I know that expecting your posts to make even a little bit of sense is a forlorn hope, but this one is particularly notable.
What possible motivation could a Democrat have to sacrifice themselves and their chance of re-election to pander to the GOP? Blackmail? Magic mind-control rays? Demonic possession?
Give us something to work with here.
Regards,
Shodan
By that measure President Lincoln should have capitulated to the Southern States.
Your average American tends to think about their own self interest and not that of the country. It takes even more thought to determine that doing something like, say, paying more in taxes not only is good for the country but in the end good for their own self interest as well (when taxes were higher in the past prosperity was higher as well).
We should expect our elected leaders to try and understand the deeper issues at work and pursue the greatest good. NOT what is most popular.
You and Obama are bids of a feather. Compromise above all else no matter the issue at stake.
Unfortunately Obama negotiates down from a position of strength better than any President I can think of. IIRC in the tax debate several months ago he just gave away the inheritance tax. Republicans were already happy to get the bulk of taxes extended…Obama tossed in a capitulation on the inheritance tax. For what? Nothing I can discern.
I am curious, if McCain had been elected president what substantial policies of ours do you think would be substantially different?
Tax breaks for the rich?
Health care reform? Well, we got Romneycare and essentially what the republicans were after when Clinton tried. Obama also handed the pharmaceutical industry big handouts in back room deals.
DADT? That would probably still exist…maybe. Not like Obama really went to bat for it. McCain might have let it die too.
Wall Street reform? Seen much of that?
Improve financial regulation? Seen much of that?
Accountability anywhere to be seen?
Environmental issues? Seen much of that? (We are handing out offshore drilling permits at a break-neck pace lately despite a lack of the industry addressing safety concerns.)
Give Americans back freedoms lost under Bush? Obama has made it worse than it was under Bush.
Patriot Act? Still there.
Net neutrality? Obama seems to be siding with the telecom corporations.
Guantanamo closed? Nope.
Military tribunals? Just capitulated on that.
Transparency in government? Laughable…as bad as ever and maybe worse.
Torture? Apparently we torture our own citizens now (Bradley Manning).
Immigration reform?
Support unions? (Not except a few soundbites)
Attack yet another country? Check.
Tell me where you think McCain would have done things substantially different. Tell me again why I should reward Obama with my vote next time around. At least McCain I would expect it from.
I understand there is compromise. Can you show me where Obama went to the mat and fought for the principles he espoused in the campaign?
If there is a non-crazy republican candidate or, better (but very unlikely) credible democratic challenger, they’ll get my vote.
One thing Obama is definitely not getting this time around from me is my money or time on his behalf. I’m sure he couldn’t give a shit but he might if there are enough other people like me and I think there are. He will not repeat his record breaking fundraising from small donors as he did last time (at least I seriously doubt it).
I’m not a conservative, and my reasons for liking Obama have nothing to do with how charming he is. “Retaliating” against Lieberman would be stupid, for the reasons **Ravenman **noted above. Or is he another “conservative” who just likes Obama because he’s charming?
Eh. You need to learn that the president isn’t king. Your ire should be directed at the Dems in Congress. You know, the one who actually pass laws.
I am not sure he was suggesting the President have the power outright to determine chairmanships.
However, the president is almost always seen as the leader of the party. The president has leverage. He can make his will known and throw his weight around.
Look at the party discipline republicans manage (I’ll have to look for cites but IIRC there have been times where they lean on wobbly members pretty hard). If democrats could manage half as well they’d be in a much better position.
Telling Lieberman to fuck-off (or Lincoln to name another) would serve them well in the long run. The next congresscritter who wants to oppose his/her caucus will think twice.
Like how Republicans whipped Arlen Specter right into line?
[QUOTE=Whack-a-Mole]
By that measure President Lincoln should have capitulated to the Southern States.
