Quote :

"And three more years for you to be dismissive of legitimate concerns about Obama's positions. And three more years for you to pretend that you're not doing this, that you're simply a passive observer witnessing all this from a monochrome monitor on Fantasy Island or some such."

i'm dismissive of everything

there's no reason in getting worked up about it... ignore me and move on

it should be easy to do because i offer little to the discussion

[Edited on December 14, 2009 at 1:44 PM. Reason : +]

12/14/2009 1:41:33 PM

^ True--except a sometimes holier-than-thou attitude. It only occasionally annoys me--when it does, I comment.

I'm not worked up about it.

12/14/2009 1:47:57 PM

but there is no holier-than-thou attitude

that's just pride fucking with you

[Edited on December 14, 2009 at 2:54 PM. Reason : +]

12/14/2009 2:38:20 PM

Polling doesn't mean much. If Obama was doing the right thing, the numbers would be even lower. All it really tells us is that the public is less supportive of Obama, but that shouldn't come as a surprise. The numbers started out inflated because of unsubstantiated hype. Most Republicans were opposed to the Obama agenda right out of the gate. The fact that his approval ratings have just recently moved below 50% is kind of surprising to me, and I expect that they will go even lower.

12/14/2009 2:59:04 PM

50% isn't bad at all, considering what he's trying to get done.

In fact, his numbers have been following Reagan's, pbuh, fairly closely.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/presidential-approval-tracker.htm

12/14/2009 5:17:11 PM

US government looks to expand scientific open access policy

Quote :

"The US government's Office of Science and Technology Policy is hosting a forum for debating an expansion of an open access policy, used by the National Institute of Health, that guarantees all publications derived from the agency's funding are available to the public within one year. "

http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2009/12/us-government-looks-to-expand-scientific-open-access-policy.ars

12/14/2009 5:26:22 PM

I think Cheney was onto something with the whole "dithering" thing. Not with regards to the issue he was discussing, but with regards to confidence in the president. Say what you will about Lyndon Johnson, but he would have had this health care bill through the senate in no time flat and still wipe up at the polls. I say this because it's exactly what he did in 1964, and I somehow doubt we're more opposed to a (sort of) national health plan now than we were then. The 1964 election was pretty decisive proof of his, well, decisiveness.

12/14/2009 9:14:39 PM

U.S. Said to Pick Illinois Prison to House Detainees
December 14, 2009

Quote :

"An administration official said President Obama had directed the federal government to proceed with acquiring the Thomson Correctional Center, a maximum-security prison in a rural village about 150 miles west of Chicago."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/15/us/15gitmo.html

WHAT, NO SUPERMAX?!!1 GASP!!!1

And before some buffoon tries to "educate" me, I'm aware that security enhancements will undoubtedly be made. But guess what? Some of these detainees still (1) won't get a trial ("WHAT ABOUT THE 'RULE OF LAW,' DAMMIT?!!1"); (2) will be designated "combatants"; and (3) will probably never be released.

12/15/2009 12:03:48 AM

Quote :

"U.S. Said to Pick Illinois Prison to House Detainees December 14, 2009 'An administration official said President Obama had directed the federal government to proceed with acquiring the Thomson Correctional Center, a maximum-security prison in a rural village about 150 miles west of Chicago.' http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/15/us/15gitmo.html WHAT, NO SUPERMAX?!!1 GASP!!!1 And before some buffoon tries to 'educate' me, I'm aware that security enhancements will undoubtedly be made. But guess what? Some of these detainees still (1) won't get a trial ('WHAT ABOUT THE "RULE OF LAW," DAMMIT?!!1'); (2) will be designated 'combatants'; and (3) will probably never be released."

12/15/2009 12:35:47 AM

pad?

12/15/2009 12:40:23 AM

^ i think he’s completely lost his mind… nearly a year into an Obama presidency and to his dismay, the world hasn’t imploded. He doesn’t know what else to do.

12/15/2009 12:44:07 AM

Quote :

"Some of these detainees still (1) won't get a trial ('WHAT ABOUT THE "RULE OF LAW," DAMMIT?!!1'); (2) will be designated 'combatants'; and (3) will probably never be released.""

I'm confused, where do you stand on 1, 2, and 3, again? I'm not wading back through your old posts nor do I keep a database of people's old posts like you so please just link me to your stance on this.

why wouldn't they get a trial?

