Criticism has to make sense.

[ProSense]

Anyone who actually believes Obama should have fixed everything by now is being ridiculous.

It's easy to take an issue that hasn't been resolved and claim that Obama isn't doing enough.

It doesn't work that way. One has to take a look at the things that have been accomplished, the things that need to be accomplished and those that are likely to be accomplished, to see that Obama is right where he should be with three years and seven months left in his first term.

Yeah, I implied it: It has only been five months.

[politicasista]

1. Kick

Very good post. :thumbsup:

[Cha]

2. Not to mention the forces of evil

that left the big Hole for Obama and Team. Yeah, I said Evil.

[Clio the Leo]

3. here here ... nice work on the links too. NT

[Ian David]

4. Your pants are Friday! n/t

[Mist]

5. I've decided not to comment on anything much Obama does until he's been

in office at least a year.

[angee_is_mad]

6. thank YOU

K&R

[babylonsister]

7. You are a dear, and so smart! Thank you, ProSense!

[jgraz]

8. As does praise

Political capital has a very short shelf-life. It's a completely legitimate criticism to say that Obama is not being bold enough in these early days.

[Cha]

9. Yeah, you can say it from the

sidelines until you're blue in the face but it's not going to change the way Obama and his team conduct their business of saving the country from the last 8 years of abuse.

[jgraz]

11. What do you mean "sidelines", Kimosabe?

Last I checked, my passport was stamped United States. That puts me in the middle of the field.

[Cha]

24. I mean you're not in the

White House and you can fucking rant and rave like bill maher's stupid dribblings but thankfully you guys don't call the shots.

[TheWraith]

10. Kicked and recommended.

Some days I wonder why the hell I come to DU.

[HopeOverFear]

17. Because like me, you're a sucker for punishment LOL

[PurityOfEssence]

12. Strawman for blanket dismissal of dissenters

The insinuation here is that most or even many critics OBVIOUSLY fall into the category of people who believe "Obama should have fixed everything by now". This is more than just a sloppy attempt at marginalizing opponents, it's smug censorship and pusillanimous groupthink/group tyranny.

Much, however, is clear.

--He's NOT going to actively take on the entrenched medical-profit business; he's going to "do something" about our health care crisis, but only as long as it isn't too disruptive to the sickness profiteers.

--Gays will be cajoled with words of acceptance, but the unquestioned lords and masters of Religion, Incorporated must be obeyed.

--Attempts to help those disrupted by the economic crisis will be made, but only if the funds are funneled through private enterprise, so the slavish market worship is appeased.

--Banks will effectively do as they please, and the financial aristocracy will only have to suffer the re-regulation that it accepts.

--The environment will be helped only in ways acceptable to Big Coal and others.

--War will be continued in the pointless and un-winnable Afghanistan to somehow disprove liberal weakness and for a host of other silly reasons.

Sure, it's MUCH better than the bleak, atavistic economic monarchy of the past 28 years, but it's nauseatingly Clintonesque, and this is hard to swallow at a time when the reactionaries are in shell-shocked disarray.

Being constantly asked to "hope" and "have faith" are the dues we pay for being a part of this society, but we have a right to nudge and petition for more, as well as mouth off at polyannish commissars of truth who'd have us believe that this is the best we can do.

They've made their values clear, and regardless how many blinkered partisans demand that we accept their "ultra-centrist corporatism with progressive garnee" as some kind of bright and shining brave new world of bliss, some of us want more.

[HamdenRice]

15. This kind of rubbish makes me wonder about how tethered to reality most people are

"--He's NOT going to actively take on the entrenched medical-profit business..."

Bullshit, pure bullshit. The public option which is Obama's line in the sand, will allow anyone to opt out of the for profit insurance sector. Even most proponents of single payer admit that and see public option as a perfectly acceptable substitute.

"--Attempts to help those disrupted by the economic crisis will be made, but only if the funds are funneled through private enterprise,"

Pure nonsense. Most of it is being channeled through state governments.

"--Banks will effectively do as they please, and the financial aristocracy will only have to suffer the re-regulation that it accepts."

The administration is announcing the biggest re-regulation of finance since the New Deal. The banks are being forced to pay dividends on the bailout money.

Do these people even read newspapers?

[Fire1]

36. One can read and still not comprehend. That appears to be the

biggest problem. Combine that with being 'opinionated.' What've you got?:nuke:

[TheWraith]

18. When you spew out tripe and BS like this message, you surrender your credibility.

And you sound like a first-year upper middle class college student taking political philosophy who thinks they know how the world works without ever having bothered to actually learn anything more than the sound bytes, and whose quasi-populist fantasies are unencumbered by anything remotely approaching reality.

[Fire1]

37. That wasn't 'tripe.' Just simple observation. What is your

problem?

[Dawgs]

13. Thank you so much. This is exactly what I've been thinking.

:hi:

[HamdenRice]

14. It's sad that this isn't obvious to everyone, but so it goes. nt

[rasputin1952]

16. There will always be naysayers...

usually those lacking a sense of vision to the far reaching effects of various aspects of the political process.

