What do you think of the job that Obama is doing? I think I have whiplash from the better than/worse than expected decisions I’m seeing lately.
About The Author
BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
for a Constitutional lawyer he sure is falling down on that job. If he can’t uphold the rule of law, there’s nothing to be said for him.
Now that more of the poo is hitting the fan it will be interesting to see how he thinks he can avoid it and remain clean.
The Treasury situation is troubling.
Most of foreign policy is OK.
Justice is a problem.
Everything else, work in progress.
Tell you what, if the memos weren’t released in full the way that they were, he wouldn’t have had my vote in 2012.
If there’s no prosecution, or even an effort of some sort, he won’t have my vote in 2012, either.
Foreign policy is good, except for the drone attacks.
I’m not that troubled on the treasury situation as his entire 2012 candidacy relies on it.
Everything else is gravy, and far better than I expected. Except for health care, but I was prepared for the fact that we wouldn’t have single payer when Kucinich lost the primary.
Oh, and I should mention that I can’t entirely blame everything, or even most of my criticisms, on Obama; those criticisms are on the Senate.
I’m pretty satisfied, overall. To the extent that I may be disappointed in the way things are going, I tend not to blame Obama, but recognize that things are even harder or more complicated than I first thought.
For me, a lot will depend on what happens with health care.
I’ll add that I have yet to feel that Obama has been placed in a situation where I really wanted him to get tough with Congress, and “lay down the law” in any way. That moment will be telling, once it finally comes.
Great!
Pretty much what I expected.
Good on some areas, horrendously bad on the economy and unitary executive, annoyingly cowed in terms of Defense and Israel, and has some good ideas but unbelievably bad execution in social liberalism, I swear his Faith based office is so bad I regret defending him over it.
I find that I am developing a slowly growing sense that the O man is not going to be what alot of us hoped that he would be.
I dont seem to be able to accept some of his actions with respect to torture, fisa, afgan and what concens me the most is his apparent willingness to accept the current banking structure while at the same time showing a willingness to overlook the role of the unions in our country.
Like a lot of progressives, I’ve struggled with my feelings about Obama’s performance thus far. But then I remind myself that he has to operate in an incredibly regressive and corrupt political/media environment that was created over decades– you can’t undo that overnight. He has a Congress and a press and a moneyed elite who are clinging fiercely to their entrenched positions, and who are complicit to some extent in the misdeeds of the Bush administration. On top of that, he’s faced with an incredibly complex and serious financial crisis, the greatest environmental crisis the world has ever seen, and an international political dynamic that is a mine field.
Those of us who sit behind laptops and spew forth our opinions have it easy– Obama actually has to play the hand he’s been dealt, and with that in mind, I give him extremely high marks for what he has already accomplished.
I would prefer another answer, but I see no meaningful difference between O and the Shrub. To me the real differences are style differences, not true content differences.
LOL!!!
You guys slay me.
Really.
Who did you think he would turn into? Saul Alinsky?
C’mon…
He is a political genius. He proves it every day. He gives with one hand, takes back with the other, and makes gradual progress in the direction in which he wishes to go. If you had watched his act closely from the beginning of his run for the presidency…way back in 2004/2005…that tactic would be crystal clear by now. It took me a minute, but I got it eventually and he has not wavered one iota in his approach. I remember first hearing him on the Randi Rhodes show…Randi creaming all over herself about his sexuality, Obama making non-committal statement after non-committal statement regarding her leftiness proclamations…and my first thought was “Who is this sleek geek!!!??? He is good. And dangerous. Tricky Dick with a Harvard accent and brownish skin. Hmmmmm….”
Then I read his book(s) and watched closer.
He is the anti-Tricky Dick, folks. He paid his dues, came up with the right goals after living in the real world, and has the genetically mandated talents to actually be able to do something about those goals.
Step by step.
Meanwhile the leftiness shmoon gabble and gawp about his “betrayals”. He’s not betraying you, folks. He just can’t afford to alienate the intelligence people. They have those guns, don’tcha know? So instead, he’s hanging them out to dry in the noonday sun.
(Hear the following in your head spoken in his own measured tones, with his own half-smile on his face.)
He doesn’t “prosecute” them, he simply dribs and drabs out the horrible details to a newsmedia starving for the story. With perhaps a parting admonition to the intel guys…
Riiiiight.
They do understand.
They can keep their power only as long as he doesn’t drop some of the other shoes regarding their act. Of which there are a closetful, bet on it.
Meanwhile, Hillary’s intel allies are protected…the left wing of the right wing, the “good” bad guys…and the hustle continues, only diminished.
One step at a time.
The same way that he managed to become president.
Watch.
Whiplash?
Keep your eye on the prize, Booman, and your whiplash problems will decrease exponentially.
His game? Straight ahead…except for all of the good basketball player’s feints and dodges, of course.
And y’know what?
Like the passing guard that he is, he won’t even take credit for the baskets.
He just sets ’em up.
And wins.
Watch.
He’s going to run the same game on the economy. Have you really listened to his rapid transit speech?
Listen to it.
And eventually…to the extent that he can do so successfully..he will run the same game on the Butches and Cheneys too.
Watch.
