2020 Democratic presidential primary

Obama didn't cut entitlements, what is this weird alternate universe you live in

xps

― Οὖτις, Thursday, December 5, 2019 1:36 PM (twenty-six seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

he proposed cutting social security and has cited not getting "entitlement reform" done as the biggest regret of his presidency

Just a year into Obama’s presidency, the White House began to pivot away from fiscal stimulus and toward austerity. The president convened a bipartisan debt reduction commission in February 2010, co-chaired by Morgan Stanley director Erskine Bowles, a Democrat, and former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wy.), and charged it with forging a fiscal “grand bargain.” That became the catchphrase of choice on the Bowles-Simpson commission — and in budget talks in subsequent years — for a compromise agreement to reduce the long-term debt, through a combination of Social Security and Medicare cuts historically anathema to Democrats and revenue increases and defense cuts hard for Republicans to swallow.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/barack-obama-grand-bargain-social-security-expansion_n_5751f92de4b0eb20fa0e0142

Obama didn't cut entitlements, what is this weird alternate universe you live in

xps

― Οὖτις, Thursday, December 5, 2019 3:36 PM

he certainly gave it his best shot. remember the "grand bargain" with boehner?

xp

Shakey puts on his rose-colored Pelosi glasses when he looks back at Racky

omg he assembled some negotiating points what a monster

Christ, yr bullshit

Yang's take on impeachment seems to be pretty bad, though. For one the whole "Senate will acquit anyway" thing is a self-fulfilling prophecy, you're essentially telling Republicans "gee if you're really gonna stick with this guy no matter what then I guess there's nothing we can do". If they voted to acquit for purely political reasons, hammer them for it! Trump very clearly broke the law and it's Congress's job to hold him accountable. End of story. Secondly the idea that the Dems aren't getting anything done because of this is...definitely not true. It is a select committee that handles impeachment and there are hundreds of bills stalled on McConnell's desk as we speak but somehow this is a Democrat problem. Funny how I never heard the GOP take shit for this when they chaired nine separate hearings on Benghazi.

do you guys know that when you negotiate it's standard practice to dangle something you you know your opponent wants in order to get them to the table.

and, in this case, it didn't even work, so who gives a shit.

xp

yeah i remember when extreme leftist pelosi opposed obama's plans

the idea that the Dems aren't getting anything done because of this is...definitely not true

"We've passed 400 bills and Mitch McConnell has refused to vote on any of them" is a pretty simple and straightforward slogan for next year.

republicans are kinda dumb for not agreeing to the grand bargain. were they waiting for another democratic president to agree to even bigger entitlement cuts?

Shakey puts on his rose-colored Pelosi glasses when he looks back at Racky

christ is there no end to your ahistorical revisionist bullshit. when Obama was murdering American citizens without due process I was one of the people (along with you) that spoke against it. And I was pissed that he backed down from the public option. And I was pissed that he spent his political capital on healthcare instead of a climate change/energy bill. And I posted all these things.

When you bring up how many people he bombed you tend to gloss over that it was exponentially fewer than his predecessor like it doesn't matter, but it does matter. Because facts matter more than ideology or political positioning.

their tea leaves showed Pete! xp

Iiiii guess Dems believed he was sincere!

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/07/07/debt.talks.progressives/index.html

do you guys know that when you negotiate it's standard practice to dangle something you you know your opponent wants in order to get them to the table.

and, in this case, it didn't even work, so who gives a shit.

xp

“We’re going to have to take on entitlements, and I think we've got to do it quickly,” Obama said as a candidate on Oct. 7, 2008, during the second presidential debate. “We're going to have a lot of work to do, so I can't guarantee that we're going to do it in the next two years, but I'd like to do it in my first term as president.”

As president-elect, Obama made a similar statement to the editorial board of the Washington Post, which ran a story headlined, “Obama Pledges Reform of Social Security, Medicare Programs.”

The Post story quoted Obama saying, “What we have done is kicked this can down the road. We are now at the end of the road and are not in a position to kick it any further," he said. "We have to signal seriousness in this by making sure some of the hard decisions are made under my watch, not someone else’s."

https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/obama-2008-we-re-going-have-take-entitlements-i-d-do-it-my-first-term

and they were right to push back against it and ensure it didn't happen. Frankly, Obama wasn't very smart when it came to maneuvering legislation through Congress. He thought pragmatic compromise would appeal to both sides and result in legislation that each could live with, seemingly oblivious to how polarizing he was as a political figure, and how dug in the opposition was on either side. This broader pattern of his is the bigger failure, not the minor points of some shit that came up in a meeting that didn't get passed.

xps

boggles my mind how seriously ppl - even here! - take debates, public statements etc. as windows into the soul of what a candidate or elected official "really believes in" or wants to accomplish. that shit does not matter. it's theater, it's designed to play to various factions or win votes or fit into a larger narrative. Like getting into a tizzy about the specifics of proposed plans during a campaign - none of those plans fucking matter! None of them are going to pass in their proposed form! What matters is that the candidate/elected official is held to delivering the desires of their constituency. And once their elected the only thing matters is policy and appointments.

maybe I'm alone in this idk. I feel like I approach politics way differently than many people. I don't need to have my ethical precepts (or personal delusions) reflected back at me by my elected officials.

on the one hand obv Obama was a terrible president who we all barely survived by the grace of our preferred deities. on the other hand how would you stack-rank actual nonimaginary US presidents, from least terrible to terriblest, from say 1970-present?

