Mother Jones: "Is it too soon to speak of the Bush-Obama presidency?" *ouch*

[nomb]

"What Obama's Closest Advisors Reveal About Him"

It's worth a read:

http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/08/obama-real-politics-revealed-cabinet-members?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+motherjones%2Fmain+%28MotherJones.com+Main+Article+Feed%29


Mother Jones, Utne Reader .... These have a powerful influence on me. And many others.

[ixion]

1. Mother Jones, Utne Reader, those RW rags?

:sarcasm:

[bvar22]

50. Teaming Up with Grover Norquist to Bring Down Obama!

:rofl:



Who will STAND and FIGHT for THIS American Majority?
I WILL!!

You will know them by their WORKS,
not by their excuses.

Solidarity!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[LaurenG]

2. Ouch

:shakeshead:

[provis99]

3. under the bus with you, Mother Jones!

:sarcasm:

[tblue]

9. Boomp boomp boomp, another one under the bus.

And another one down, And another one down, Another one under the bus....

[Ozymanithrax]

4. Presidents BushBama will have a great affect on our future.

[sad sally]

5. Will the grand speech after Labor Day include more not-shovel ready projects

the President and Mr. Immelt can laugh about?

At a June 13th meeting of the president's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, a questioner said he assumed that President Obama knew about the difficulties caused by the drawn-out process of securing permits for construction jobs. Obama leaned into the microphone and offered a breezy ad-lib: "Shovel ready wasn't as, uh, shovel-ready as we expected"—and Immelt got off a hearty laugh. An unguarded moment: the president of "hope and change" signifying his solidarity with the big managers whose worldly irony he had adopted.

[dana_b]

26. that made me sick

I can't believe that they can joke about that when so many were/are depending on those jobs.

Then looking at all of the people he chose to keep at his side v.s. those whose advice he ignored and ultimately let go? Wow - so telling. He's doing stuff Bush didn't dream of.

[FiveGoodMen]

40. Hmm.

Reminds me of, "Now where are those WMDs? Nope. Not under here."

[SammyWinstonJack]

41. Funny I was thinking just that. How very arrogant and condescending of Obama.

[sad sally]

53. Remember the all the green jobs the President talked up?

President Obama once pledged to create five million green jobs over 10 years. But the results so far suggest such numbers were only a pipe dream. Which makes me suspicious that any grand new ideas we're going to hear about in the Grand Speech will probably be disappointing - no funding (blame it on the other side, although wouldn't major employment investments in green jobs be just the thing rich-folks-with-so-much-money-they-feel-bad-they're-not-taxed-enough could put their money where their mouths are and put millions of people to work?).



This week Evergreen Solar officially declared bankruptcy and, thanks to Gov. Deval Patrick, took around 40 million of our tax dollars down with the “green jobs” ship.

On Beacon Hill, that’s considered good news because Patrick originally wanted to give them $100 million, and in 2009 “offered Evergreen more than $76 million in grants, land, loans, tax incentives and other aid,” according to The Boston Globe-Democrat.

and this:

But there is a reason that we haven't seen the kind of 'Green New Deal' that many were hoping for to help get the nation's unemployed back to work and nascent clean energy industry kicked into high gear -- a lack of adequate, sustained funding. Top economists (even some of Obama's advisers) routinely called for a larger stimulus package back in 2009, and Obama didn't heed them -- largely due to immense pushback from the GOP, which was overwhelmingly opposed to the idea. Like the rest of the stimulus, the green jobs initiatives included in it were simply too small to make any transition towards a cleaner economy seem palpable.

So despite consistent gains and progress in the sector, those gains never felt front and center to the American public. And they simply weren't big enough drastically alter the nation's employment picture. If we want green jobs to take root, we're going to have to either a) direct a major, sustained boost of stimulus investment in cleantech, building efficiency, and renewable energy sectors or b) price carbon. Stripping subsidies from fossil fuel companies would help. Barring that, we won't be seeing that green jobs revolution anytime soon.

