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

Discussion in 'BBS Hangout: Debate & Discussion' started by glynch, Jul 7, 2011.

  1. glynch

    glynch Member

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    As usual Obama has shown some courage, but only in being willing to piss of his base-- never to contest the conservative narrative. I know conservatives and libertarians are happy with this. I see a fair number of Democratic Congressman aren't.

    Obama is always trying to placate the conservatives as they keep moving the goal posts. He can't call their bluff to shut down the government and stop paying on the government's bills. They have his number. As one AFL-CIO guy who was for Hillary nailed it: "We have worked with this guy; he is a poet not a fighter". Too bad the lower 98% needed someone to stick up for them.

    I suppose it will make Major and other moderates Republicans and perhaps some moderate Dems happy that he has been so moderate. He will be hailed on Wall Street and the corporate media as a tactical genius somehow. I doubt he has any sort of plan except to be a nice guy.

    Now instead of running as the guy who kept the GOP from ending Medicare he can run as the guy who ended it slowly. Instead of running as the guy out to end social security he can run as the guy who cut the benefits more slowly.
     
    1 person likes this.
  2. thadeus

    thadeus Member

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    Obama is an establishment man.
     
  3. Rocket River

    Rocket River Member

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    We moving in the wrong direction by leaps and bounds
    then
    we try to inch worm our way back to good

    Rocket River
     
  4. RocketMan Tex

    RocketMan Tex Member

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    And nothing like the person he ran as/promises he ran on. He won't get my vote again.
     
  5. Rockets Pride

    Rockets Pride Member

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    yes we can America!
     
  6. Rocket River

    Rocket River Member

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    *sigh*
    the problem is .. . he will be the lesser of two weevils

    Even if he is bad. . . . you have to prevent WORSE from capturing the White House.

    Rocket River
     
  7. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Member

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    Thank you for starting another thread as this was cluttering up the other thread.

    I will repeat what I said in the other thread. We don't know the details yet of what Obama is proposing regarding changes to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. We have the recommendations from the deficit cutting commission but we don't know if that is exactly what Obama is proposing.

    Second, as another poster noted this might be more of a political ploy to put pressure on the Republicans. That would fit with a general political strategy that has been going on since Ryan introduced his budget of painting the Republicans as threatening Social Security and Medicare. In this since this could be a point of gamesmanship on Obama's part that the Republicans are so intransigent that they are forcing Obama's hand on these issues. If the Republicans don't take this, which they probably won't, he can come back and point out again how intransigent the Republicans are.

    I will agree that this is a political ploy is somewhat speculative but given the lack of info we have about this I think its way too early to talk about Obama as ending Medicare.

    Finally speaking from my own POV, not trying to read into Obama's, entitlements do need to be addressed. Our current system is unsustainable and changes need to be made. Whether Obama will make those type of changes I don't know.
     
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  8. KingCheetah

    KingCheetah Atomic Playboy
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    Obama is just positioning himself for reelection.
     
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  9. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Member

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    And what were you specifically expecting him to do?

    I've brought this up before but Obama's campaign was very vague and I think a lot of things were expected of him that wasn't necessarily going to be the case.
     
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  10. juicystream

    juicystream Member

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    Its odd, how Republicans view this man as super liberal, and this guy does everything against them, while strongly liberal people dislike him because he won't take a strong enough stance against the right.

    It may just suck to be President.
     
  11. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Member

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    Probably so and one of the reasons why if by some miracle I could be President I wouldn't want to.
     
  12. DonkeyMagic

    DonkeyMagic Member
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    he is great at winning elections. Unfortunately, that's about all.
     
  13. moestavern19

    moestavern19 Member

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    Exactly why I laughed when everyone was acting like he was the savior of America.

    He's just another politician too caught up in his own status to really get anything done.
     
  14. Depressio

    Depressio Member

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    Obama, I am disappoint.
     
  15. DonnyMost

    DonnyMost Member
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    It needs to be done, but it's only a part of the puzzle. Can the Republicans please stand up and offer to kill tax protection for the uber wealthy and other corporate favors now? Supply side can't be any more demonstrably disproven than it has been over the last 10 years, time for that side of the table to pony up.
     
