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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsHere's a little history lesson for those who think voting Republican is a good idea
When ever I enter a discussion about President Obama, I like to have a starting point. The facts are tremendous allies of ours in this debate, yet everyone discounts them.
Gas prices were $4.09 a gallon in June of 2008, before the start of the Great Bush Recession. It's less than $3.00 a gallon now. For the first time in over 40 years, America is energy independent. The stock market, which was in free fall and into which much of the middle class pension funds and 401k investments are in has risen about 250% under Obama and over 9,000 points. We have had 54 consecutive months of positive job growth for the first time in modern memory. The unemployment rate is under 6% from a Bush high of nearly 10%. Our country is safe, even as Republicans continue to play the "fear card" on every issue they can think of (except guns).
Here's what I tell my friends who disdain Obama, "go back and Google Sept. 15th and 16th, 2008, and then come back and talk to me about the President."
This Day in Crisis History: Sept. 15-16, 2008
By
Paul Vigna
Wall Street Journal
This September, MoneyBeat will take a daily look back at the developments surrounding the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the financial crisis that followed. Each day, we will recap the events of the corresponding day in 2008, as the worst crisis in 80 years built to its terrible climax.
Sept. 15, 2008
After one of the most momentous and tumultuous weekends in Wall Street history, investors awoke to a rapidly intensifying financial crisis.
Lehman Brothers had filed for bankruptcy protection Monday morning and Merrill Lynch had sold itself to Bank of America BAC +0.23%. By the end of the day, investors had turned their focus to insurance giant AIG, which was tottering, needing to raise billions in capital or face collapse.
The Dow fell 504.48 points on Monday, Sept. 15, its biggest percentage drop in more than six years. Prices on Treasurys rose as investors fled to safety; and the cost of insuring the debt of investment grade companies against default jumped.
The weekend had begun with U.S. government convening a meeting of Wall Street CEOs Friday night. Their task for the weekend, the government said: Find a solution to Lehman, but there would be no government bailout.
By the afternoon of Sunday, Sept. 14, Lehman CEO Dick Fuld was essentially out of options.
Without government aid, a deal in principle for Barclays to buy Lehman had fallen apart. Bank of America, considered the most likely buyer earlier in the week, had informed Lehman it could not do a deal after concluding that firms real-estate portfolio was worse than expected.
Desperate to avoid steering his 25,000-person company into bankruptcy proceedings, Mr. Fuld kept calling Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis. His call wasnt returned. Unbeknownst to Mr. Fuld, Bank of America was in secret talks with Merrill Lynch. By Sunday night, the two firms had struck a deal, and there was only one option left for Lehman.
As a meeting of Lehman directors wrapped up around 10 p.m. Sunday night, Mr. Fuld leaned back in his chair. I guess this is goodbye.
Stocks headed south from the opening bell Monday. For much of the day, however, they held up better than many had expected and traders marveled at the markets resilience. Then in the final hour, a wave of selling swept through the market, driven by concerns about the stability of AIG, whose stock had dropped 60%.
Sept. 16, 2008
Uncle Sam didnt take long to change his mind.
One day after watching the market fallout from its decision to let Lehman fail, the government did a complete roundabout, and saved AIG, which, it deemed, was truly too big to fail. The government lent the companys $85 billion in exchange for a 79.9% stake, capping off 10 days of frantic maneuvering that would reshape the world of finance.
The decision was arrived at after a series of what by now were becoming regular affairs: the emergency meeting. Mr. Paulson and Mr. Bernanke met with Congressional leaders. What had them truly worried was that a failure at AIG could spiral into seemingly safe investments like, into stocks and bonds and derivatives, and send the credit crisis spiraling out of control.
It wasnt just the travails at AIG. Earlier on Tuesday, a money-market fund, the $62 billion Reserve Primary Fund, did something that wasnt supposed to happen in money-market funds: It broke the buck, meaning its net asset value fell below $1 a share. A number of money-market funds had investments in both Lehman and AIG, and AIG was also a big insurer of the funds.
AIG was downgraded on the 15th, forcing it to post $14.5 billion in collateral more than it had in liquid assets. Not being able to post the collateral would spell a collapse for the firm, and the domino effect of that collapse would be catastrophic, the government determined, with staffers from the Fed and Treasury working through the night of the 15th to come up with a plan for the 16th. The president was briefed, and AIGs board agreed to the deal on the evening of the 16th.
LWolf
(46,179 posts)so many people at DU think voting Republican is a good idea and need a lesson on why they're wrong.
Okay. You've convinced me. I won't vote republican.
Of course, I voted almost 2 weeks ago. Fortunately, I didn't vote Republican. In fact, I don't think I ever have.
louis c
(8,652 posts)but some of this stuff can be used in discussions with people who aren't.
I've found that listening carefully, and responding to what I actually hear someone saying, though, is better than delivering pre-planned talking points. That's just me.
It's probably because of the disdain I feel when someone, on any side, tries to feed me those talking points that I've heard repeated again and again...it makes me feel disrespected, as though I can't think for myself and wouldn't already have considered the obvious.
I guess it triggers my wariness of the stuff that is repeated so often it becomes conventional wisdom that "everybody knows," whether or not it has any validity.
