what are barack obama's flaws?

http://www.progressive.org/mag_reed0508

similar claims about obama. and some really bad calls.

oh, "calls" as in 'predictions.' BAD political sportswiter.

Fuck us all.

Morbs can I get you a T-shirt that says that

for a political science prof, he totally misread the underlying situation. that was the whole story of 08, it didn't matter, really, whether HRC of BHO won, either of them was going to be president. it's not calls about the future, but about the then-present that he got wrong. about BHO's status as an ambitious black bourgeois liberal, of course!

this is an interesting claim:

2) his horribly opportunistic approach to the issues bearing on inequality—in which he tosses behaviorist rhetoric to the right and little more than calls to celebrate his success to blacks—stands to pollute debate about racial injustice whether he wins or loses the Presidency

i don't know what to make of it, or how to evaluate it now. has the debate about racial injustice been polluted by obama's rhetoric? not trying to be snide here, it really is a possibility, but i can't tell exactly what reed means. which debate, for instance?

but this?

3) he can’t beat McCain in November... there’s no way that Obama will carry most of the states in November that he’s won in the primaries and caucuses... Obama’s style of being all things to all people threatens to melt under the inescapable spotlight of a national campaign against a Republican... Obama’s campaign has been very clever in carving out a strategy to amass Democratic delegate votes, but its momentum is in some ways a Potemkin construction—built largely on victories in states that no Democrat will win in November—that will fall apart under Republican pressure.

this is channeled right from mark penn

i don't know if he is a vacuous neoliberal or not but i'd like to see him run some more offense against supply-side economics. the sotu the other night could have used more of it

otm

also more owl city references

TH, my "Fucked" t shirt isnt worn out yet

times was you just notched your bedpost

neoliberal

Not quite sure what this means. Unless it is 'convenient political boogeyman for neocons that under pressure doesn't really pose the threat of promoting truly progressive legislation'.

"Neoliberal" = "triangulating" Democrat.

talks a lot, does shit

*talks a lot, does shit*

Maybe someday, calling a black man a 'smooth talker' in print won't seem racist or patronizing to me, but I doubt it.

how disingenuous can you get, you don't know what neoliberal is?

suzy, how about if you're a black writer like Adolph Reed Jr? I guess you made an assumption.

neoliberal is a slippery term, but it doesn't exactly mean "triangulating democrat" although plenty of the latter are the former

liberal as in 19th cent liberal not US liberal

^^^yes

neoliberal predates neocon

(at least, the terminology does afaict)

it means a belief in the market, deregulatin' and privatizin' shit imo. so the clints was a neoliberal.

Really? I first saw it used by The New Republic in the eighties about Gary Hart types.

neoliberal like that accomodationist sellout booker t washington?

neoliberal predates neocon

neocon is a sort of bewildering term, the way its used. but i think they happened almost simultaneously, from the late 1960s. neocons are guys like podhoretz and kristol. neoliberals are like milton friedman and hayek. i guess they'd existed before then, but so had strauss. they began to catch impt ppl's ears in the 1970s -- thatcher, pinochet, reagan's guys.

yeah that might be coincidental! xp to alfred

i always thought neo-liberal meant the modern strain of Liberalism, with laissez faire free market connotations. not like clintonian dems.

all the words "neoliberal" and stuff--they basically just mean "political view i dont agree with" right?

Long before Hitchens left the reservation he derided "neoliberalism" as the thinking of exhausted sixties pols who couldn't figure out how to beat the Reagan Revolution, so they supported "national defense," public anti-Soviet belligerence, and tax relief.

no! it's like neocon, there is a precise meaning. or a few of them. xp

i always thought neo-liberal meant the modern strain of Liberalism, with laissez faire free market connotations. not like clintonian dems.

― u b ilxin' (Hunt3r), Friday, January 29, 2010 4:43 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

clinton believed in laissez faire economics tho. maybe a bit less rabidly than reagan, but still.

all the words "neoliberal" and stuff--they basically just mean "political view i dont agree with" right?

― max, Friday, January 29, 2010 4:44 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

up to a point, but they have some irl meaning.

i mean i know there is some kind of "dictionary definition" but

yall i did graduate from college

people using them sloppily is a problem.

The prefix is accurate: a "new conservative," which is why so many former Democrats (especially those in Scoop Jackson's orbit) claim the title: Krauthammer, Perle, Podhoretz, the two Kristols, Jeanne Kirkpatrick.

i don't know shit but, to me:

neoliberal---"right winger" whose prevailing interest is in free markets
neoconservative---"right winter" whose prevailing interest is in "values" (which can range widely from the economic to the moral)

lol typ

o

eoconservative---"right winter" whose prevailing interest is in "values" (which can range widely from the economic to the moral)

Not quiet true. Most neocons are "moderate" on social issues; their bugaboo is defense.

*quite

hey max, the two root words are "neo" meaning new, and "liberal", which may refer to any one of a few different political movements. do you see the confusion? i hope i helped you out!

sigh

maybe we can go over the difference between the american and european uses of the word "liberal" next

Not quiet true. Most neocons are "moderate" on social issues; their bugaboo is defense.

― Blue Fucks Like Ben Nelson (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, January 29, 2010 10:49 AM (30 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah that actually sounds more accurate. i guess it's kind of a rhombus/square thing to me: neocons are very likely to be neoliberal, but not necessarily vice versa

Not quiet true. Most neocons are "moderate" on social issues; their bugaboo is defense.

― Blue Fucks Like Ben Nelson (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, January 29, 2010 10:49 AM (20 seconds ago) Bookmark

i dunno, they talk about defense the most, in a "war makes societies great" kind of way, but the kristol's wrote all kinds of shit about how a victorian shame and propriety is some kind of ideal iirc. they weren't southern-style racists, is the thing.

(max i was trying to be funny)

god I fucking hate the Kristols

apropos of nothing...

ugh extra apostrophe there

xp

suzy, how about if you're a black writer like Adolph Reed Jr? I guess you made an assumption.

I guess you made an assumption about what I know! Which I'm sure you never, ever do to anyone who contributes here.

My complaint was that the description could seem 'racist OR patronizing' (and I was trying not to throw the skin of the writer in the game to prove a point/bait you).

(max i was trying to be funny)

― goole, Friday, January 29, 2010 11:52 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

dude

success?

Republicans Ready to Spar With Obama
By CARL HULSE

BALTIMORE — It’s the rumble in Baltimore as House Republicans take on President Obama today.

Gathered for a retreat in the Renaissance Hotel overlooking the blue-collar city’s famous harbor and historic Fort McHenry, members of the conservative Republican House Conference say they are itching to quiz the president and present their policy ideas rather than listen to another lofty presidential address.

“House Republicans welcome any opportunity to present our better solutions,” said Representative Mike Pence of Indiana, the No. 3 House Republican and the organizer of the House retreat.

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/29/republicans-ready-to-spar-with-obama/?partner=rss&emc=rss

Obama's biggest flaw is that he's going to be taking Mike Pence seriously.