12/15/2009 12:10:39 PM

^ It's not necessary for you to wade through old posts--all you need to do is read the article I posted, stooge:

Quote :

"In May, Mr. Obama proposed bringing some detainees to a facility inside the United States, including some who officials have decided are [1] too difficult to prosecute and [3] too dangerous to release. [2/3] They would continue to be held without trial as 'combatants' under the laws of war."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/15/us/15gitmo.html

[Edited on December 15, 2009 at 2:09 PM. Reason : .]

12/15/2009 2:08:50 PM

let me quote myself again:

Quote :

"I'm confused, where do you stand on 1, 2, and 3, again? I'm not wading back through your old posts nor do I keep a database of people's old posts like you so please just link me to your stance on this."

I didn't realize that the NYT article was YOUR stance.

12/15/2009 3:25:19 PM

It's simple:

If Obama does something hooksaw doesn't like, he complains. If Obama does something hooksaw does like, he argues that Obama is disingenuous for not doing what a liberal should do.

There is literally nothing Obama can do that won't lead to hooksaw coming to this thread to whine.

12/15/2009 3:43:24 PM

Barack Obama represents the entirety of left-wing policy in this nation.

Obama, ACORN, Bill Clinton, Ralph Nader, Michael Moore, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, MSNBC, the DRIVE BY MEDIA: all the same thing.

[Edited on December 15, 2009 at 3:48 PM. Reason : .]

12/15/2009 3:46:27 PM

From a recent Politico article:

Quote :

"The whole episode adds to what’s become an almost palpable frustration in the House. “When you’re dealing with the Senate, it’s a miracle if you can get anything done at all,” House Appropriations Committee Chairman Dave Obey (D-Wis.) told POLITICO. And after pressing for months to get agreement on a five-year highway bill, House Transportation Committee Chairman James Oberstar (D-Minn.) spluttered in anger at the thought of just two months. “We ought to just pass the damn thing and let them choke on it,” he told POLITICO. “It’s ridiculous, and the Obama administration is sitting on the sidelines. That’s nonsense.” “The White House has been useless,” he said. The Democrats’ four-bill strategy was first spelled out by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer at his weekly news conference Tuesday morning, and the Maryland Democrat said he hoped to begin voting Wednesday so the House could go home by this weekend for the holidays."

http://bit.ly/77L2Is
Now, on a personal and philosophical level I like the idea of an executive less tangled up in the act of legislating. However, in a bit of schadenfreude I'm happy to point out that those who called out President Obama as a legislative lightweight (including myself) were correct. On the other hand, he does deserve credit for securing more NATO assistance in Afghanistan. So perhaps my gleeful criticism is ill warranted as he is actually focusing on being the President and not simply the head of the Democratic legislative machine.

12/16/2009 6:44:48 AM

This article goes more into the health care bill specifically: http://bit.ly/8m4xVA

Quote :

"But it’s not just the liberal base that’s feeling unsettled. Obama has also proved frustrating to moderates, who simply wanted to know where Obama’s core principles on health care stood, all the better to cut a deal to the president’s liking. Time and again, he rebuffed Democrats’ requests to speak up more forcefully about what he wanted — a strategy that allowed Obama to preserve maximum flexibility to declare victory at the end of the process, no matter what the final bill looked like. "

12/16/2009 7:15:58 AM

Quote :

"I'm confused. . . ."

PinkandBlack

You've pinpointed the problem. Now you need to do something about it.

My position is self-evident. Please troll elsewhere.

12/16/2009 1:58:25 PM

http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/dec/16/justice-restrains-lawyers-in-panther-inquiry/

This ticks me off. The DoJ has ordered it's attorney's not to comply with the Commission on Civil Rights' inquiry into why the charges against several members of the New Black Panthers were dropped.

It's DoJ, and the buck ultimately stops with Obama on this.

12/16/2009 2:13:14 PM

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1135424.html
U.S. planning to restart Israel-PA talks based on '67 borders

12/19/2009 8:16:52 PM

Obama gives Israel billions of dollars, sabotaging any chance of peace
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=114132§ionid=351020202

Supreme court(at Obama's request) declines to hear torture case=de facto endorsement of torture
http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/dec/14/supreme-court-hear-texting-privacy-case/?feat=home_headlines

12/19/2009 9:54:37 PM

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aHV.Dg8JwWNo&pos=1
Treasury Yields Reach 4-Month High; Yen Falls, Asia Stocks Rise

Quote :

"Treasuries fell, pushing 10-year yields to the highest level in four months, on prospects U.S. economic reports will show a sustained recovery. The yen weakened after the Bank of Japan said it will fight deflation by keeping interest rates near zero. Asian technology stocks rose."

