No, it's been repeatedly and literally claimed that "Obama is not a liberal", and the evidence for this has been his supposed conservativism.
Of course, we're using "conservative" to mean a "tax cuts for the rich, militaristic foreign policy, pro-big business" agenda, as the word is generally understood to be defined in the context of modern American politics. But, if you mean "conservative" in the sense of "generally opposed to intervention or change", which is kind of what we agreed Chomsky meant by it, then my argument still stands - Obama could be (and is) as liberal as any of you want, and still his administration could only produce fundamentally conservative policy, because of fundamental constraints on the power of the Presidency.
I suppose when juxtaposing Obama with Dennis Kucinich, he probably looks like Hitler. But really isn't it a debate on semantics to some degree?
I could say that Bush Jr. really wasn't conservative on the basis that his Big Government approach is counter-intuitive to ideals traditionally embodied by conservatives. But even that fails for the simple fact that Republicans ARE all about Big Government -- they're just really selective on what parts of the government they want BIG (Border Wars, military industrial complex, Drug war, etc).
The Tea Party movement was essentially hijacked by the so-called limited government folk, but when push comes to shove they are nothing like it. (I should know, I once was a Big Government Republican). Thankfully I've seen the error of my ways.
All I know is that Obama is not "change we can believe in," he's the status quo repackaged. And that's not to undermine the good things I think he has done, and it certainly doesn't overlook the fact that he inherited a huge portion of the problems. That's lost on me.
Is Obama a liberal or a conservative or a moderate? He's a Progressive with moderate tendencies. I think that is the most accurate one is going to get. He's certainly not a classical liberal (few, if any, Democrats are).
"Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it" -- Thomas Paine
I respectfully disagree. Repealing DADT wasn't the status quo.
Like I said, I don't want to overlook the good things he has done, such as the repeal of DADT and ending the war in Iraq. Those are two milestones worth mentioning. What I mean is he spends like every other American president, and even worse. He's placed the country in more recession than any other president in history -- an unprecedented and obscene amount.
As if Bush wasn't bad enough, he's spent 3 times as much, in the middle of one of the worst recessions in American history.
Whether his health care bill was a good or bad thing is not even up for debate at this point. I'd like to point to the timing of it. That was just about the worst time to go off and splurge like a teenager with a credit card. Without a strong economy no country can take care of its citizens. The economy is priority number 1.
Dronester and Rrhain believe - genuinely believe - that Obama believes in the rights of insurance companies to exploit the sick, the right of the government to kill and torture literally anybody it wants to for fun, and the right of powerful interests to exploit the powerless with no recourse. You clearly don't. I, too, am hoping to have a discussion more on the terms of our axis of disagreement as opposed to Dronester's, because (and I never thought I would say this to Nemesis Juggernaut!) you're far more reasonable than either of them.
I would prefer being realistic on matters. I highly doubt that Obama is intentionally sabotaging things to destroy the country. That's silly.
I'd genuinely like to explore your contention that Obama is genuinely a status quo kind of guy.
He campaigned on the platitude that he was all about change, but it's the same shit we've seen.
Stimulus package of $787 Billion. Right, because that worked so well to stimulate the economy when Bush tried it. I mean, why not just pile the money in a heap and set it on fire. It's about as effective.
Still taking cues from Bush's failures, Obama signs on with TARP and bails-out companies.
Obama has a huge list of czars, some of which are every bit as threatening to free speech and freedom of expression and privacy than the Patriot Act (Let me know if you want a list of these clowns and their stated goals. Pretty scary stuff).
Remember the problem he had with the Patriot Act? He didn't get rid of it, he just revised it marginally. Things like extraordinary rendition are still in place.
Continues the War in Afghanistan. What's the goal? At what point do you win, and at what point do you lose? How do you even win?
Most of this is simply an extension of Bush's policies repackaged. That's the funny things about bickering between Dems and Reps... They're flipsides of the same coin.
I see nothing worthy of change that is beyond the status quo. Presidents like Kucinich or Paul would be a shift large enough to get away from the status quo. Everyone else are power-hungry, career politicians first, citizens second.
Obama's approval rating among Democrats is even worse than Bush's approval ratings for Republicans.
I cannot wait for election time. Obama was not the hero riding in on a horse. He's propped up by his rhetoric, but his words are beginning to condemn him
Edited by Hyroglyphx, : No reason given.
Edited by Hyroglyphx, : No reason given.
"Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it" -- Thomas Paine
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