Well, wait a sec. It won’t count if congress can get the credit? I understand the president has relatively little independent influence over the budget (i.e. he largely has to work with congress to get things done, occasionally threatening a veto, but while he can strongly suggest budget items or cuts, it is and always has been congress’s ball), but this sounds vaguely like a escape clause.
I don’t think we have the same idea about what “reporting bias” mean. To me it is a scientific term and doesn’t mean “biased reporters”.
("<bleep> added since this isn’t the Pit.)
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Exactly. Average isn’t bad, it’s just not good enough to be the leader of the worlds most powerful nation. You should have the best leader out of a sample size of over a hundred million people. He or she should be exceptional, not average. And that’s elitist.
Shodan?
Why do we care about what people expected of Bush, again?
If the point is to call Shodan irrational or inconsitent, then from the perspective of this thread and forum that’s just a pointless ad-hominem.
Because there’s a judgement issue. If Bush supporters thought Bush was a good candidate in 2000 and 2004 but now realize he did a bad job that demonstrates their political judgement can be faulty. Somebody who knew in 2000 and 2004 that Bush was a bad candidate has been proven right by history - they spotted that he would be a bad President.
So when somebody is offering their views in 2010 about Palin’s ability as a potential President, you should go back and check out their record for judging candidates. If they were right about Bush in 2000 and 2004 then that’s evidence they might be right about Palin in 2012. If they made a mistake in 2000 and 2004 then they might be wrong again in 2012.
Okay, but be careful - you can’t actually assume that people who opposed Bush did so because of clear-eyed insight into the weakness of his leadership ability. They may have done so for completely different reasons, such as being Democrat or thinking that he might not be that fun to have a beer with after all. Heck, they might have been afraid he might be too competent - and thus have steered things too far in the conservative direction.
So while a person who wholeheartedly lauded Bush’s competence does have suspect judgement, it remains the case that the rest of us might not be any better. Maybe we’re all terrible judges, for all we know.
Because Shodan takes it upon himself to criticize [del]Democrats[/del] Obama. I have no objection to his doing so, of course, but I think it’s reasonable to weigh his views on Obama against his views on other politicians.
ETA: You may be correct that the question is outside of the scope of the debate, but it followed from his own post.
It depends on what he does. If the GOP takes over Congress and reduces the deficit, and Obama fights them every step of the way, then no, he won’t get the credit.
Think of how welfare reform went down. Clinton was President, and he signed the bill, but he doesn’t deserve any credit for it - he vetoed it twice and was forced into signing it because he wanted to be re-elected. Same thing with balancing the budget, almost - he forced a government shut down because he wanted to postpone what was necessary until after the elections.
But it is a point I have made before - Obama has had almost two years, with his party in control of Congress, to do what he claims he wants to do. And reducing the deficit has, to say the least, not been a priority. If he can’t do it now, it is going to be pretty hard to accept the excuse that he couldn’t do it because the GOP controls Congress.
Because we are currently out of the recession. If Obama is a Keynesian, he would be starting to reduce the deficit and not jacking it up to a trillion and a half or more.
It’s a legitimate point. I guess the answer is, the important one.
The issue in 2004 was security. The economy and the deficit are the big issue now.
But the question can be easily turned around - if Obama fails to keep his promise to reduce the deficit to less than $535 billion, will you vote for him anyway? Do you think you have legitimate reasons for doing so?
Regards,
Shodan
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What specific promise did he keep vis-a-vis national security? He certainly didn’t keep any of the ones he made during the 2000 election.
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I probably won’t be able to vote in 2012. I’m a permanent resident, not a citizen. However, the deficit is fairly low on my list of priorities, since economic performance is largely unrelated to who occupies the White House; thus, had I a vote, it would be predicated on social policy. The jury’s still out on that one: DADT is, rather implausibly, still in effect; Guantanamo is still stuffed with people who have not been charged with crimes; and health care reform, though a step in the right direction, wasn’t much to write home about.