Yeah it’s crazy how people think Obama really wanted to cut Social Security just because he said he wanted to and then tried to and was only stopped by the ludicrous intransigence of the GOP, I mean how naive can you get?

xpost nah you’re not alone but esp in the bay area it sure can feel that way

To figure out what a candidate wants to achieve, you should first throw out everything they've ever said and every proposal they've actually put forth, then decide if they're worse than their opposition. If they're not, you should assume they implicitly believe and desire everything you believe and desire and everything will be fine.

to figure out what a candidate wants to achieve, you should look at what they've actually implemented to-date, and how well that tracked with what their constitutents wanted. that's it.

idgaf what my elected officials believe and desire because a) it's unknowable and b) it doesn't matter. how many of you would have looked into LBJ's soul in 1956 and seen the Civil Rights Act? Or Nixon and the Clean Air Act? Or Reagan negotiating to draw down the US nuclear arsenal? Or Pelosi bringing articles of impeachment?

and then tried to and was only stopped by the ludicrous intransigence of the GOP

jfc can you even read up a few posts to where Obama ran into opposition FROM THE LEFT IN CONGRESS, as he should've?

I hate the fucking internet.

he floated a trial balloon, people on both sides popped it, it didn't go anywhere. why does any of this matter.,

There's a difference between being an adult and mistrusting politicians, and thinking you're an adult by not committing to any position or politician because it gives you a high to say I-told-you-so a hundred times a week.

and then tried to and was only stopped by the ludicrous intransigence of the GOP

jfc can you even read up a few posts to where Obama ran into opposition FROM THE LEFT IN CONGRESS, as he should've?

I hate the fucking internet.

― Οὖτις, Thursday, December 5, 2019 2:31 PM (three minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

uh, but he could have passed the proposals with GOP support. despite the GOP saying the budget had to have chained CPI reform of social security and obama offering it they turned it down.

how would you stack-rank actual nonimaginary US presidents, from least terrible to terriblest, from say 1970-present?

there are ILX polls for this I think? or maybe those are just "best". I guess my personal ranking from least-terrible-to-most-terrible would go:

Obama
Carter
Clinton
Bush the Elder
Nixon
Reagan
Trump
Bush the Younger

altho those last two could flip depending on how bad things get in the next year

xps

Also, people, Barack and Michelle Obama are fine and living in languid splendor while his reputation continues to swell. Let's concentrate on 2020.

uh, but he could have passed the proposals with GOP support.

again, why do these hypotheticals matter. we can argue back and forth about how likely it would be for Obama to turn on/split his party in such a manner and what the ramifications would have been (they would have been v bad imo) but what's the point.

U.S. Presidents - Cold War and New Millennium Edition

those are good results, except for Dubya's placing which should def be lower/on the bottom imo

he floated a trial balloon

for five years

longest-running balloon not in the Macys parade

thinking you're an adult by not committing to any position or politician

OH, adult...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OU3rXvNnRr0

"again, why do these hypotheticals matter." - because they're a thing the guy who's still the face of the party and has enormous influence with actively tried to accomplish? The only reason it's not "what they've actually implemented to-date" is because the opposition was even more racist than he was craven.

Scritti Politti >> Ambitious Lovers

Obama wasn't craven -- he did exactly what he wanted to do, failing at some things for which he deserved censure and succeeding at others.

I think the "let's compromise with the other side by being reasonable adults" predates and circumscribes Obama - his approach to governance was a symptom of it, not the genesis.

The only reason it's not "what they've actually implemented to-date" is because the opposition was even more racist than he was craven.

but the lesson to be learned from that dynamic is not "our guy was BAD" it's that the opposition (as currently constituted) is not worth negotiating with.

xp

I mean, y'all are forgetting the role of, I don't know, race, and the weight of being the first black president.

Why are we talking about this?

Morbzbait

Right, if he had taken the stance that deficit scolds should fuck off and Social Security isn’t going to be touched (wasn’t this basically Al Gore’s position?) the acceptable parameters of economic policy in the Democratic Party might look different. And I’m not so idealistic that I can’t acknowledge the decent things he did and the constraints he was under, but it does affect my impression of him that he was happy to screw over millions of people for the sake of a bipartisan deal that would impress the David Brookses of the world.

jfc I keep forgetting I'm on a board with male white libs who continually forget how race works in this country

anyway

at this point I'll vote for Bernie or Warren in the CA primary, whichever one is ahead.

to bring it back to obama: if either of those candidates is ahead he will be coming out against them

but the lesson to be learned from that dynamic is not "our guy was BAD" it's that the opposition (as currently constituted) is not worth negotiating with.

Obama hasn’t learned that, though. Nor have any of the candidates he favors over Bernie and Warren this time.

if either of those candidates is ahead he will be coming out against them

lol no he won't, shall we place bets

if either of those candidates is ahead he will be coming out against them

lol no he won't, shall we place bets

― Οὖτις, Thursday, December 5, 2019 3:17 PM (forty-nine seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

california is a little early i suppose

Obama will stay out of the primary until the convention. I guess you guys are all privy to behind-the-scenes maneuvering that you seem to think matters, I don't particularly give a shit or believe anything that leaks to the press on that particular topic. He's not gonna publicly endorse Joe Biden or anything, that's fingers-on-the-scale/norms-violating stuff, and Obama - more than anything - is an institutionalist.

just Bernie is what Politico said xp

i have my doubts, the Dems will be slightly more subtle about it