  16. Batman Jones

    Batman Jones Member

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    Can't argue with this or with the OP. But...

    Obama is still the best president we've had in my lifetime (Nixon was prez when I was born and he was more liberal than Clinton) and also the best for progressive causes, against great odds. Carter was unlucky and unsuccessful and Clinton didn't just placate or continue corporate interests; he giddily triangulated the libs out at every opportunity. He didn't cave; it was his primary intention to carry water for big business. He was pure DLC and anybody that knows what the DLC was knows what I mean. And Obama has not yet done anything as unconscionable or draconian as Clinton's welfare "reform," which was not a matter of agreeing to Republican demands but doing something he actually wanted to do.

    Most unfortunately, Obama is also an incredible p***y. In fact, he is not only the best president of my lifetime (and boy is the bar low), he is the pussiest president of my lifetime too. He is also the most disappointing president of my lifetime. (I knew Clinton was going to suck.) It's funny how one guy can be all three things.
     
  17. gifford1967

    gifford1967 Member
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    I am so ****ing tired of all the sniping at Obama from the left. If we're going by preferred policies, I'm probably the leftiest lefty on this message board. But this isn't fantasy land, it's the real world. Obama has done a masterful job at threading the needle to get the most progressive legislation that is realistically possible passed. If people really want to make a ******* difference instead of whining incessantly, they would start by looking at where the problem really lies, in Congress, because that is where progressive policies go to die. And specifically, they would identify the House and Senate seats where more progressive candidates could feasibly get elected and then support the best candidate in the primaries and elections. For a concrete example of how this works, look up Donna Edwards' race in Maryland and see how she came to be elected to the House of Representatives.
     
    #17 gifford1967, Jul 7, 2011
    Last edited: Jul 7, 2011
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  18. JeopardE

    JeopardE Member

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    What I'm reading is that this amounts to not much more than a political ploy that, if successful, would be a massive win for the president -- the cuts would have to be in exchange for ~$1 trillion in "new revenue" through closing of tax loopholes and other tax-related avenues. And as it were, Boehner and co. would probably cave but for that maniacal freshman class of teabagger House reps.

    The bottom line for the Republicans is that any deal right now is a win for Obama, and they would rather see the country burn under his watch than concede political points - they want him out next year at all costs. Obama sees that, and he's going to try to play it to his maximal political advantage -- in the end, he's the one who tried to bend over backwards, and they're the ones who just screamed no all the way to the gates of hell and beyond.
     
  19. Batman Jones

    Batman Jones Member

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    You got rep on this from me for the first part, not the second. I wish we could give half-rep.

    Obama was in no way vague; you are buying in here again to shoddy conventional wisdom.

    He campaigned first of all as much more of a moderate and a pragmatist than a liberal. Amazingly, both sides took his plain words and turned him into a super-liberal. He never was one and he never promised to be.

    He did however make a ****-load of promises he was either forced to renege on or simply chose to renege on. Both are disappointing in pretty much equal measure I think. Because even though he was officially forced (blackmailed really) into keeping the Bush cuts for the uber-rich in order to give relief to the poor and middle class, for just one example, he could have beat that with his bully pulpit, a thing he apparently doesn't know he has or that was somehow removed by the Bush staff on their way out.

    I will vote for Obama again with enthusiasm and even a little left over hope. But that does not mean I am not deeply disappointed in him.

    But that's not because he was vague. That was a BS talking point. He spelled out his positions to the letter, down to unusual detail, on his website. That's actually the only reason there are so many broken (and kept) promises to count.
     
  20. A_3PO

    A_3PO Member

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    For the sake of positioning, it's in Republicans' interest to paint Obama as super-liberal, even though it's complete nonsense. The Dems who thought Obama was a left-wing ideologue just didn't listen during the campaign.

    Guys, you just have to face up to the fact the nation as a whole doesn't want a left-wing president who relishes confrontation every chance possible. If that's how you interpreted Obama, you didn't listen.
     

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