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Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Barack Obama. Show all posts

Saturday, September 08, 2018

How hard can that be? Saying that Nazis are bad?

Remember back when we had an articulate and sane president? It's only been a couple of years but still it was nice to see 44 completely fucking own 45 in the speech below. Even better, he called out the Republicans with this corker of a line.

Got a lot of good Republican friends here in Illinois, but over the past few decades, the politics of division, resentment and paranoia has unfortunately found a home in the Republican Party.

Yep. Exactly. He went on...

This Congress has championed the unwinding of campaign finance laws to give billionaires outside influence over our politics, systematically attacked voting rights to make it harder for young people, and minorities and the poor to vote. Handed out tax cuts without regard to deficits. Slashed the safety net wherever it could, cast dozens of votes to take away health insurance from ordinary Americans, embraced wild conspiracy theories like those surrounding Benghazi. Or my birth certificate. Rejected science. Rejected facts on things like climate change. Embraced a rising absolutism from a willingness to default on America’s debt by not paying our bills, to a refusal to even meet, much less consider, a qualified nominee for the Supreme Court because he happened to be nominated by a Democratic president. 

None of this is conservative. I don’t mean to pretend I’m channeling Abraham Lincoln now, but that’s not what he had in mind, I think, when he helped form the Republican Party. It’s not conservative. It sure isn’t normal. It’s radical.

Double yep. Here is the best line of the whole speech.

How hard can that be? Saying that Nazis are bad?

The simple fact that Trump and his minions can't say this shows how far fucking gone they are.

Here is the full transcript of the speech.

Here is the video.


The score?

Obama 1,000,000, Trump/Republicans  0

Sunday, February 26, 2017

The Flippers

Take a look at these charts from NPR. They show the people that voted for Barack Obama in 2012 and then flipped to vote for Donald Trump in 2016. The contrast is staggering. How could this happen? At first glance, it appears confusing and beyond explanation. Obama and Trump are two vastly different people. I'd go as far to state that one is good and one is bad.

Yet they do have a common thread that they also share with Bush, Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan. The losers in past elections (Hillary Clinton, Mitt Romney, John McCain, John Kerry, Al Gore, Bob Dole and George HW Bush) also have something in common. It's pretty simple when you think about it. The winners all have a populist appeal and seem to care more about common folk. The losers come off as elitist and unsympathetic to your average Joe.

All either party has to do in each presidential election cycle is nominate someone that is populist and is down with regular people. That's it. It really has nothing to do with Ds or Rs.


Sunday, February 05, 2017

Saturday, January 07, 2017

Challenge Extended

President Obama has extended a challenge to Congressional Republicans. Come up with something better than the Affordable Care Act and he will publicly support it. I am extending that challenge as well to any of my readers. Post your plan in comments, show me examples of how this has worked more effectively in the past, and I will publicly admit that the ACA has been defeated by a better plan.

My bet is the GOP comes up with nothing and just repeals the ACA out of pure, adolescent spite.

Saturday, December 17, 2016

The President's Press Conference



A stunning press conference and, I have to say, one that really pissed me off. One of the president's biggest faults is to under react to situations. He sure did when he found out that Russia and Putin personally hacked the DNC and the RNC. You didn't want a scrum, Mr. President?

Well, life is messy...sorry to be the one to inform you...sheesh.

Saturday, August 20, 2016

Wednesday, August 17, 2016

Remember President Obama?

All this talk of Trump and Clinton has made most folks forget about our current president who is currently shaping up to be what Ronald Reagan was for the GOP-a legacy president who will be remembered as one of the best. Take a look at this, courtesy of 538.

JOB APPROVAL RATING
YEARPRESIDENT1 MONTH BEFORE ELECTIONFINAL
2000Bill Clinton57%66%
1960Dwight Eisenhower5860
2016Barack Obama53*
1988Ronald Reagan5163
1976Gerald Ford5053
1968Lyndon Johnson4349
1992George H.W. Bush3449
1980Jimmy Carter3434
1952Harry Truman3232
2008George W. Bush2529

Stunning. And this is with all the BS that the right threw at him for the past decade. Essentially what we have here is the recognition that the man deserves from people who live outside of the bubble...you know, in REALITY.


Friday, August 12, 2016

Obama is the Founder of...ISIL?

Like an adolescent who desperately needs attention, Donald Trump is now at the point where he will say pretty much anything to keep the media spotlight upon him. His latest statement, repeated over and over again yesterday, posits that Barack Hussein Obama is the founder of ISIL.

