Apparently we should disabuse ourselves of the notion that Obama doesn’t know what he’s doing, because he knows exactly what he’s doing!
I’m sure it was intentional.
Well, I sure noticed a huge change when Obama was elected. A newfound respect for science, doubling of the NSF budget, mostly very competent and reputable Cabinet secretaries and agency administrators, a move to climate mitigation instead of denial, health care reform, and many other things, with Dick Cheney and Michael Brown nowhere to be found despite their famous propensities for waging unbelievably stupid wars and doing a heck-uv-a-job, respectively. Apparently there really is a difference between Obama and the former dumbass Texas village idiot. Some folks were disappointed that he wasn’t a more radical liberal and turned out to act more like a centrist, but that didn’t stop Republicans from demonizing him for being a “socialist” and probably a Muslim, too, and opposing his agenda at every possible turn.
Just exactly where in this scenario is Obama at fault?
I agree with what you’re saying, to an extent. The political process is not just a game with winners and losers; it has real consequences that affect people’s lives. Ideally the process should channel the wisdom of the electorate into electing the best people, and should reward those who govern well.
But I think there’s some spillover between the “horse race” and “good governance” ways of looking at things. Obama presumably believes that the Democratic platform is in the best interest of the country. The disintegration of the GOP would make it more likely for Democrats to win elections and enact their agenda.
Again, I don’t blame Obama for the GOP’s problems, but it’s not fair to say that such an argument is solely about hurting the other team, and not about ideas.
And I have to add that what the republicans are doing betrays their denials about the change that has taken place in jobs, health care, and many other items that benefit America.
As for Trump, I guess one has to let Superman remind us about how un-american the message he is telling to many really is.
Rubio is wrong, the Republicans are the ones that set the time bomb that is just going off, luckily it seems that it will just damage the ones that decided it was a good idea to set it up in the first place.
No, the Democrats should design and implement policy and laws for the betterment of the country and her citizens. So should the Republicans. No political party should put itself before the good of the country.
We can blame anyone for any thing if we want to, but blaming Obama for the last eight years of stalemate, divisiveness, and deception and self-decpetion is not rational.
The leaders of the Republican party publicly stated that the party’s primary goal was to prevent Obama from accomplishing anything, but blame him for everything including problems in the Republican party itself.
That Obama is not running, and it is more likely that they did not had a job then, but now they will remember that they have jobs now or better opportunities. They will think for sure that Clinton will be right by mentioning that the Trade wars that Trump is proposing will lead to an even worse recession than the one we are recovering from.
But wouldn’t you agree that a President is at least somewhat responsible for who succeeds him? The political environment that exists now, in both parties, was a political environment that occurred under his leadership.
Just more smoke from your sources adaher. It is clear that you still need to watch the often posted Frontline report about how powerful fossil fuel interests and conservative ones have distorted the politics of the Republican party in recent years.
They were a very important reason why people that should not had been elected to congress were and in big part because of their denial of science was a feature, not a bug. The powerful interests did not mind that the new republican crop’s anti intellectualism also leads to draconian right wing views and a lack of compromise in government.
However, now IMHO most of the powerful are beginning to understand now that they made a big mistake, the Frankenstein monster that is rising up among the Republicans is not what they wanted out of this deal.
Which is why Marco began to make comments about the size of the Donald’s manhood on national TV, to keep the dignity of the process at an appropriate level. :rolleyes:
No, I agree that the GOP is responsible for its own mess. But what’s going on in the Democratic Party and the nation as a whole is definitely on him. If Trump is elected despite the presence of a clear successor for his policies, then there’s no way he avoids responsbility for that outcome.
The usual caveat is that it is still early, and the Democratic numbers can go down, but even Nate Silver was wrong by thinking the same about Trump’s lead among the Republicans not lasting. So it is interesting that the pollsters got the general trend about Trump right and early, and more importantly: the same pollsters matching polls of Clinton (or even Bernie) vs Trump show the democrat ahead, and for “ages” already.
But the most important thing here is that the most recent polls show Clinton increasing the old constant lead she had over Trump of about 5 points to 10 points ahead of the troglodyte now, and it is clear that the people is taking into account not only the recent behavior of Trump, but also that all the “scandals” launched at Clinton are more likely being seen as exaggerations by most of the people.
I don’t think Obama has anything to do with what’s happening in the Republican Party. I think it’s more a symptom of non stop messages in echo chambers. We are seeing people on both sides self select into mind-hive camps and I fear it’s not going to end well.
Wow, I thought I made it as simple as I could, A or B. “None of the above” was not one of the options.
Once again, it’s not enough to just say that it happened on his watch. What did he actually do to cause it? He’s been in office for seven years, just pick something.
That’s a little different, because it involves actual legal regulations and laws.
In U.S. terms, Obama gets to say, “Republicans are poopy-heads,” but he can’t use the FBI to investigate opponents. That was Richard Nixon’s capital blunder: he crossed the line between political activity and the administration of the state.
Alas, in a two party system, it’s zero sum. Reducing the other side’s credibility is helping your own ideas get implemented.
The other problem is that negative campaigning works. Attack ads really do sway the opinions and votes of large numbers of people. We throw a lot of mud, because history shows that people are influenced by it. We, ourselves, in our own human nature, are a part of the problem.
I actually do agree, and would like to see a more elevated and intelligent campaign. But if (all other things being equal) candidate A runs an intellectually honest campaign, and candidate B tells a blort-load of filthy lies about how his opponent (oh, I don’t know, hypothetically) deliberately let the ambassador to Libya die in a consulate attack – candidate B has the better chance of winning.
The OP mentioned Obama’s speech, but I just read a longer transcript of it and it’s excellent, and directly addresses the point that he’s responsible for the fouling of the GOP.
I don’t know if the youtube link in the OP is of the speech, but anyway here is a longer quote of the text.
The increased cynicism and the fact that he’s just a typical politician who ran as something different. What those who want change found out is that you simply cannot elect someone who is part of the establishment and expect change.
Tell me about it, it seems that many Republicans will continue to ignore the data that shows the achievements and the change from the disastrous direction that Bush the lesser administration was taking the USA. That is something that will not change.