[/QUOTE]
That’s unclear (i.e. whether or not a majority of Americans supported or didn’t support slavery…I’d say that the majority of VOTING Americans did not support slavery by 1860, however) and beside the point. Lincoln came in prepared to compromise and continue to work for the proper dissolution of slavery, but the entire matter was taken out of his hands when the South succeeded. At that point, his clear duty was to maintain the Union…and even then, he was prepared to compromise with the South if they had been prepared to compromise as well. They weren’t, and so we had a Civil War.
I agree. But, the thing is, a president is not a God King…he has to work within the system as it actually is. So, that means that he’s got to have the support of the peoples representatives, if nothing else…which means he’s got to work with the Congress and Senate, and he’s got to shape what he tries to do based on the realities of what he actually CAN do. Contrary to Der Trih’s assertion, Republican presidents can’t just steam roller things through as if they were God or King either…they have to have not only the support of their own party in the Congress or Senate but some non-zero percentage of folks from the other side as well. Which is why, for all the hype and hand wringing about Bush, we actually didn’t get all those conservative programs everyone was worried about in 2000…instead, we got a series of wars that BOTH parties supported in the House and Senate.
Honestly…I think Obama has kicked ass in his first term, and accomplished a hell of a lot, especially considering the amount of rancor between the parties when he became president, and the amount of problems and issues, especially with the economy he faced.
We’d need to then expect our leaders to do stuff that would basically mean they don’t get re-elected if they do things that are unpopular with the majority then. I hear what you are saying, but I think your target is off…it’s not the president who you need to be giving this speech too, but to the members of your own party in the House and Senate. And basically, you’d be asking them to commit political suicide in some of the loopier maunderings from lefties in this thread…if the Dems forced everyone in the party to toe the line on pushing through some of that stuff (arresting bankers and such) then either the more conservative or moderate Dems would revolt, or they would be deposed in the next election cycle by Independents or Republicans.
Given the same economic situation?
Probably. I don’t see that the president had much choice there, regardless of who the president was. Of course, I’m biased on this one so grain of salt.
I doubt he would have even tried, and if he did I seriously doubt he’d have gotten anything through at all. Consider the state of the economy, and the amount of rancor as well as the makeup and composition of the House and Senate when his term would have started. We’d have gotten nothing. Now, that might have been a good thing or a bad thing, depending on if you think what we did get has any merit at all, or is worth the money, but I seriously doubt McCain would have even TRIED in his first term. He would have been spending whatever small amount of political capital he had on ‘fixing’ issues with the economy.
I doubt McCain would have made it any sort of issue at all. I think he would have had bigger fish to fry in his first term, and his entire focus would have been different.
I’m seeing some, yes. Perhaps McCain would have focused more on this, instead of health care…but the reforms he would have (perhaps) gotten through would have been filtered through Republican glasses, and then a hard cycle of compromise since they would have necessitated Democratic by in to get anything accomplished at all. Unless you think, given the mood at that time (and given that McCain would have beaten Obama, which would have had Dems even more set off than they are now) that the Dems would have just meekly gone along with whatever McCain and the Republicans wanted? :dubious:
Again, there has been some, though not to the ‘string up all the bankers!’ level that is apparently what lefties want.
Same same. I don’t know what you expect, or how you think it would have been the same under McCain…his focus would have been completely different, and he’d have had to filter whatever plans he had through the same reality that Obama does…though McCain would have had a much tougher job, since he’d have had to try and get his own party buy in AND a large number of Democrats too, or he’d have gotten NOTHING accomplished.
Sorry, I don’t have time to go through everything so I’m going to skip ahead.
His entire focus would have been different. My guess is, based on the state of the economy at that time is that he would have focused everything on that on on Iraq. His ability to get anything accomplished on either issue would have been seriously degraded, since, as I said earlier, he would have had to simultaneously get things his own party would support fully (in total lockstep) AND get a substantial by in from an already dissatisfied Democratic House and Senate. You tell me man…what do YOU think he could have gotten accomplished in that environment and with those constraints?? I think his list of accomplishments at this point would be hovering around absolute zero, personally.