[DireStrike]

6. You do so to prevent your replacement by fanatics: people, for example, like those who invented the

"You must stay in power in order to go on "seeking." Therefore, in "the world as it is," you must requite evil with lesser evil. You do so to prevent your replacement by fanatics: people, for example, like those who invented the means you began by deploring but ended up adopting. Their difference from you is that they lack the vision of the seeker. Finally, in the world as it is, to retain your hold on power you must keep in place the sort of people who are normally found in places of power."

Oh man... ouch.

[dmallind]

7. As realistic as their opposite loonies who think he is a socialist

Why can so few accept the patently obvious truth that he is neither Bush nor Debs, but in between like the vast majority of the country?

[Skittles]

8. bullshit

[Bluebear]

10. +

[Raine]

11. + nt

[Hydra]

28. + n/t

[Maven]

33. +

[SammyWinstonJack]

42. +1

:thumbsup:

[truebrit71]

46. +1

nt

[bvar22]

51. I'll Second That!

:patriot:

[BzaDem]

54. Looks like someone struck a nerve. Truth is sometimes uncomfortable for some to hear. n/t

[Kurovski]

64. Bullshit.

you have no argument. The article does.

[MissDeeds]

58. + 1 too

[Kurovski]

63. +

[Selatius]

12. Sure, he isn't Bush. He's just too close to Bush. nt

[nomb]

13. It wasn't a throwaway blog, it was an all too well considered and reasoned observation. n't

[woo me with science]

16. On what specific issues are Americans so conservative?

Medicare?

Social Security?

The wars?

Tax cuts for the rich?

What on earth are you talking about?

[Maven]

34. They need to perpetuate that lie.

It's the only way they get conservatives elected by Democrats.

[woo me with science]

38. Well, this is an important and telling point, isn't it?

We are seeing more and more attempts to convince DUers that conservatism is the new normal, even though there is plenty of good evidence that Americans as a whole poll very liberal when asked about specific, actual issues rather than generic, media-demonized labels.

Now, tell me. Why on earth would a Democrat at DU be so insistent on pushing the former view and so determined to ridicule, downplay, or avoid evidence of the latter?

[wakemewhenitsover]

57. +1

Well-stated.

[lumberjack_jeff]

55. "In between" how?

Debs would have hired new advisers and gotten out of Iraq and Afghanistan. Bush wouldn't.

In what sense is Obama "in between" Bush and any hypothetical progressive?

On a spectrum between GWB and FDR, the points which represent Obama and GWB are imperceptibly separated.

[TransitJohn]

14. K & R

That was a good read. Thanks for posting.

[ellie]

15. Well that was depressing to read.

[ProSense]

17. Bullshit article reprinted from Tom Dispatch

<...>

5. Eric Holder: Holder once said that the trial of suspected 9/11 "mastermind" Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in a New York City courtroom would be "the defining event of my time as attorney general." The decision to make KSM's a civilian trial was, however, scuttled, thanks to incompetent management at the White House: neither the first nor last failure of its kind. The policy of trying suspected terrorists in civilian courts seems to have suffered from never being wholeheartedly embraced by the administration's inside actors. Local resistance by the New York authorities was the ostensible reason for the failure and the change of venue back to a military tribunal at Guantanamo. No member of the administration besides Holder has been observed to show much regret.

During his 30-month tenure, in keeping with Obama's willingness to overlook the unpleasant history of CIA renditions and "extreme interrogations," Holder has made no move to prosecute any upper-level official of any of the big banks and money firms responsible for the financial collapse of 2008. His silence on the subject has been taken as a signal that such prosecutions will never occur. To judge by public statements, the energies of the attorney general, in an administration that arrived under the banner of bringing "sunshine" and "transparency" to Washington, have mainly been dedicated to the prosecution of government whistle-blowers through a uniquely rigorous application of the Espionage Act of 1917. More people have been accused under that law by this attorney general than in the entire preceding 93 years of the law's existence.

