BARACK OBAMA Is Actually A Near-Mirror Of His Many Critics! NOT That They [YOU] Will Acknowledge It!
Kyle Schwitters
have irreparably broken the Once-United States of America for the
duration of our lifetimes.
And their sole tangible platform is to keep Barack and the Dems from
ANY success, even if that means their "own states" and supporters are
neglected.
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"Obama: A pragmatic moderate faces the 'socialist' smear"
By Norman J. Ornstein
Wednesday, April 14, 2010; A19
IN THE 1950s, Democratic senators from the solidly Democratic South
uniformly supported segregation and opposed civil rights and voting
rights bills. They dutifully spent long hours on the Senate floor
filibustering such efforts. Legend has it that during one marathon
filibuster, after Olin Johnston of South Carolina, a populist liberal
on economic matters, handed off the baton to Strom Thurmond, Johnston
went into the cloakroom where many of his colleagues were seated,
gestured back toward the Senate floor, and said, "Old Strom, he really
believes that [expletive]."
This story came to mind with the recent blizzard of attacks on Barack
Obama by Republican presidential wannabes and other office-seekers,
along with their allies on cable television and talk radio. The most
extravagant rhetoric has come out of the gathering of Southern
Republicans in New Orleans, led by former House speaker Newt Gingrich,
who called Obama "the most radical president in American history" and
urged his partisan audience to stop Obama's "secular, socialist
machine."
At the same conference, Liz Cheney, the former vice president's
daughter who is often mentioned as a possible Senate candidate from
Virginia, fiercely attacked Obama's foreign policy as "apologize for
America, abandon our allies and appease our enemies." And last week
the ubiquitous Sarah Palin said of the arms-control treaty Obama
signed with Russia, "No administration in America's history would, I
think, ever have considered such a step," likening it to a kid telling
others in a playground fight, "Go ahead, punch me in the face and I'm
not going to retaliate."
On talk radio, Rush Limbaugh accused Obama of administering "statist-
assisted suicide." Talk show host Michael Savage called Obama's health-
care plan "socialized medicine" and described the nuclear treaty as
"insane." These are not isolated comments; the terms "radical,"
"socialist" and even "totalitarian" are bandied about frequently by
Obama opponents, including congressional and other GOP leaders.
To one outside the partisan and ideological wars, charges of
radicalism, socialism, retreat and surrender are, frankly, bizarre.
The Democrats' health-reform plan includes no public option and relies
on managed competition through exchanges set up much like those for
federal employees. The individual mandate in the plan sprang from a
Heritage Foundation idea that was endorsed years ago by a range of
conservatives and provided the backbone of the Massachusetts plan that
was crafted and, until recently, heartily defended by Mitt Romney. It
would be fair to describe the new act as Romneycare crossed with the
managed-competition bill proposed in 1994 by Republican Sens. John
Chafee, David Durenberger, Charles Grassley and Bob Dole -- in other
words, as a moderate Republican plan. Among its supporters is
Durenberger, no one's idea of a radical socialist.
What about Obama's other domestic initiatives? The stimulus was
anything but radical -- indeed, many mainstream observers, me
included, thought it was too timid in size and scope given the
enormity of the problems. The plan could have been more focused on
swift and directed stimulus. It included such diversions as a fix for
the alternative minimum tax -- at the insistence of Grassley. And it
excluded some "shovel-ready" ideas such as school construction -- at
the insistence of Republican Sen. Susan Collins. It did not include
the kind of public works jobs program employed by Franklin Roosevelt.
Nonetheless, it has been widely credited with ameliorating the worst
effects of the downturn and helping to move us back toward economic
growth. The widely criticized Troubled Assets Relief Program --
initiated by Obama's predecessor -- is now returning to the Treasury
most of the taxpayer money laid out to keep us from depression and
deflation.
It is true that, in an attempt to head off a meltdown stemming from a
collapse of the automobile industry, Obama engineered a temporary
takeover of two of the Big Three auto companies. But nothing suggests
that this is anything but temporary, and Obama has resisted many calls
to take over major banks and other financial institutions.
The nuclear treaty with Russia excoriated by Palin, Savage and others
was endorsed by Indiana Sen. Richard Lugar, the GOP's resident foreign
policy expert, and it was crafted under Defense Secretary Robert
Gates, who was first appointed to that post by George W. Bush. Obama's
approach to terrorism has been similar to Bush's, while more
aggressively targeting leaders of terrorist groups; his larger foreign
policy has received the seal of approval from James Baker, former
chief of staff to Ronald Reagan and secretary of state to George H.W.
Bush. Obama's energy policies include more nuclear power and more
offshore drilling. Obama's education policies have received wide
acclaim across the political spectrum. The "secular" president has
shored up and supported federal faith-based initiatives, to the dismay
of many in his base.
Looking at the range of Obama domestic and foreign policies, and his
agency and diplomatic appointments, my conclusion is clear: This
president is a mainstream, pragmatic moderate, operating in the center
of American politics; center-left, perhaps, but not left of center.
The most radical president in American history? Does Newt Gingrich, a
PhD in history, really believe that [expletive]?
[The writer is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise
Institute.]
