Obama's Troubles.

[Hyena Dandy]

Now, I'm not going to talk about why I like Obama, or why I don't like Obama. Honestly, while I don't like him, I don't think he's the antichrist or Hitler. I'm going to explain why I think that Obama's presidency was doomed from the start.


Here's the thing. Obama is a moderate. He likes to make compromises. He doesn't LIKE doing things like pushing through bills through reconciliation. He's not a fan of doing that. And he ran on that message.

But Obama's message became bigger than Obama. All people remember from the campaign is surging crowds chanting "YES WE CAN!" and all those "HOPE" and "CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN"

Obama was a victim of his own charisma. His style, on the campaign trail, and at other times, was... Well...

He speaks inspirationally. He speaks passionately. At least that's how he instinctively speaks. And people listen a lot less to what you're saying than they do to how you say it.

Obama was saying change, but the change was supposed to be teaming up, bipartisanship.

That's not what anybody heard.

Both sides, as Obama ran, assumed he was going to be a radical, he was going to change the world.

Uh... Not so much. He wanted a few things which really weren't that radical, and he ran on them. But he spoke so passionately, that he became a radical figure.

Conservatives still don't listen to him, and talk about him like a radical. And why shouldn't they? That's good for their business (getting elected). For all the things you can say about Glenn Beck, the one you can't say is that he doesn't do his job. His job is to fire up the Republican base, and shill gold bonds.

And he does both of those very well.

So Conservatives have their job to do. Get elected. So they portray Obama radically, which everyone was expecting. Its easy, just don't stop Palin's portion of the 08 campaign.

The Liberals, on the other hand, are an even bigger problem for Obama. See, people wanted him to win. They REALLY wanted him to win. Because they were looking for HOPE and CHANGE and YES WE CAN and other such things. What they got was a guy who really wants everyone to get along. That wasn't what they signed up for, so they lost faith. They felt 'betrayed'.

So now there's a fired-up group of conservatives because they think Obama is a socialist, and a bunch of liberals who feel betrayed because Obama isn't a socialist and they REALLY wanted him to be (but they won't say the word socialist because that's an EEEEVIL word).

[guywithashovel]

Here's the thing. Obama is a moderate. He likes to make compromises. He doesn't LIKE doing things like pushing through bills through reconciliation. He's not a fan of doing that. And he ran on that message.

Thank you for saying this. I die a little inside every time I hear someone from the Fox News crowd rant about Obama being "a socialist" or "the most left wing president I've ever seen." He isn't even a liberal, much less a socialist.

[Crazedclerkthe2nd]

Thank you for saying this. I die a little inside every time I hear someone from the Fox News crowd rant about Obama being "a socialist" or "the most left wing president I've ever seen." He isn't even a liberal, much less a socialist.

It's usually the people that have close influence on Obama (Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Van Jones, Andy Stern) that are labeled as more left wing and socialist by the Conservative talking heads. They generally subscribe to the idea that Obama is just a charismatic figurehead being manipulated by the unions and other leftist revolutionaries within the government.

But then again there's so much BS out there it's sometimes tough to separate the truth from the lies.

[BookstoreEscapee]

I gotta say I don't follow politics that closely. I haven't commented on the health care bill or anything because I honestly haven't followed it closely enough to have an informed opinion. But when I read articles and skim through the comments, the rants about Obama's a socialist and everything's his fault and liberals are evil and etc. are just so ridiculous (especially when they do it on a story that has nothing whatsoever to do with Obama, politics, or the federal government in any way, shape, or form). But then people do it on the other side, too, because a little over a year ago, it was all Bush's fault, and he's a theocrat and warmonger and etc. But people seem to expect one person to make huge changes in a short time without recognizing that they are dealing with a huge system populated with varying viewpoints and agendas, and just because he's president doesn't mean he gets to do whatever he wants.

For the record, I tend toward the liberal end of the spectrum, and I voted for Obama, but I am not a registered Democrat (not registered with any party).