The whole world sees what’s happening except the leftiness clones and their opposition, the rightiness people.
The whole world.
Watch.
Later…
AG
indeed. But the US Left is addicted to angry futility.
I listened:
He is allocating 8 billion (down payment, full cost hundreds of billions ? [I think this is extremely optimistic and who is going to pay for this, oh I forgot, the American people are good for it]) for a high speed rail system. Keep in mind that the following figures are for a subway system (not high speed rail) in Los Angeles.
Red Line Facts and Figures
Rough Payoff date based on ticket sales: 116 mil per year = 48 years without the cost of maintenance, staff, or any other inevitable and eventual unforeseen costs
So the question become one of viability…do we need another transportation system that ends up costing more than we make in potential profitability?
Keep in mind that this is a terribly rough analysis based on a system that is only vaguely comparable.
Any thoughts?
and then simultaneously expect people to pay serious attention to what you are saying?
Deep.
Lissen up.
It’s FDR/WPA II. It worked then; the same sorts of objections were raised to it then, and it will work now.
Why?
Because “the people” can do damned near anything when aroused. The American people. The damdest concatenation of other cultures’ rejects, fools and freaks ever to come to a dead end continent and build a country.
You also wrote:
That’s a war that Obama can win. That is his genetically predefined strength.
Watch.
AG
Ok…
I thought this was a forum for progressives…obviously, this is my misunderstanding of what ‘progressive’ might mean. It is ‘progressive’ as long as we can refer to arcane policy, that brings us exactly back to where we are today in 50 or so years, not so bad, as we will all be dead by then and it will be someone else problem.
I am not sure that you choice of ‘fix’ for the system is a ‘working’ solution. It seems like what you are proposing leads us back into a rinse, wash, repeat, cycle rather than a true fix.
Wow…’dead end continent’ by that are you referring to the millions of people we committed genocide on in order to make the ‘dead end continent’ flourish into a respectable country? I get the feeling I know exactly what kind of person you are.
Either way, don’t you think it is kind of a hippy mentality to think that economics or taxation doesn’t actually play a part in the role of government? Or that we should question all possible solutions to problems with a fair examination of the potential and viability.
And what kind of person just ignores the possible tax burden or refuses to discuss it in a blind frenzy of leader/country worship? That is kind of cult oriented clap trap that I would expect from the hopelessly ignorant, not someone who considered themselves a ‘thinking person’ or a progressive thinker.
‘Genetically predefined strength’ yikes…I am really not sure what that is supposed to mean.
You bothered to respond to my post and brought nothing to the table except something your parents probably ‘told’ you was the correct way to run a country. I would appreciate it in the future if you would actually think through my points before responding instead of a knee jerk espousing of your political agenda. It makes you look weak.
you might like reading this, Arthur: http://bradhicks.livejournal.com/422902.html
Let’s use the report card
Economy – good stimulus package, a bit on the small size, flunk on picking Paulson’s boy. Flunk on trickle down from the banks. Overall a “D”
War – Staying in Iraq 6 more years and expanding Afghanistan – “F”
Human rights – anti-torture, but won’t do anything about it. Pro- massive warrantless wiretaps – “F”
Science policy – Lifts Stem Cell ban and expands other research – “A”
Crisis handling – Somali pirate incident – “A”
Tax policy – puny “making work pay credit” but letting Bush cuts expire – “C”
Health Care – incomplete “I”
Diplomacy – Cuba and Iran initiatives “B”
Adding these up “C-“. But I won’t vote for him again because of the Human Rights issues. It’s a deal breaker.
I think he’s doing as good as possible at present, under the circumstances.
Any move against the CIA could well be a death sentence for him, and he has much he can accomplish without that.
Ditto the torture stuff. Airing the documents – good, ballsy. Not prosecuting anyone? Cowardly and wrongheaded. There has to be some accountability somewhere along the way, at the highest levels, before we can have any faith that our government truly is by, of, and for the people.
Financial situation? Oddly enough, one of my more conservative associates in the financial world is saying Obama should nationalize the banks, and not just the bad assets. I didn’t expect to hear that from a conservative, and I happen to agree.
Meeting with Chavez and hopefully Castro? Good. They’re not quite the monsters they’ve been painted as, but I would proceed slowly, of course, and not trust ANY foreign leader. Frankly, I’d trust a hostile one almost more than a friendly one, because the former can’t risk betraying a trust, whereas the latter is more likely to take that for granted.
He’s so much better than what I’ve seen in the past decades, I get a frisson of pride! But I will not abandon my right to lobby for even better.
He has a tendency to try to be ‘loved’ by the opposition. I honestly believe he doesn’t understand the psychology of the dominionist crowd.
So I will continue to exercise my right to pressure. Prosecutions of torturers and those who have data mined my communications MUST occur.
Supporting OBAMA does not mean abandoning my brain or my conscience.
Very happy so far, but then I always felt he is a pragmatic left/center type so I didn’t expect an immediate festival of ponies and unicorns and rainbows.
I’m yet to get upset, we are less then 100 days in and I’m giving him time. I think things are gonna end up better then the daily ebb/flow/jubulation/outrage would lead one to believe.
If he gets health care with a strong public option, that alone will put him in my personal pantheon of the greats.