12/22/2009 12:54:43 AM

“The urge to save humanity is always a false front for the urge to rule it.” -H.L. Mencken


[Edited on December 22, 2009 at 10:40 AM. Reason : .]

12/22/2009 10:39:31 AM

There's pretty much nothing Obama can do at this point to improve his popularity. If he did the right things (according to me), his popularity would plummet. More and more Americans are going to realize that the promises of systematic change were just hype. There's nothing Obama can do to pull us out of this recession. We're probably about to have housing crisis 2.0 in 2010 when ARMs reset, which will be an absolute disaster. Many banks are going to fail. We might end up bailing them out, I don't know. Hard times are coming for a lot of Americans, if not all Americans, and Obama is going to take the heat for it, even though he isn't personally responsible for the fundamental problems with the economy.

12/22/2009 10:57:34 AM

^the tax increases will only help the economy.

12/22/2009 11:03:53 AM

Quote :

"“The urge to save humanity is always a false front for the urge to rule it.” -H.L. Mencken"

lol, wtf?

12/22/2009 11:28:56 AM

^^^ promises of systematic change aren't hype. it's the reality of getting it accomplished is what's hard. there are far too many people that just want to see him fail, regardless of if his policies are sound.

12/22/2009 11:37:00 AM

Obama isn't bringing real change. He's just doing more of what Bush did. Bush was a fiscal liberal. He expanded medicare, he expanded federal control over education, and he increased the debt. Obama is doing the same kinds of things, but more of it. You think promising people free stuff and borrowing money to pay for it is "systematic change"? That's what we've had for years. Obama is maintaining the status quo. His policies aren't sound, they're terrible, and I want him to fail at implementing them.

Systematic change would mean being honest with the American people and the world, and letting them know that we can't possibly pay off our debt. In a few years time, something like half of all tax revenue is going to be used to service the debt. Maybe, in 10 or 15 years, we can have a normal economy with balanced budgets again. Maybe then we'll be able to join the rest of the world and provide basic healthcare for those that can't afford it. We can't do it with borrowed money, though. Sometimes, real change can't be accomplished by working with or inside the system. The system has to be restructured.

12/22/2009 12:21:08 PM

Quote :

"You think promising people free stuff and borrowing money to pay for it is "systematic change"? That's what we've had for years. Obama is maintaining the status quo. His policies aren't sound, they're terrible, and I want him to fail at implementing them."

If you've watched carefully, you'd see that he's said several times that he wants it to be budget friendly, or deficit neutral. But at least you've admitted that you want him to fail. The trouble is that you perceive his policies through a lens of misinformation.

12/22/2009 12:24:47 PM

Everyone claims to want to pay down the debt or reduce deficits, but it's all talk. It never happens, because it would mean raising taxes or cutting programs, and that's not something any politician wants to do.

12/22/2009 12:55:27 PM

Fine. Name some programs that need to be cut.

12/22/2009 1:02:24 PM

cuts to medicare, medicaid, reform SS, defense, energy, education. Just off the top of my head.

The ones which need cutting first are the big three entitlements, then defense.

So O has said several times he is concerned about the debt, but then chooses to spend even more..and you view that as a POSITIVE? He is a politician, pure and simple. One day he is talking about cutting the debt. The next day he is talking about spending billions to curb global warming to a different group. The next wanting to spend billions to help homeowners. Change? No More BS? you bet

Obama is A LOT more of the same. Esp the reason I disliked bush was his spending.

12/22/2009 2:02:33 PM

The better question is how much we need to cut. We have a debt of a little more than 12 trillion at the moment. Probably going to be around 14 trillion pretty soon.

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/histab18.xls

That spreadsheet shows tax revenues up to 2007. In 2007, total tax revenue was around 2.7 trillion. Now, I've heard that tax revenues have gone down in 2008 and 2009, so the government is probably receiving less money to pay the bills. That's how much money we actually have to spend. So how much are we really spending?

http://perotcharts.com/2008/05/us-government-spending-1968-2007/



As you can see, the government spends more than it actually gets through tax revenue. That's a budget deficit. The federal government has been running a budget deficit every year since 2000, and they keep getting bigger:



Here's the thing: we need to run budget surpluses in order to begin paying off the debt. Let's pretend the debt is interest free, which it isn't. We would need to run a trillion dollar surplus for fourteen years straight to pay it off. And that's ignoring the massive amount of interest that we're going to have to pay on it. Now, to determine what we would actually need to cut, we first need to know where all the money is going. Here's a breakdown from 2007:



We could free up a lot of money by ending our military operations around the world. Then we're going to have to deal with Social Security and Medicare. The amount we spend to keep those programs afloat far exceeds the amount any other country has to spend to provide healthcare to the poor and elderly. Those programs have to be cut or replaced with something cheaper. Obviously, there's a lot of other things that should be cut. We can cut every unconstitutional program, which is most of them.

