Obama's Two Mistakes That Lost the Country

[coloradoatheist]

Cite?

I'm surprised you didn't know that Obamacare was actually a conservative plan.

Was a policy that they pushed on their website or a paper that they had?

 

[ksen]

I'm surprised you didn't know that Obamacare was actually a conservative plan.

Was a policy that they pushed on their website or a paper that they had?

Read the Forbes article. There was a whole book put out by Heritage in the late 80s extolling the wonderful virtues of things in Obamacare that modern republicans now say came straight out of the pit of Stalin's asshole.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

Do we also tell him how they and Cato considered Reagan a hack?

 

[coloradoatheist]

Was a policy that they pushed on their website or a paper that they had?

Read the Forbes article. There was a whole book put out by Heritage in the late 80s extolling the wonderful virtues of things in Obamacare that modern republicans now say came straight out of the pit of Stalin's asshole.

I did, and they said book but couldn't find it. It also had some major differences as pointed out. But I asked was it a major talking point of Heritage or one publication? Was Heritage in favor of the Romney's Mass. plan and said it would owrk at the national level?

 

[ksen]

Read the Forbes article. There was a whole book put out by Heritage in the late 80s extolling the wonderful virtues of things in Obamacare that modern republicans now say came straight out of the pit of Stalin's asshole.

I did, and they said book but couldn't find it. It also had some major differences as pointed out. But I asked was it a major talking point of Heritage or one publication?

About 5 seconds on google later . . .

http://thf_media.s3.amazonaws.com/1989/pdf/hl218.pdf

Was Heritage in favor of the Romney's Mass. plan and said it would owrk at the national level?

About 2 more seconds on google later . . .

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/04/12/463097/romneycare-6/
http://www.heritage.org/research/commentary/2006/01/mitts-fit

 

[Underseer]

I think that Obama's early mistake was that he thought he was the next Lincoln and was the guy to heal the fractured and divided nation. He didn't want to overexploit the Democratic majority or go for left wing populism because he wanted to be the guy who could work with the Republicans and achieve bipartisan solutions where every bill came with a free unicorn. That didn't work because the GOP wanted nothing to do with him. By the time he got around to saying "Fuck it", the partisan divisions were more entrenched than ever and he'd lost the Democratic support he'd started with.

Yes, who can forget the bipartisan spirit that surrounded choosing to focus on the bi-partisan issue of socialized healthcare and then jamming it through using corrupt bargains, reconciliation maneuvers, and zero Republican votes. If it weren't for everyone suddenly becoming so racist his legacy would be as the Great Compromiser.

Also, he used the Secret Weather Weapon and has a Secret Muslim Ring!

 

[Valjean]

They were when the Heritage Foundation was proposing it.

Cite?

Just Google "Romneycare." Obamacare was patterned after a Republican healthcare initiative.

The Republicans opposed Obamacare and everything else Obama proposed (even previous Republican legislation). It was their stated intent to oppose Obama's entire presidency at every turn.
http://www.opednews.com/articles/A-Republican-Dance-of-Trea-by-John-Reed-120901-573.html

I see Obama's two major failings as:
1. Failing to expose the conspiracy against his presidency.
2. Attempting to compromise and work with opponents who had every intention of destroying his presidency by any means necessary.

The Caucus Room Conspiracy (Google) was well known, yet Obama kept coming back to the Republican legislators with olive branch in hand, like a fawning puppy that keeps begging for attention no matter how many times it's abused.
He was hopeless as a negotiator.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

You mean where he bent over backwards to get Republican support and was basically offering free handjobs in the Oval Office to anyone from the GOP just so he could say he got one vote from them and dismissed left wing implementations of the healthcare package out of hand in favour of a middle of the road solution which neither side ended up liking?

LOL @ bent over backwards to get Republican support for his massive new socialized medicine plan.

It wasn't new though, remember? It was originally Mitt Romney's idea.

If it really HAD been a socialized medicine plan instead of a relatively pragmatic (if deliberately incredibly limited) Republican idea, it might been more effective AND more popular among democrats.

I see Obama's two major failings as:
1. Failing to expose the conspiracy against his presidency.
2. Attempting to compromise and work with opponents who had every intention of destroying his presidency by any means necessary.

Exactly this. He tried to take the moral high ground and extend an olive branch. The Republicans responded by lighting the high ground on fire, sharpening the olive branch into a spear and trying to stab him with it.

It isn't the civilized or stately thing to say, but negotiating with Republicans is, at this point, an exercise in futility. Democrats outside of Washington generally know this, but the party's willingness to compromise LITERALLY ANYTHING to avoid a fight leaves them disengaged and apathetic.

