Obama to Cave to GOP and Cut Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security

Seriously, people were way off in what they expected from Obama.

His whole career prior to being president was one of being middle of the road, never taking a stand on any legislation, and generally talking about pragmatism and compromise over anything else.

His biggest stance before being president was saying he was against the Iraq war. That is pretty much it.

I voted for him because he is black, because his administration wouldn't be anti-intellectual, and because McCain was nonsensical. It would have been Obama or no vote. Same goes for the next election. But I never expected nor will I expect him to do anything grand. That would be a waste of effort.

 

BMJ, very impressed with your objective analysis of Obama's performance so far, including reasonable expectations and the unforced errors on his part.

Repped.

 

Given the sh-tty jobs report this AM - he needs to trade short term spending increases for long term spending cuts.

 

I believe in National health care but how does it effect our government spending other than increase it?

 

Have been disappointed in Obama. He should have tried harder back when the Dems controlled everything. He shouldn't have extended the Bush tax cuts, etc. Grow some damn balls.

 

I appreciate that .. sort of..

That is exactly my point though. He was a cipher that many people projected on different ideas of what they wanted or thought he was.

Except he also couched a lot of those specifics with various qualifiers and himself said that things would change based on circumstances.

To his credit he did present specifics, although couched, most of his campaign rhetoric was vague and the whole direction of his campaign was vague. For as much of a transformational candidate he was there wasn't one clear vision that everyone could agree with what an Obama presidency would be like. "Hope and Change" are nice but as a slogan even less meaningful than "Compassionate Conservate".

Its understandable since it is difficult to campaign on specifics but it is a fact that many different people had different views of what Obama was and he was happy to go along with that. That is why I said in the other thread that the four different opinions of Obama all have some truth to it.

 

I know this is somewhat out of context, since you listed other reasons, but what a terrible reason to vote for or against someone.

 

It would increase government spending, but reduce the overall cost of healthcare substantially. It would also remove the need for Medicaid/Medicare/SCHIP. I think it is only a matter of time before we have it. I don't think there are advantages to private healthcare, but don't think they outweigh the benefits of universal healthcare.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/07/health/policy/07medicaid.html

First Study of Its Kind Shows Benefits of Providing Medical Insurance to Poor

The findings of this study should surprise no one. I also get the feeling this won't change anybody's mind about socialized medicine. Either you think healthcare should be a national entitlement, or you think it should be a private commodity. And the people who feel the latter won't be swayed by any evidence that socialized medicine benefits people that they don't give crap about in the first place. Maybe I'm just feeling extra cynical today, but the best way to campaign for universal healthcare is to show how socialized medicine does not decrease efficiency or effectiveness (if anything, it keeps costs down), and how privatization policies turn healthcare into a blood money market, which basically strangles the middle and lower class moreso than any other tax you can levy. Which in turn hurts the people on top of the class food-chain. Having a happy, healthy, and financially stable middle and lower class is like keeping the foundation of your house from cracking. Without a solid foundation, any building on top of it (corporate industry, government, etc), no matter how glorious or awesome, will surely topple. When the meak do well, the strong do even better. It's time to water the damn lawn and stop worrying about how pretty we can make the flowers look on our tallest trees.

 

Sadly I have to agree with your analysis. I just saw an attack against one of the candidates running for a possibly recalled seat in Wisconsin that accused this person of supporting a health care system that pays for people who don't even pay taxes. That just shows the reasoning behind these people that they are so ideologically bound they are unable to consider the possible benefits of making health care available to all.

 

For the entirety of our country's history only white men could get elected. Changing that by introducing the first minority or woman president is a ****ing great reason to vote for someone, especially if it's not the only reason. There were also practical reasons for letting race influence the decision. As Andrew Sullivan wrote, and I'm paraphrasing, 'just imagine the difference in perception throughout the world an Obama president would make (my words here: and it did), imagine the effect it will have on young, dark-skinned Muslims to see the America they have been told is a great demon elect a black man named Barack Hussein Obama.'

Though I wanted a minority or woman president already, more than anything, I found that argument extremely persuasive.

I personally don't want to see another straight, white, male, Christian president again (again, until 2008, a prerequisite to be a serious candidate) until we've had at least one woman, Latino, Asian, Native American, Jew, Arab, Mormon, Muslim, gay and atheist one.

We have a lot of catching up to do, especially for a country with so enormously heinous a record on race, women's rights, etc.

 

That doesn't make him a cipher, it makes the people who didn't know what he was about idiots and their ignorance about his specific plans willful.

Example, please? Or are you going to refuse to support your points as you did repeatedly on the "everybody does it" BS and then continue to repeat your flawed and unsupported premise without adding any support to it?

You know, I think you think you post this lazy stuff in an attempt to be fair. You should know it is fundamentally unfair. His specifics were not "couched" or "vague," they were in his position papers and on his website to which he constantly directed people. And his vision was a very clear one. He promised to be a pragmatic compromiser that would reach across the aisle. "Hope and change" were a slogan. "No red America, no blue America, just America" was his clear message. It began in 2004 and never lapsed. You can't fit all that on a campaign poster. Sorry, but the facts don't support anything you said above. I do not expect you to do "more research" than NO research to provide a link to support your claims, not from an op-ed but from an objective source.

You are far too easily swayed by conventional wisdom, even when that 'wisdom' is demonstrated to be false. I asked you one simple question in the other thread (back up your primary statement), you never answered it, you kept repeating the same stuff, unsupported, and then you started acting like I couldn't let well enough alone. That is not because I'm unreasonable. It's because you don't support your arguments when challenged to do so. For all your good qualities, shame on you for that.

He campaigned on specifics in every place it was feasible or even possible to do so. You can't do it on bumper stickers, posters, 1 minute debate answers, 2 minute commercials or even 30 minute speeches or paid adverts. It is too complicated for any of that, unless you do indeed present vague, cipher-like policy positions. He said in response to criticism that his plans lacked detail, again and again, frustratedly in fact, that all anyone had to do was go to his website. The details were there, they were painstaking details. After having tried to get people to go read them repeatedly, it is unfair to say he was a cipher or vague.

I now expect you to concede a couple points (to continue your idea of yourself as a moderate, valuing all opinions equally whether they are or not) and say "though Obama was vague and a cipher, Batman has a point." That will not do.

Evidence or go home.

 

Holy man. Go read a book or a newspaper or simply look at the CBO analysis. This has been explained ad nauseam.

 

That's a terrible argument. The best candidate should win regardless of race, sex, religion, etc. If those happen to all be WASP men, then so be it, and I'm a minority.

 

I'm gonna rep you on this if I haven't done so too recently or too often to be able. But...

I think you're making too little of the Iraq war speech. When he made it the country was in lockstep support of the war as was the Dem party and he made the speech in a very close Dem primary (having lost his last one). The speech was brilliant, brave, no holds barred (I don't support a 'stupid' war) and very dangerous to his political future.

It wasn't just a random campaign speech.

Regarding the rest of your post we're in total agreement.

 

Would it be okay for me to hire a white guy over a black guy because my intended customer base would probably prefer the white guy?

You shouldn't look past the color of someone's skin, you shouldn't see it at all.

You are free to vote for whoever you want to, and for whatever reason, but I wouldn't want your prejudiced vote.

 

Reading BJ's post I don't think he is looking at race as the only reason but a very compelling reason and state there were other reasons to vote for Obama.