[crashhelmet]

I'd say that the biggest reason why he's failing, appears to be failing, or is going to fail is not because he's a moderate. It's because his opponents have the distinct agenda of making him fail. He could come up with some idea that's going to benefit everyone, while reducing the national debt, ending the war in the middle east, and eradicating cancer but his opponents will still do everything to make him fail.

The tea baggers and pundits have never once made recommendations about how to fix health care before or after the bill was signed. It's always been about how it needs to fail. This past weekend, CNN was doing this IOUSA program about the National Debt. Everything they brought up as ways to fix the debt are points Obama outlined in his SotU address. Yet, the opposition failed to acknowledge it.

The Sub-title for Sean Hannity's book "Conservative Victory" is "Defeating Obama's Radical Agenda." I think that says it all.

CH

[Hyena Dandy]

I'd say that the biggest reason why he's failing, appears to be failing, or is going to fail is not because he's a moderate. It's because his opponents have the distinct agenda of making him fail.

I wasn't saying his problem is that he's a moderate. I approve of his being a moderate. The problem is that he can't get anyone to BELIEVE he's a moderate. While plenty of the more intelligent conservative leaders may realize Obama is a moderate, many others honestly BELIEVE he's a radical leftist socialist Nazi who probably kicks puppies or something.

The thing is, I was saying he was doomed to fail from the start, because no matter what he said, both his followers and opponents were determined he was going to be a radical leftist.

I was fortunate enough to be in a politics class during election season, and I could see the problems from there. The liberals in the class were determined Obama was going to change everything, fix all of Bush's mistakes, and do just about everything short of leaving burning dog doo Anne Coulter's front porch. The conservatives were of the same opinion.




Obama is a man who inspires a lot of passion in people, whether that be passionate hatred, or passionate affection. However, his policies and actions are those of a dispassionate, level-headed thinker.

He is failing/has failed/will fail because he's dealing with a congress who wants him to steamroll the opposition, a base who's angry because he's NOT steamrolling the opposition, and an opposition who's doing their damnedest to convince everyone they're being steamrolled.

Is that because all conservatives are power-hungry people willing to bend the truth to get their way?

In most cases, no. In most cases, they're good-hearted people who have a different opinion of how the government has been run, and are surrounded on all sides by people talking about how Obama's a radical. The Republicans in Congress ended up forcing his hand so he HAD to take radical means to pass a fairly centrist health bill, and its STILL being called everything short of Genocide. Although I think that may have been mentioned too.










The important thing to remember here, the VERY important thing to remember, is that people on both sides of this issue are good, honest people who want what's best for their country. They simply disagree on what's best. They are not evil, they are at worst misguided. And as a result, people on both sides need rational discussion.

[Boozy]

I haven't commented on the health care bill or anything because I honestly haven't followed it closely enough to have an informed opinion.

I have to commend you for this. The funny thing is, you probably know more than many people who are spewing about it (in real life, not here), but you're not comfortable with your knowledge so you hold back.

People need to learn to keep their mouths shut and their ears open when it comes to complicated issues they know little about.

We have some well-informed people on this forum, but that's pretty rare. Usually people can't wait to subject the world to their opinions on issues they know little about. And they don't shut up long enough to learn anything.

That's been a big problem with this health care debate from day one.

[smileyeagle1021]

Is that because all conservatives are power-hungry people willing to bend the truth to get their way?

Of course they are. There is no doubt that they will lie, steal, cheat or even sell their mother if it helps their political career. The same can and should be said about the liberal politicians too.

*except in Utah where the "liberals" are really moderates who will try to run an honest campaign and the conservatives have the platform "Jesus is coming, look busy."


As far as Obama, I agree, he was doomed to fail. This nation has become so splintered that ANY president would fail. A conservative would turn us into the Theocracy that the Christians have been wanting us to be for the last 250 years (and those damned Founding Fathers forgot to put in the Constitution ) and a liberal would turn us into a Chinese territory. A moderate won't be able to get anything done because both extremes are fighting against anything that isn't their dream vision of a Christian Theocracy or a Godless Socialist State.