 

[untermensche]

Gerrymandering lost the Democrats the Congress, not Obama.

 

[J842P]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-morris/obamas-two-mistakes-that_b_8854226.html

Early this year President Obama spoke before the Cleveland Club. After the speech 7th grader Alura Winfrey inquired, "If you could go back to the first day of your first term what advice would you give yourself?" Obama reflected for a moment and then blithely explained he would have worked harder to sell his economic policies.

Ms. Winfrey asked the right question but might have elicited a more revealing response if the question was given more context and phrased more insistently. Something like this: "Given that under your watch your party lost the country, in retrospect what would you have done differently?"

The data clearly would have supported her. When Barack Obama took office Democrats controlled the White House, both houses of Congress and had outright control (both houses of the state legislature and the governorship) of 27 states. Republicans controlled 17. In 2010 Democrats lost the House and the number of Democrat to Republican-controlled states almost exactly reversed. In 2014 Republicans won the Senate and the score regarding state control now stands at an astonishing 32 to 7 in favor of Republicans. And Republicans could complete the federal trifecta in 2016.

Nothing Obama could have done would have avoided the tsunami of vicious racist and xenophobic hatred that washed over him and the country, aided and abetted by the savagely partisan and vitriolic FOX news. Nothing would have stopped obscenely rich and intensely self-interested individuals like the Koch brothers from pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into campaigns to discredit and defile the President and the government in general.

But Obama might well have stunted the emergence of a rightwing populist movement if he had pursued an aggressive populist strategy of his own, one that demonstrated government could effectively challenge giant corporations and unbridled private greed on behalf of small business and the average family.

And he has no one to blame really other than himself for these lapses.

He was never a populist. Honestly, he has always been center-left at best. While he isn't a DLC democrat on some foreign policy issues, he pretty much has always been of the DLC stripe. He is certainly is center-right when it comes to economic issues.

 

[J842P]

You mean where he bent over backwards to get Republican support and was basically offering free handjobs in the Oval Office to anyone from the GOP just so he could say he got one vote from them and dismissed left wing implementations of the healthcare package out of hand in favour of a middle of the road solution which neither side ended up liking?

LOL @ bent over backwards to get Republican support for his massive new socialized medicine plan. That he passed with corrupt deals, reconciliation maneuvers, lack of popular support, etc, etc.

Oh please. The plan was straight out of the Heritage foundation. Calling it "socialized medicine" is pretty daft.

- - - Updated - - -

He won HIS elections. If the next president is a republican, we can talk about him 'losing' the country. If the pattern continues, Democrats will do better in this election. Then it is only a question of during which election the vulnerable candidates show up on. Another pattern we have is that two term presidents almost always leave office unpopular and with much disappointment.

Otherwise it sounds like loser downticket democrats blaming the guy up top. In other words, they are whining because they couldn't get democratic voters to turn out in numbers as large as when Obama was on the ticket. Thanks Obama! Guess what, the democrats have had plenty of problems in their local organizations for a long time. Obama owes his success largely to his organization he built himself. Frankly, I wonder if people are already smelling defeat for Clinton in the cards and want to start blaming Obama for it. Clinton's partisans will never forgive him for beating her in the primaries.

Yeah, I have to agree with this.

 

[Alcoholic Actuary]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-morris/obamas-two-mistakes-that_b_8854226.html

Early this year President Obama spoke before the Cleveland Club. After the speech 7th grader Alura Winfrey inquired, "If you could go back to the first day of your first term what advice would you give yourself?" Obama reflected for a moment and then blithely explained he would have worked harder to sell his economic policies.

Ms. Winfrey asked the right question but might have elicited a more revealing response if the question was given more context and phrased more insistently. Something like this: "Given that under your watch your party lost the country, in retrospect what would you have done differently?"

Right?!?! Totally more appropriate question for a 7th grader to ask. I mean what was this little bitch thinking throwing up such softballs?? Way to hold the "Liberal Cleveland Middle School System" accountable, Huffington Post.

aa

 

[zorq]

I agree that gerymandering was a big factor.

What happened was that after two years of slumping economy (following the collapse that happened on Bush's watch) and a black face in the white house Fox news brainwashed conservatives and the entire white racist faction of the US voted en mass in the 2010 mid-term election while weary liberal leaning folks stayed home. This won the Republicans (with the help of Tea party spirit) the majorities in a number of state legislatures who were eager to redistrict in their favor following the 2010 census.

The result was that in voting for house seats in 2012 Dems got 49% of the votes while the GOP candidates got 48.2% of the votes but SOMEHOW that turned into 233-195 seat majority for the GOP.