Again, this is a focus that Bush-era attorney generals John Ashcroft, Alberto Gonzales, and Michael Mukasey might have relished, but on which none would have dared to act so boldly. Extraordinary delays in grand jury proceedings on Army Private Bradley Manning, suspected of providing government secrets to WikiLeaks, and Julian Assange, who ran that website, are said to have come from a protracted attempt to secure a legal hold against one or both potential defendants within the limits of a barbarous and almost dormant law.

<...>

He's comparing Eric Holder to John Ashcroft and Alberto Gonzales? Ludicrous!

[Generic Other]

19. What's bullshit is the load of crap we were all sold

I voted Democrat and got stabbed in the back by my president. And some of you expect me to vote for him anyway. Unbelievable.

Here is my Maginot line:

1. End the pointless wars now.
2. Tax the rich.
3. No cuts to SS or medicare.

No one who refuses to back my platform will get my vote. Even if they call themselves Democrat and dance a jig on election day.

All you accomplish by continually ragging at me instead of at this failed president is to harden my conviction that a vote for Obama is a vote for 4 more years of Bush-era policies. Yes. Obama is Bush lite. And all of us have had three years to come to grips with this fact.

[Greybnk48]

20. +1 n/t

[golddigger]

21. You tell it Generic other! +1000

[piratefish08]

23. what HE said +1

[ProSense]

27. Oh please

Here is my Maginot line:

1. End the pointless wars now.
2. Tax the rich.
3. No cuts to SS or medicare.

The wars are ending, the President is doing exactly what he said he would do. So you weren't sold "load of crap." If you were, that's your own fault for not paying attention.

There have been no cuts to SS and Medicare, and the President is still pushing to end the tax cuts for the rich.

"All you accomplish by continually ragging at me instead of at this failed president is to harden my conviction that a vote for Obama is a vote for 4 more years of Bush-era policies. Yes. Obama is Bush lite. And all of us have had three years to come to grips with this fact."

Don't fucking flatter yourself, and the rest is absolute nonsense.

[Generic Other]

44. "Don't fucking flatter" myself?

What does that mean? Aren't you one of the high pressure salesmen browbeating me daily to do something that goes against my own interests and core values?

I don't see how you are winning any votes for Obama with your attitude. I guess though like him you just don't care.

[truebrit71]

47. "the wars are ending".....yeah, except for the ones that aren't....

...I suggest you are the one that needs to stop "fucking flattering yourself"...

"pushing to end the tax cuts"...yeah, he tried REAL fucking hard with the debt-celing capitulation didn't he...

Don't you ever get tired of blowing sunshine up people's arses???

[femrap]

So shouldn't we be

looking for someone to Primary him?? Who has the courage to do that? And of course never get into a small plane!

I still think past Governor of Ohio, Ted Strickland, would be a good choice. He has been openly opposed to many of Obama's policies...especially not taxing the rich.

People here in Ohio really miss him and have buyer's remorse w/ King Kasich.

Any other people?

[slay]

35. I agree

failed president indeed - but just for us - he's been FUCKING GREAT to the rich, big banks, coporations, etc. Obama will NOT get my vote in 2012. I do NOT support his actions and no amount of Rick Perry's and Michelle Bachman's will force me into voting for a fake Dem and corporate rule.

[SammyWinstonJack]

43. !!!!

:applause:

[indepat]

52. Coming to grips with the reality of the unthinkable is hard to do: it took me almost two

years of reality relentlessly smashing all my senses to finally come to grips with this grim reality staring me in the face. :patriot:

[MissDeeds]

59. Agree completely

Well said, friend!

[smokey nj]

18. Kick!

[Contrary1]

22. And this is why we no longer hear from the big Dick Cheney:

"Americans are rubbing their eyes, still wondering what has befallen us with the president's "debt deal"—a shifting of tectonic plates beneath the economy of a sort Dick Cheney might have dreamed of, but which Barack Obama and the House Republicans together brought to fruition. A redistribution of wealth and power more than three decades in the making has now been carved into the system and given the stamp of permanence."

"Americans are rubbing their eyes," Not all of us, just the ones who can see what is going on.

[lumberjack_jeff]

24. "By their fruits shall ye know them. Not by their roots." n/t

[BzaDem]

25. It's not so much the timing as it is the substance. In other words, such a non-sensical comment

would be wrong at ANY time (now, 5 years from now, 50 years from now, etc).

