EPTPresident Obama Re-Elected - Page 5
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Hey guys! We'll be closing this thread shortly, but we will make an American politics megathread where we can continue the discussions in here. The new thread can be found here: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=383301 | ||
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Arnstein
Norway3381 Posts
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feanor1
United States1899 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:16 Silidons wrote: Would you bet anyone money that it won't be Romney? I really don't think so.... he put the war on the books, faux bro To be fair Obama expanded the war in Afghanistan, increased drone strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somolia. Oh and not his fault as we are a member of the UN but we got to join a war in Libya too!! | ||
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Vega62a
946 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:05 Adila wrote: What most people forget is that Congress has a lot of control over what the President is capable of doing. The mistake Obama made was believing that Republicans would be willing to work with him in a constructive manner. He started negotiations way too close to the Republican position and then had nothing to negotiate with. This. Although it's a fucking cynical and depressing world we live in when "he put forth ideas that the other side would like / has supported in the past" is a bad negotiation strategy. In any case, OP is rather biased, (MSM is not so much left-leaning as fact-leaning, unless you count MSNBC (leftward) and Fox (rightward), both of which I refuse to watch) but the biggest thing I'm concerned about is Obama not being able to get hold of the rhetoric of his own party and get the message across to Americans about the things he actually did (there were a lot of them, and they were pretty good, though not perfect). If he can present himself as the leader of the more reasonable party, that's a good start, and it's not hard considering the rhetoric that flies around on the right. (Did anybody even notice that Rep. Allen West openly accused Democrats of being communists? Why is that not a thing?) If he can combat the absurd notion that he did nothing useful (or at all?) in his time in office, that's better. Mitt Romney has a decent shot at the presidency. Right now a lot of conservatives (the crazy ones who won't vote for him because he's a Mormon, for example) aren't on board yet, but they will be. Possibly only on the night of the election, but they will be. I am concerned about a potential Romney presidency only insofar as that he seems to have bent wa-ay to the right during the primaries. He was actually a fairly reasonable and moderate Governor of Mass., if I remember correctly, and while I'm not convinced that was him being genuine (I don't know if he has a genuine) if that is his true style of governance, a Romney administration with a Democratic legislative branch might not be awful, especially if he can get hold of the psychotic partisans that have hijacked his poor party. (As an aside, does anybody else feel really bad for moderate Republicans, whom I happen to like a great deal? Like, Eisenhower couldn't have gotten the nod from his party now.) | ||
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Contagious
United States1319 Posts
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tree.hugger
Philadelphia, PA10406 Posts
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Vega62a
946 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:13 RJGooner wrote: He had a filibuster-proof majority in the first two years of his term. Funny that everyone blames Republicans when it's Obama who has added trillions to the deficit and not put out a plan to reform entitlements. Here's the issue: When Republicans put out a plan to do something like reform entitlements, it's not really a plan. It's "dump it on the private sector and hope they hire enough folks to sweep up the bodies." The Republican platform puts deficits ahead of people who can't support themselves, and to make that stick, they've taken up a consistent position of demonizing the poor as lazy and ungrateful. Obama's filibuster-proof majority only works if he's a Republican. Republicans vote in lock-step, Democrats vote for their districts; it's pretty established, and it's been that way for decades. | ||
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feanor1
United States1899 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:21 Vega62a wrote: This. Although it's a fucking cynical and depressing world we live in when "he put forth ideas that the other side would like / has supported in the past" is a bad negotiation strategy. Mitt Romney has a decent shot at the presidency. Right now a lot of conservatives (the crazy ones who won't vote for him because he's a Mormon, for example) aren't on board yet, but they will be. Possibly only on the night of the election, but they will be. I am concerned about a potential Romney presidency only insofar as that he seems to have bent wa-ay to the right during the primaries. He was actually a fairly reasonable and moderate Governor of Mass., if I remember correctly, and while I'm not convinced that was him being genuine (I don't know if he has a genuine) if that is his true style of governance, a Romney administration with a Democratic legislative branch might not be awful, especially if he can get hold of the psychotic partisans that have hijacked his poor party. (As an aside, does anybody else feel really bad for moderate Republicans, whom I happen to like a great deal? Like, Eisenhower couldn't have gotten the nod from his party now.) Agreed I would have considered voting for Romney, but the primaries became a who can go more extreme right pissing contest. And Romney who was arguable the most moderate of them all going in came out looking similar to Santorum. | ||
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Vega62a
946 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:24 tree.hugger wrote: lol @ "discussion" questions which are all "Obama is going to lose; discuss" Hey, let's be fair. There were also topics about how Romney is going to win. Think positive. | ||
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NtroP
United States174 Posts
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paralleluniverse