That's right. More people voted for Dem representatives in 2012 but the GOP got their second biggest house majority in 60 years.

Election reform could have been Obama's #1 objective. Maybe then he wouldn't have "lost the country." as this article claims.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

Yes, who can forget the bipartisan spirit that surrounded choosing to focus on the bi-partisan issue of socialized healthcare and then jamming it through using corrupt bargains, reconciliation maneuvers, and zero Republican votes. If it weren't for everyone suddenly becoming so racist his legacy would be as the Great Compromiser.

Also, he used the Secret Weather Weapon and has a Secret Muslim Ring!

The things you believe keep getting weirder.

 

[Jaecp]

Also, he used the Secret Weather Weapon and has a Secret Muslim Ring!

The things you believe keep getting weirder.

Pretty sure Underseer is joking

 

[RavenSky]

Gerrymandering lost the Democrats the Congress, not Obama.

Yep

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Also, he used the Secret Weather Weapon and has a Secret Muslim Ring!

The things you believe keep getting weirder.

That's not Underseer's and you remember it too.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

The things you believe keep getting weirder.

Pretty sure Underseer is joking

Pretty sure he's not joking.

The things you believe keep getting weirder.

That's not Underseer's and you remember it too.

I cannot parse your response.

 

[laughing dog]

I cannot parse your response.

That is not news. What is your point?

 

[maxparrish]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-morris/obamas-two-mistakes-that_b_8854226.html

...Nothing Obama could have done would have avoided the tsunami of vicious racist and xenophobic hatred that washed over him and the country, aided and abetted by the savagely partisan and vitriolic FOX news. Nothing would have stopped obscenely rich and intensely self-interested individuals like the Koch brothers from pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into campaigns to discredit and defile the President and the government in general.

But Obama might well have stunted the emergence of a rightwing populist movement if he had pursued an aggressive populist strategy of his own, one that demonstrated government could effectively challenge giant corporations and unbridled private greed on behalf of small business and the average family.

And he has no one to blame really other than himself for these lapses.

Apparently a generational label for the current American left is overdue. Historian John P. Diggins (in 1992) identified four generations in his historical overview: the Lyrical Left, the Old Left, the New Left and the Academic Left. After reading David Morris, it seems overdue to identify a new category - the theory-less lumpen left.

The article is left populism, a seething rant against their usual demonic 'evil doers' (banks, insurance companies, mortgage companies, Wall Street, "giant corporations", etc.) and their machinations in the great recession. And what remains, by article end, is a residue of bitterness against Obama not doing more - his "more" not being measured by the degree of recovery from the recession (that seems irrelevant to the author), but in Obama's failure to punish individual enemies and dismantle the institutional class enemies.

What an opportunity for political exploitation - lost! In the venerable tradition of Huey Long and Elizabeth Warren Mr. Morris wanted the streets filled with financial blood. He bemoans "the could have been" had Obama mounted the barricades, red flag flying behind his upturned gaze, fist clenching the air in defiance, to the cheers of the yearning masses of proto-revolutionaries - why, Morris wonders, didn't he turn the capitalists over to those with the pitchforks?

Perhaps because, unlike the author, Obama was aware of he was not elected as Tsar or a one-party Chairman the the American Soviet? Might it have something to do with Congressional majority that contained cooler and more moderate Democrats? You know, like the ones that supported Obamacare but rejected a single payer Medicare system?

Or might it be that Obama made "the mistake" of listening to his own well educated economists, his own Treasury secretary, and his own financial system experts on the path to, and priority of, recovery?

Or, finally, might it be that he was well aware that his win and his Congress was the result of the "perfect storm" of a unpopular war, deep recession, a major hurricane, and several years of effective (and relentless) Republican bashing rhetoric over a "culture of corruption"? Could it be that he understood that his coalition was a fragile and temporary deviation, one that needed nurtured against the coming backlash?

I am not one to defend Obama, but its difficult to see how he could have been expected to do much more. Very shortly after he took office, a grass roots Tea Party arose to fight his "creeping socialism", his wall street supporters balked (e.g. Dimon), and his bank bashing class rhetoric effectively terrorized and alienated the blue dog moderates in his party's Congress. People were looking for a unify-er and hope generator, not a revolutionary.

It was not enough to be adored by academia, teachers, blacks, students, government employees, single women, the gays, the unions, wind power boosters, illegals, and Hollywood...although you wouldn't know it listening to the lumpen left.

As it was, the blue dogs got wiped out in 2010 and then, in spite of Republican blunders, so did many Democratic Senators (in 2014).

Guess it goes to that the lumpen, of either party, never let's reality cloud their passions (or bitterness).