[Hydra]

29. Basically

We have a WH with no moral courage.

...I'd almost rather it be that they are evil and know what they do, than that they do evil out of fear and ignorance. I'd feel better not having to lecture a bunch of children in the WH that have no business being there.

[hay rick]

30. Cass Sunstein.

Among the influential "saved" members of Obama's inner circle is Cass Sunstein, head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. From the article:

"As head of the president's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, with an office in the White House, Sunstein adjudicates government policy on issues of worker and consumer safety; yet his title suggests a claim of authority on issues such as the data-mining of information about American citizens and the government's deployment of a state secrets privilege. He deserves wider attention, too, for his 2008 proposal that the government "cognitively infiltrate" discussion groups on-line and in neighborhoods, paying covert agents to monitor and, if possible, discredit lines of argument which the government judges to be extreme or misleading."

The Article links to a Glenn Greenwald article from January, 2010: http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/01/15/sunstein

From the Greenwald article:

"Cass Sunstein has long been one of Barack Obama's closest confidants. Often mentioned as a likely Obama nominee to the Supreme Court, Sunstein is currently Obama's head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs where, among other things, he is responsible for "overseeing policies relating to privacy, information quality, and statistical programs." In 2008, while at Harvard Law School, Sunstein co-wrote a truly pernicious paper proposing that the U.S. Government employ teams of covert agents and pseudo-"independent" advocates to "cognitively infiltrate" online groups and websites -- as well as other activist groups -- which advocate views that Sunstein deems "false conspiracy theories" about the Government. This would be designed to increase citizens' faith in government officials and undermine the credibility of conspiracists. The paper's abstract can be read, and the full paper downloaded, here (http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1084585.)

Sunstein advocates that the Government's stealth infiltration should be accomplished by sending covert agents into "chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups." He also proposes that the Government make secret payments to so-called "independent" credible voices to bolster the Government's messaging (on the ground that those who don't believe government sources will be more inclined to listen to those who appear independent while secretly acting on behalf of the Government). This program would target those advocating false "conspiracy theories," which they define to mean: "an attempt to explain an event or practice by reference to the machinations of powerful people, who have also managed to conceal their role." Sunstein's 2008 paper was flagged by this blogger, and then amplified in an excellent report by Raw Story's Daniel Tencer."

I missed the Greenwald article when it came out. Still well worth the read.

[zalinda]

31. After reading this article, it confirmed my impression of Obama n/t

[DU GrovelBot]

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[woo me with science]

36. Highly recommend that people actually READ this article.

He is not weak. He is not overwhelmed. He is not blocked by a recalcitrant Congress.

He is a Third Way Democrat. His goals on the economy and the wars are identical to those of Republicans. The sooner we label the problem for what it is, the better.

Kicked and strongly recommended.

[nomb]

39. That's why I intentionally neglected to quote blocks of prose from it. It should be read not glanced

[truebrit71]

48. +1

...

[MissDeeds]

60. Yep

And a "Third Way Democrat" is in no way a Democrat.

[Autumn]

37. K/R an excellent read.

:dem:

[truebrit71]

45. That is an interesting and depressing read...

It has been posited by Christopher Hitchens that the Clinton Presidency was a de-facto continuation of Reaganism, and that Slick Willie proposed ideas and did things to the welfare state, for example, that Reagan daren't dream about...

We have a situation now where a President that was elected to "change the way things were done in Washington" has now done the almost inconceivable and actually codified the criminal activities of his predecessors and has then gone on and continued the offences he once railed against...

I am left feeling discouraged and very bitter. This is not the "change" I had "hoped" for...

[gulliver]

49. Man, that's some serious black tar heroin.

Nuttiness porn. I guess as long as you don't read or write this kind of stuff too much there's not too much harm.

[xchrom]

56. Recommend

[MissDeeds]

61. K&R n/t

[Kurovski]

62. Spells it out pretty well. (nt)

[readmoreoften]

65. +1. (late)