Such diverse views on President Obama.
Consider this from the Daily Kos. Too much Kool-Aid?
One from the WSJ. Too little of it?
WSJ:
"His fall from political grace has been as swift as his rise a handful of years ago."
Look, I'm not crazy about the guy's philosophical outlook (he's a progressive) but has he fallen from grace? Yeah, his popularity isn't high these days but I'm sure he bet on that. In the end, he did ram through two reforms - whatever their faults. The right is squeezing him but so is the left for not furthering the progressive agenda fast enough. If anything, even if he loses major seats, his first two years has to have been a success politically speaking.
"The vaunted Obama economic stimulus, at $862 billion, has failed. The "progressives" want to double down, and were they to have their way, would have pushed for a bigger stimulus still. But the American people are in open rebellion against an economic strategy of public debt, higher taxes and unending deficits."
The jury is still out, but yeah, that's probably the case.
There was no hesitation in the monumental changes Mr. Obama had in mind. The logic was Jacobin, the authority deriving from a perceived mandate to recast time-honored practices. It was veritably rule by emergency decrees. If public opinion displayed no enthusiasm for the overhaul of the nation's health-care system, the administration would push on. The public would adjust in due time.
What time-honored practices I'd like to know?
"It is in the nature of charisma that it rises out of thin air, out of need and distress, and then dissipates when the magic fails. The country has had its fill with a scapegoating that knows no end from a president who had vowed to break with recriminations and partisanship. The magic of 2008 can't be recreated, and good riddance to it. Slowly, the nation has recovered its poise. There is a widespread sense of unstated embarrassment that a political majority, if only for a moment, fell for the promise of an untested redeemer—a belief alien to the temperament of this so practical and sober a nation."
We'll see. I hold a similar skepticism (shoot, does that make me a racialist now?) but I'll let the next two years run on.
I don't hold to the shame and guilt tripping of Americans for voting for Obama as an untested redeemer. Mind you, I didn't vote for him and I won't the next time either, but one would be wise to remember that the GOP candidate was horrible, and the outgoing GOP administration had lost its way so badly that there was hardly any alternative. Sorry, but even McCain tried to run on an anti-McCain platform at one point.
ReplyDeleteThe stimulus gimmick was greatly expanded by Obama, but remember it was the Republicans who came up with this trick. The Bush administration is also the one that came up with the bailouts, and McCain threw one of his temper tantrums when it didn't get passed the first try and actually suspended his campaign -- looking all the more like an unfit propeller head for doing so.
If voters lose faith in Obama, well that allows voters to look elsewhere for better answers. I can't say we didn't know what we were getting with this President. he really has been quite clear.
Oh, I'm well aware it was the GOP who brought in the bail outs/stimulus. They're equal to the task of "expanding government" they are rebelling against right now.
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