of growing financial clout ahead (my generation being heavily anti-Republican).

The GOP is trading short-term gains for long-term misery, and it's just amusing to watch. A lot like one of those daytime talk shows of old, I suppose.

 

I have not yet seen one serious idea being put out there by the Republicans, not one serious issue in which the GOP seems sincere that they want to be bipartisan.

I think now is still too early to judge Obama.

Once the bills for healthcare reform, energy reform, financial reform are (or aren't) passed through both chambers of Congress and signed by President Obama... then we can judge how his first year went.

Right now, I just see a lack of vision on Obama's part, and a stubborn unwillingness to cooperate on the Republicans' part.

Obama's first "State of the Union" address, and what has happened between it and the Innauguration, are what I'm waiting for before I can honestly judge him and his administration.



Now I'll post here with what I just responded to in the GOP future thread:

Besides being a Democrat?

Well he's also an African-American, which must ruffle a lot of feathers, since I know some people who still think slavery should be legal. We've seen how much race has played a part in the Sotomayor confirmation hearings, and how Obama's input to the Gates arrest really poured gasoline on the fire instead of putting it out.

There's also the fact that people are afraid of change, and Obama does indeed want change, especially in the areas of Healthcare and Energy/Environment. As much as they may not like the status quo, at least they know it, its probably the rationale for some people. Fear of the unknown.

1. I agree here, his plan for financial reform seems underwhelming. He could have had radical change. I mean, there was even talk that the government should nationalize the banks among some people. I don't

 

They didn't shut out the Democrats. They were allowed to write and vote on legislation. What makes you think that they weren't? Not having the votes to pass or defeat legislation is not the same as barring participation from discussion of a bill. Post proof or retract.

And only a man blinded by ideology would say "large fringe" as the two terms are mutually exclusive. As far as "utterly and shamelessly pandering to their base": If that's true how would that be any different than what the Democrats did from 2002 to 2006? Or is it OK for the dems to do that but shameless if the Republicans do it?

 

So correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I could tell the Republicans were far more vicious in their attacks against their rivals than the Democrats ever were. Given such a scenario, I automatically default to the other side. Take this question: how much capitalism is too much? Debating this is a legitimate question, but why is it that sliding the bar the other way suddenly regarded as socialism when (1) capitalism and socialism exist on a spectrum with no defined lines, and (2) America moving to match Cesar Chavez's actual socialist system is clearly preposterous?

And as far as ideology is concerned, how do you begin to justify conservatism (or whatever it is that Republicans call conservatism)? What happened to American values regarding pre-emptive war and separation of church and state? Why aren't American values of individual liberty applicable to gay marriage? Compared to all this, the Republican self-image of standing up for virtues and morality rings absolutely hollow.

 

Even Robert Reich is having problems with Obama.

You liberals really don't have a problem with him selling out to Big Pharma as long as you get your "Universal Health Care," do you?

 

I can't speak for all liberals, but I have a huge problem with this. Huge. It goes against one of the main reasons I campaigned for him, which is that he promised that the corporate lobbyists and special interests would not run his administration.

I'd rather stall health care reform until we can do it without giving so much voice to the very people who are making our system so expensive in the first place.

 

About the only contribution I can make to this thread is to say that I'll be reading it and that I'm glad to have provided the necessary impetus (or at least been a big enough pain) to get it created. Beyond that, service obligations preclude my ability to freely comment in a public forum (no pun intended) on a sitting commander-in-chief. But anywho, thanks to J-Rod for posting the discussion thread.

 

Man, what I find rather ironic (and kind of scary) is how much Bill Clinton has reverted to his old "slick Willie" persona, and I mean that in both the positive and negative connotations it holds.

Has anyone seen the press conference where Bill Clinton pulled a "punk'd" on Obama, and really busted Obama's chops on his difficulties with the town hall meetings? It was just a throw away joke by Clinton, but he's really sowing his wild oats. The other half is a bit sad because Clinton is definitely coming off with a sour grapes attitude at Obama's expense, but there's got to be hard feelings left over from the campaign. But I think a great deal of this is because Clinton doesn't have the weight of the office resting on him. More than anything, Obama is really showing the effects of Presidential pressure lately.