4065 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:13 RJGooner wrote: He had a filibuster-proof majority in the first two years of his term. Funny that everyone blames Republicans when it's Obama who has added trillions to the deficit and not put out a plan to reform entitlements. Here's some graphs about the deficit: https://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/opinion/sunday/24sun4.html?_r=1 From this we can see that the deficit tripled as a result of falling tax revenue in the GFC. And Bush increased the deficit 4 times more than Obama. Nearly all of the deficit is falling tax revenue, the 2 wars, and the Bush tax cuts. The Obama stimulus is completely insignificant in comparison. Furthermore, a lack of spending now and a continually depressed economy as a result, will lead to less tax revenue then could otherwise be generated, making it even harder to pay back the debt. This is what's happening in Europe. Paying back debt is not hard because tax revenue naturally grows as a result of population growth, economic growth and inflation. | ||
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Black and Proud
49 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:26 NtroP wrote: Delegates choose the republican candidate. Not the Mainstream media. Thread based on incorrect information. You're right, there is a very real possibility that Newt Gingrich will take this. | ||
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Kar98
Australia924 Posts
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schaf
Germany1326 Posts
I have a theoretical question, would Ron Paul be able to run for president in the main elections as a third candidate? Or does he have to be put up as a candidate formally by his party? | ||
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feanor1
United States1899 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:29 schaf wrote: chaaaaaaange... oh. I'd still vote for Obama, though, if I was a US resident, but will not take part in the poll. I have a theoretical question, would Ron Paul be able to run for president in the main elections as a third candidate? Or does he have to be put up as a candidate formally by his party? He could still get on the ballot | ||
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FairForever
Canada2392 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:26 feanor1 wrote: Agreed I would have considered voting for Romney, but the primaries became a who can go more extreme right pissing contest. And Romney who was arguable the most moderate of them all going in came out looking similar to Santorum. No one actually believes Romney is going to govern like that. I'm happy Romney won the primary, as everyone else on the slate (save Huntsman) is a loony. Romney has strong private sector experience. As long as he governs similar to how he governed before it should be ok. To be fair Obama ran super far to the left of Clinton, but you've seen that he's turned out to be a moderate. To be honest I would be happy with either, slightly favour Romney since I'm not a big fan of some of Obama's economic decisions but it isn't clear-cut to me that Romney would do significantly better given the bad timing of the presidency. | ||
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neversummer
United States156 Posts
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FairForever
Canada2392 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:25 Vega62a wrote: Here's the issue: When Republicans put out a plan to do something like reform entitlements, it's not really a plan. It's "dump it on the private sector and hope they hire enough folks to sweep up the bodies." The Republican platform puts deficits ahead of people who can't support themselves, and to make that stick, they've taken up a consistent position of demonizing the poor as lazy and ungrateful. Obama's filibuster-proof majority only works if he's a Republican. Republicans vote in lock-step, Democrats vote for their districts; it's pretty established, and it's been that way for decades. Doesn't sound biased at all. Republicans have had some ridiculous positions (eg. maintaining tax breaks on the wealthy), but the Democrats haven't done much better - entitlement reform is a serious issue and while Republicans didn't do a very good job of proposing a plan, at least they put out a plan that would actually curb entitlements. In all honesty, any plan that will work needs both huge entitlement cuts and significant revenue increases, but that will never happen because Dems won't go for the former and Repubs won't go for the latter. The political world is too polarized at this point, you can't have a Bush Sr. or Clinton come in who actually worked both sides - I respect Obama for trying (and I believe Romney would try too) but neither could really put a strong effort without getting huge flak from their teams. | ||
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FairForever
Canada2392 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:31 neversummer wrote: Mormonism a non-issue? Not a chance. Are you serious? I don't agree with Mormonism but as long as it doesn't affect his ability to govern and make decisions (hint: it doesn't) why the hell do I care? | ||
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1Eris1
United States5797 Posts
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paralleluniverse
4065 Posts
On April 19 2012 21:03 feanor1 wrote: Obama has broken many of his campaign promises, but instead of doing stuff drastically different he followed the plans laid in place by Bush. I know the rest of the world hates Bush, but he obviously wasn't completely full of shit. At least his last year in office, those middle 6 were pretty terrible. He said Guantanamo shut down within a year, four years later there are still detainees there, what do you know Bush was right no one else wants to take them and you can't let them go. Troops out of Iraq by August of his first year, eventually happened by way after his goal. Who knew Bush was keeping them there despite it being massively unpopular because it would be irresponsible to pull out without a solid plan to transfer security and Iraq was not ready. Bush also had pretty similar policies to combat the economic crash, IE bailouts and such. Who extended the Bush Tax cuts. Obama is who. Anyhow Obama's approval rating received a major boost because he basically was not George W Bush. It's also almost impossible to anything as President with a hostile congress. Obama was forced to extend the Bush tax cuts by Republicans. They wanted him to extend all of the Bush tax cuts, but he didn't want to extend them on the rich. Obama choose to extend them all because if had they expired, it would be a tax increase on the middle class, and during a recession that would significantly damage the economy and reduce aggregate demand. Obama has says he will not will extend them further. The Bush tax cuts haven't done any good. | ||
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