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/13/AR2010041303686.html
spicpussy
"Politics hampers effort to reform the $450 trillion derivatives
market"
Editorial
The Washington Post
Wednesday, April 14, 2010; A18
"DERIVATIVES" is the financial industry's fancy term for contracts
that market participants make with one another to profit from, and
protect against, various kinds of risk. A grain futures contract helps
a farmer hedge against an unexpected drop in the price of his crop; a
credit default swap enables a bond buyer to insure against a corporate
failure. Derivatives, therefore, are wonderful; they grease the wheels
of capitalism by promoting economically rational risk-taking. And
derivatives can be terrible; they induce investors to take too much
risk by giving them a false sense of security. A major cause of the
recent financial crisis was AIG's sale of credit default swaps to big
banks, without enough collateral to back them.
In its financial regulatory reform effort, Congress must improve
federal supervision of the $450 trillion derivatives market to protect
against systemic risk without negating the useful functions that
derivatives perform. Fortunately, everyone in the debate -- from the
Obama administration to Wall Street -- agrees with that proposition,
at least in theory. Not so fortunately, that's as far as agreement
goes: Consequently, the administration, Democrats and Republicans in
the Senate, and a host of lobbyists are wrangling over where to draw
the line.
A basic distinction is between derivatives that commercial firms buy
to hedge actual risks to their own business plans -- a utility's
purchase of natural gas, for example -- and a financial firm's
speculative trading in, say, credit-default swaps for Greek government
debt. The former should be more lightly regulated than the latter. The
House adopted a bill last fall that would regulate trades by "major
swap participants" that "could have serious adverse effects on . . .
financial stability." That standard looks too permissive to us: too
hard for regulators to interpret, and thus too easy for financial
firms to exploit.
Improving on it shouldn't be so hard, but -- it may not surprise you
to learn -- partisan politics is getting in the way. Republican
leaders, eager to deny the Obama administration any accomplishment,
walked away from negotiations on financial reform in the Senate
Banking Committee that had brought both sides 95 percent of the way to
a deal. Now the White House, convinced that it has a winning issue --
go ahead, Republicans, side with Wall Street if you dare -- is
discouraging Democratic senators from working with any Republicans who
might still be so inclined. The risk is that the mudfight will keep
Congress from doing the essential business: bringing most of the
derivatives market into the sunlight.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/13/AR201...
God'sPoopyAnus
GREATNESS!
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"Obama and the challenge of slow change"
Op-Ed
By David S. Broder
Thursday, April 15, 2010; A21
We are beginning to learn that the Obama presidency will be an era of
substantial but deferred accomplishments -- perhaps always to be
accompanied by a sense of continuing crisis. His vaunted "cool" allows
him to wait without impatience and to endure without visible despair.
It asks the same of his constituents.
These thoughts were generated by the events of the past few days in
Washington, when a glut of 46 visiting heads of state caused a massive
traffic tie-up and a veritable windstorm of talk, all to yield a
promise that two years hence, we may see major steps toward control of
loose nuclear weapons and their fuel.
A year ago in Prague, Barack Obama -- treading deliberately and
dramatically further down the path of disarmament than his
predecessors of either party had dared to go -- drew his portrait of a
world substantially freed from the fear of atomic annihilation.
This week, responding to his leadership, the nations of the world --
with a few notable exceptions on both sides of the Arab-Israeli divide
-- sent their leaders to Washington to signal their assent to that
aspiration.
Two years from now, they or their successors will reconvene, and we
will be able to measure how much -- or little -- progress they have
made individually and collectively toward this noble goal.
This is the characteristic pattern, we can begin to see, of Obama's
great initiatives. It is repeated in health care and in economic
policymaking, and -- it seems safe to speculate -- it is likely to be
followed in education, energy, the environment and fiscal policy as
well.
Take health care. More than a year ago, Obama outlined a vision of a
redesigned system, covering far more people at substantially lower per
capita cost. He was notably sparing in how to get there, and for many
months it was not clear that Congress would take up the challenge. In
the end, a law was enacted that addressed exactly that goal. But it
will be four years at least before its key components are in place and
another four beyond that until its financing mechanism will really be
tested.
Take the economy. The "emergency" measures designed to deal with the
manufacturing calamities and the overall housing and economic crises
Obama inherited were quickly passed in 2009. But none was expected to
show results at that moment. For month after month, there was no sign
that the downward spiral had been slowed, and only now, more than a
year later, are there enough positive signs -- in employment, in sales
and in profits -- that many economists are willing to talk about
recovery.
It is likely that if and when Congress responds to other challenges
Obama has given it -- to restructure financial regulation; to
rationalize energy, education and environmental policies; and to slow
the ruinous growth of entitlement programs -- the pattern will be the
same: incremental steps leading to possible future breakthroughs.
For a nation whose culture has produced a psychology demanding instant
gratification, this politics of deferred satisfaction is something not
easily learned. In his political career, Obama has been a perfect
embodiment of an impatient generation. He rocketed through his few
years in Springfield to capture a Senate seat from Illinois, then
quickly became impatient with the Senate's ways and set his cap for
the presidency.
But somewhere, he has learned the virtues of patience when it comes to
governing.
I think it is welcome to have a president whose vision extends beyond
the duration of his own term of office, though it entails a political
risk that he could be cut off by the voters before any of his hopes
are realized. If the current high level of public frustration fuels a
Republican resurgence well beyond the normal midterm losses for a
president's party, it is possible that next year might bring a serious
effort to repeal the health-care act and reject his initiatives in
international affairs.
I do not think this is likely. But a president who is not driven by a
compulsion to provide instant gratification for his constituents must
also cultivate adult patience in them. My bet would be that Obama has
that capacity.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/14/AR2010041402991.html