But let's get real: none of that is going to happen. We're going to keep running these deficits, possibly until 100% of tax revenue is going towards paying the interest on the debt. That's why this isn't sustainable. The only reason we're allowed to do any of this is because foreigners are still buying treasuries. If they stop, the free money well dries up, and they are saying that they're going to stop because they're worried about our ability to pay back the debt. There's only one option at that point: print our way out. That's how the United States can go from being a superpower to a third world country in a decade. If you don't see the disaster looming here, you're just not looking.

12/22/2009 2:11:04 PM

I agree and predict collapse of federal government functions by 2015.

12/22/2009 2:56:41 PM

Quote :

"The administration is sensitive to criticism the legislation does too little to trim growth of health costs. Budget Director Peter Orszag says the 40% tax on high-cost or "Cadillac" plans will encourage employers to look for more thrifty coverage and discourage unnecessary procedures. Cost is the reason for favoring this as well as the Medicare commission. Mr. Obama said in an NPR interview Wednesday that Cadillac plans "don't make people healthier but just take more money out of their pockets because they're paying more for insurance than they need to.""

http://bit.ly/77269D

Excuse my language but . . . who the goddamned fuck does Barack Obama think he is that he knows how goddamn much insurance someone needs??? He can go fuck himself starting with Harry Reid's dick and working his way up to Nancy Pelosi's.

Two fucking rotten Presidents in a row and a string of incompetent to downright corrupt congresses.


Not that a rant on the internet tonight will change anything but jesus it feels good.

12/23/2009 10:26:59 PM

I'm hoping there's more that goes into what's deemed a "cadillac" plan than strictly price.

My friend is almost at what's considered "cadillac" merely because she has a severe back problem (multiple surgeries) and so insurance is $$$$


(plus she's a self-employed person so she has to get it on her own)

12/23/2009 10:29:13 PM

The last I heard, "Cadillac" was considered $8,000 for an individual or ~$670 a month ($666.67 specifically). Add a 40% tax and you get: ~$940 a month. Seriously, go fuck yourself Mr. President.

12/23/2009 10:38:23 PM

Won't Obama be staying in a expensive beach-front home in Hawaii for his Xmas vacation? Isn't that more luxury than a person really needs? We must do something about these presidents and their cadillac vacations.

12/24/2009 10:14:07 AM

Security System Failed, Napolitano Acknowledges
December 28, 2009

Quote :

"[Homeland Security Secretary Janet] Napolitano said on the 'Today' program on NBC that her remark on Sunday that the system worked had been taken out of context. 'Our system did not work in this instance,' she said on the program. 'No one is happy or satisfied with that. An extensive review is under way.'"

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/29/us/29terror.html

The credit or the blame, right?

12/28/2009 10:05:16 AM

*shrug*

12/28/2009 10:10:42 AM

^ Would you shrug if it happened on Bush's watch--after 9-11? Just asking.

12/28/2009 10:17:59 AM

He's probably shrugging at this:

Quote :

"The credit or the blame, right?"

--the part where you act like a sand-packed vagina and ascribe views to others and treat everyone in TSB as part of some monolithic liberal-borg.

12/28/2009 10:20:17 AM

^ Does he need an interpreter? I was simply pointing out that presidents get the credit or the blame--whether they deserve it or not.

12/28/2009 10:25:22 AM

12/28/2009 10:31:12 AM

Why can't I find any Obama administration quotes where Bush gets the blame for the detroit terrorist? I know they're out there...

Plz post if u find 'em

12/28/2009 10:31:32 AM

Is this the Bush Recovery?

12/28/2009 10:41:20 AM

It's Bush's recession. It's going to turn into Obama's depression.

12/28/2009 10:56:16 AM

12/28/2009 11:02:42 AM

^^ It's been a Depression by traditional measurements, but we like to re-name things when we're not comfortable with them. Either way, both politicians are following the time honored path of doing nothing to address the real issue while appearing to be doing everything in their power to make things worse.

12/28/2009 11:58:04 AM