-XT
They made him a democrat.
I wish dems made Lieberman put an (R) next to his name (or at least refused to let him caucus with them much less give him a chairmanship).
And guess who is no longer a senator from Pennsylvania?
Bucking the system worked out well for him didn’t it.
Do we need to get **Shayna **in here to get all Medieval on your asses about what Obama has and hasn’t done?
Aye, and much worse is that, deep down, a very large portion of the population wants this.
True - but of those who want it, half want him to do it to the other half. And vice versa.
Regards,
Shodan
It is rather underappreciated in some progressive circles…
So, you agree the president needs to do what is best for the country and not what is popular. Clearly he would not or could not compromise sufficiently for the south to not secede.
Glad we agree.
No one is suggesting he is or even should be a God King. I agree compromise is important.
Thing is you should fight for your vision. You negotiate hard.
Obama capitulates before he has even tried much. When republicans proved themselves to be recalcitrant and obstinate and obstructionist to anything Obama wanted tell me why you keep giving those people concessions?
If we ever sit across a negotiating table from each other remind me to keep telling you “no” so you keep giving me more. As long as a deal is done is the important thing.
Is the country in a better place than before he took office (or at least headed in the right direction)? I’d argue it is not. That is the bottom line for me.
Um, kinda. Yeah.
So Republicans drove Specter from their ranks, and he became a pretty reliable Democratic vote for the remainder of his term.
The same thing happened when Republicans drove Jim Jeffords out of their party. When Ben Nighthorse Nelson felt he was no longer welcome in the Democratic party, he became a reliable Republican vote. Lisa Murkowski was turned on by the Republicans, and she went from being a solid Republican vote to a a wildcard.
I can’t think of many examples where political parties have benefited from driving people out of their ranks, no matter how much one has to hold one’s nose.
Democrats could insist that Lieberman, Ben Nelson, Claire McCaskill, and other conservative-leaning senators hold the party line or take a hike. Do you want Republicans to control the Senate this year?
The problem with threatening to exile somebody from the party is that, as you point out, there’ll always be a home for them in the other party.
I wonder if it would benefit both parties to form an unofficial agreement not to take in the other side’s strays? That would give each party better control over its own membership.
Why would you want someone playing for the other team on your team again? So what if you boot them and they go to the other side. Good riddance. I doubt many congresscritters want this to happen since their next election just got a whole lot harder.
Also, why would you give a juicy chairmanship to any of them? I think that chairmanship might be better peddled off to someone faithful in your own party.
Campbell. Ben Nighthorse Campbell.
:smack:
It’s the traditional black mode of governance in the US.
:::d&r:::
You don’t have to put all bankers on trial, just the guys who were running the show before the crisis, the guys you can nail for control frauds. There are dozens of equally talented guys working just under those guys who would stab their grannies for the opportunity to take over their bosses’ jobs if they were suspended due to SEC investigations and their banks/firms would carry on seamlessly. America is such a magnet for global investors because it’s seen to have deep and transparent capital markets. Put the guys on trial who were responsible for those global investors losing half of their investment portfolio value and you’d probably see an increase in investment and a subsequent market rally.
And prddicting another crisis isn’t a minority view right now. There’s been no real re-regulation, banks are back to their pre-meltdown levels of leverage and risk-taking, they’re still hiding their toxic assets because they don’t have to value them at market prices, etc. It’s not a question of whether there’s a financial crisis, it’s a question of when. Since the creation of the first stock market and banking system we’ve had financial crisises. Do you honestly think that a laughabable Dodd-Frank re-regulation bill somehow means that we’re no longer going to have any more crisises? Exactly what re-regulation that you’ve seen since the meltdown convinces you that there’ll no longer be any financial crisises, hmmm?