It took a long time for many of the New Deal aspects to actually come to fruition, and that was after mistakes were made and needed correction. FDR and his administration took steps to correct errors they made, if it didn't work, change the tack.

It wasn't until LBJ that the Voting Rights Act was signed into law, and women, (I still can't believe this), had to wait until 1920 to gain suffrage.

All good things that happened in this country took time and effort...all bad things took little time and effort. As always...time is the critical factor...:hi:

[mopinko]

19. make sense?

you trying to wreck all the fun, or what?

[karynnj]

20. Thanks for posting this

It is easy to understand the impatience - because so many things are really really wrong. However, it took a very long time to get them so bad and the solutions are not easy. They are also harder than was thought even in spring 2008. When Obama started running in 2007, he knew he faced two major active wars and many hostilities, climate change and an ever increasing divide between the people making it and those sinking down the economic ladder.

Those lists show what already has been accomplished and what they are working to change.

As you said it only 5 months.

[tomp]

21. you cite the white house website....

....as the ultimate source on "accomplished" (done, coming, and maybe coming).

most items listed there are debatable as to their details and whether it will/has accomplish/ed anything that is unequivocally good. the fact that you use this cite indicates you're not really willing to hear another side of the argument (deny that there is another side to the argument).

in addition, nowhere is it mentioned in your links anything about bringing bush, inc. to justice. this happens to be my number one issue. it is the issue on which i will judge obama in the end because without prosecution we are at risk for the same and worse. every day that passes that obama does not address this issue head on and unequivocally (or openly blocks the way) is a mark against his legacy.

fortunately or unfortunately, we each retain the right to decide what makes sense and what doesn't, i.e., you are only the final arbiter of "sense" for yourself. and trying to make yourself the arbiter for everyone else is a bit haughty.

ps: when is it sufficient time to evaluate?

[uponit7771]

22. AMEN!!!!

[solstice]

23. Take your own damn advice. Not one person has EVER said that

Obama should have fixed everything by now. So YOUR criticism makes no sense and your attempt to set up strawmen is pathetic but predictable.

When you can't defend Obama for his shit, attack those of us who dare to criticize him - even though not one of us has ever said we expect him to fix everything in five months.

[uponit7771]

25. It also has to be factual, Obama never gave a time span for fixing a good

...amount of Bush's fuck ups complained about on this board knowing a time span would set him up for failure.

[Willo]

28. +1

[nichomachus]

27. Please don't mess with a straw man -- they are so fragile.

Of course, there are tons of people screaming that Obama should drop everything and attend to their own special interest. Haven't you seen the tons of posts saying he should not work on health care or that he should ignore the environment?

:sarcasm:

[ProSense]

32. Oh nonsense.

If you add up all the fix this now and fix that now, the overall takeaway is that everything should be fixed now.

Perfectly clear.

[PVnRT]

40. LOLOLOL I didn't realize political opinions were an additive quantity (n/t)

Seriously, that's how you came to your conclusion? Give me a break.

[Zynx]

39. Yes they have. For example, people blaming him for an "ineffective stimulus" because

unemployment is still rising. Well, of course it is. The stimulus money only has started to be dished out.

[incapsulated]

26. Strawman

No one claimed "Obama should have fixed everything by now".

Therefore tearing down that argument is a strawman.

People have every right to complain when he is not living up to his promises or going back on them, however. Or if he is avoiding taking leadership on issues he said he would.

In fact, he asked us to.

[AtomicKitten]

29. For some it's unrealistic impatience coupled with an opportunistic potshot. n/t

[Touchdown]

30. Dissent is unpatriotic. Sit down and shut up.

Bullshit strawman. Nobody, not Olberman, not Maher, not Rhodes, Hartmann, Malloy, anybody said anything about fixing everything in 5 months, or really anything in 5 months.

[ProSense]

31. "Bullshit strawman." Yes, this comment is exactly that.

Dissent doesn't have to make sense?

How about this: Obama is a terrorist?

[Touchdown]

33. Try and keep up. The 5 months thing... remember that?

There's more to the OP than the thread title. YOU wrote it. Why do I have to tell you?

[ProSense]

34. Keep up? How about a little reading comprehension? n/t

[Touchdown]

42. Ok, I'll bite.

Exactly what in your verbal masturbation up there is the most important thing I should pay attention to?

[lindisfarne]

45. Except he has fixed a few things in 5 months! n/t

[mvd]

35. There has been constructive criticism, like on the DOMA brief, but..

on other things I'm not sure I see it. Like there's this post explaining the blocking of a list of visitors to the White House:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=3925001&mesg_id=3925663

[ProSense]

38. Yeah, but jumping to conclusions

at the first sign of an opening is in. The story sounds like a gotcha moment to begin with. If the WH had announced it as a policy that would be a different story.

[angee_is_mad]

41. Kick

:fistbump:

[guruoo]

43. K&R for the truth

All fired up and nowhere to go,
(they're all just missing *, you know.)
:hi:

[lindisfarne]

44. Absolutely agree n/t