When I want to engage someone who might be voting republican, I'm going to listen, try to determine what their real motivation is, and come from a direction they don't expect.
louis c
(8,652 posts)And all the facts are on our side.
Why is that?
Could it be that the talking points, echo chamber on the Right is killing our long winded explanations?
I believe our failure is strategic. But then again, that's just me.
LWolf
(46,179 posts)I don't really understand. How can Obama, who is not running for anything, be "13 points underwater?"
The connection escapes me. But then again, I've been under the bus since the GE of '08; he's always been "underwater" with me for any political purposes.
I don't base my votes on that fact. That would be making him more relevant to the process than he is.
louis c
(8,652 posts)from Gallup.
The Repukes in New Hampshire have made what should have been a Democratic Landslide a very close race by running thousands of ads that just say that Jean Shaheen has voted with "Obama 99% of the time".
If we made the case months ago that Obama's administration has turned this economy around and saved America from the "Great Bush Recession", we'd be wanting our candidates associated with the President.
I do agree with one of your points, though. You don't understand and too many Democrats don't get the fact that the President's (any President's) favorability rating does drive an off year election result. After reading your post and believing that you speak for the majority of Democrats (I speak for the minority) I can understand our landslide loss this year.
Bye, Bye Senate.
are being lost? The independents who don't cast a partisan vote, or?
It seems like any Republicans who would be swayed by that slogan wouldn't have voted for Democrats, anyway, and I don't see it convincing Democrats to vote Republican.
How does a politician vote "with" Obama? Did Obama actually "vote" for something, or is that an awkward way to say that the person voted for the policies Obama promoted?
Obama's favorability rating doesn't surprise me, considering his positions on issues and policy, and on his preference for compromising liberal values in order to pander to the opposition. He loses support from his own that way, while nothing he can do will ever get support from the opposition he's tried so hard to befriend. That was a train wreck some of us, those of us not wearing rose-colored glasses or emotionally inspired by generalities, saw coming from a long way away. If that rating is now compromising the election, that's on those who supported him as he repeatedly let us down.
My Democratic Senator is going back to the Senate with my vote. He earned it, and not because of his support for Obama.
Skidmore
(37,364 posts)The Big Lie The Medias Telling You About Obamas Approval Rating
AUTHOR: DEWYN NOVEMBER 1, 2014 10:10 AM
If youve spent any time at all paying attention to the mainstream, or what is often called the liberal media, you might be under the impression that the country is turning on President Obama that his approval rating has never been lower. The only problem with that meme is that its simply not true.
The news media reminders arrive almost daily now: President Obamas approval rating is low and going lower. McClatchy Newspapers highlighted the dropping approval ratings, while the Washington Post declared President Obamas approval ratings have plunged to record lows. The Christian Science Monitor noted the numbers have plummeted. The Washington Examiner stressed the presidents approvals were sinking to historic lows, while an Atlantic headline announced, Obamas Sinking Approval Could Drag Democrats Down With Him.
Source: Media Matters
A plummeting presidential approval rating right before a midterm election definitely adds drama to the news cycle and it has had the effect of scaring Democratic candidates away from the President, but if anyone would actually sit down and look at the numbers, theyd see that Obamas approval ratings have hardly budged since the beginning of the year. As a matter of fact, they arent much lower than they were in October of 2012, right before he was reelected in a landslide.
According to the cumulative ratings posted daily at Real Clear Politics, which averages together an array of national polls to come up with Obamas composite job approval rating, the presidents approval on January 1, 2014 stood at 42.6 percent. The presidents approval rating on October 30, was 42 percent. So over the course of ten months, and based on more than one hundred poll results in 2014, Obamas approval rating declined less than one point.
more...
louis c
(8,652 posts)All it will prove is that people came or didn't come out to vote for their own representatives.
louis c
(8,652 posts)and we'll keep losing elections.
We had a great story to tell and we kept it a secret. Social issues can only get us so far.
Independent voters need to be convinced in short sound bites that focus on economic issues.
The other side gets it and we don't.
We can win Presidential Election years and off years if we know how to fight.
Let me give you a little anecdote.
An Italian-Catholic brought his young Jewish nephew to a prize fight. The smaller of the two fighters in the ring performed the sign of the cross while the referee was giving both fighters their pre-fight instructions. The young Jewish boy inquired what that sign meant. The Man replied, "It doesn't mean a damn thing if he doesn't know how to fight."
The same goes for us. We can be correct and on the side of the angels. But it doesn't mean a damn thing if we don't know how to fight.
LWolf
(46,179 posts)I thought I was talking about the current election. Hopefully, it's not Obama's approval rating that counts, but the actual candidates'.
I know I'm in the minority, but Obama is truly irrelevant to my voting choices.
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)for some Republicans after spending the bulk of her life as a Reagan/Bush Trickle Down Republican. It's folks like her that need reminding.
baldguy
(36,649 posts)We have to support Democrats.
kentuck
(111,110 posts)..with a painful look on their faces, I knew we were in deep doo-doo. The last thing they wanted to do was ask for help from the "government". Neither of them was a strong believer in government. They were faithful converts of the "free market" system.