The BBC has a great piece up about the origin of ISIL. Skip past the Trump drivel for the solid and insightful reporting on who the real founders of ISIL are and how exactly they were allowed to flourish.

Friday, June 03, 2016

Great Answer!



I'm wondering why we have to continue to coddle gun rights supporters as if they were self entitled teenagers. We too easily give in to their nonsense and allow them to control the conversation. We should call them out for exactly what they are: paranoid liars who should find alternate ways to soothe their insecurity and inferiority...ways that don't cause the deaths of thousands US citizens every year.

Thursday, April 07, 2016

Saturday, March 12, 2016

Good Words From The President

"We’ve got a debate inside the other party that is fantasy and schoolyard taunts and selling stuff like it’s the Home Shopping Network," Obama said in a clear reference to Trump's Tuesday-night press conference, where he wheeled out products like Trump Steaks and Trump Water to prove his business bona fides. 

"How can you be shocked?" he asked. "This is the guy, remember, who was sure that I was born in Kenya. Who just wouldn’t let it go. And all this same Republican establishment, they weren’t saying nothing. As long as it was directed at me, they were fine with it. They thought it was a hoot. Wanted to get his endorsement. And then now, suddenly, we’re shocked that there’s gambling going on in this establishment." 

Sounds familiar...:)

Thursday, March 10, 2016

Three Year High

The president's approval rating has hit a three year high. Real Clear Politics has him at more approval than disapproval. That's good news for Hillary Clinton who seeks to continue the president's legacy.

Right around now is when Republicans will start to say that there were some good things that Barack Obama has done...:)

Monday, February 15, 2016

Our Diversity


"We need to reject any politics that targets people because of race or religion. This isn’t a matter of political correctness. It’s a matter of understanding what makes us strong. The world respects us not just for our arsenal; it respects us for our diversity and our openness and the way we respect every faith." 

(Barack Obama, State of the Union address (12 January 2016), Washington, D.C.)

Tuesday, January 05, 2016

Exactly Why I Voted For Him

I voted twice for Barack Obama for two basic reasons. The first reason was to fix problems that we already knew we had. He's certainly done some of that. Getting bin Laden and literally saving American lives by making health care available to everyone are two of the biggest accomplishments.

But I also voted for him because he'd work to fix the problems that we didn't know about yet. The main problem I have with conservatives is they are very limp when it comes to new problems, especially if it's domestic issues. A great example of this is the gun issue. When the president took office, guns weren't really a top priority. We didn't have mass shootings every week and violence was on a downward trend. We did have the ongoing issues of gang violence and suicides but guns aren't necessarily at the root of those problems.

Then came Aurora and Sandy Hook and everything changed after that.

It certainly did for me. The chief cause of Sandy Hook was the Gun Cult. Nancy Lanza bought into their bullshit, armed herself to the teeth, and, like most "responsible" gun owners, allowed someone access to guns that should not have had them. As a result, first graders were shot in the face. Nothing was done to change our insanely loose gun laws and look what has happened since. Can anyone really remember all the mass shootings? I can't because they happen all the fucking time now.

Today, the president issued executive orders that are going to expand universal background checks and allow doctors to report some mentally ill patients to the FBI to prevent them from getting guns. His speech was extraordinary and made me proud to be an American and have this man stand up for what is right. Here is an excerpt.



President Obama, tearing up about the Sandy Hook shooting: "Every time I think about those kids, it gets me mad." http://cnb.cx/1UtHVET
Posted by CNBC on Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Monday, January 04, 2016

Military Man


Thursday, December 31, 2015

Best Political Moment of 2015

Looking back on this year, I suppose I could note the various accomplishments that the president helped to achieve (Iran, final legality of the ACA, gay marriage legal in all states, ISIL long term strategy drives group out of Ramadi... among others).

Honestly, though, the best political moment of this year was all thanks to Donald Trump. He has singlehandedly laid bare the neo-fascist, ultra-nationalism that permeates a substantial portion of the conservative base. There can be no more denials of racism when the leading candidate for the GOP (now five months running) calls for no Muslims to be allowed in the country AND THE PEOPLE CHEER.

If you want to know how totalitarians take over a country, this is it. They use anger, hate and fear as a fuel to drive nationalism and pick a scapegoat. With the Nazis, it was the Jews. With the Soviets, it was capitalists. With the Italian fascists, it was socialists. With the Japanese, it was the imperialists...even though they themselves were imperialists.

It's this last example that makes me crack up the most. The conservative base bemoans state control and authoritarianism. Yet, that is EXACTLY what they want. They want a return to the aristocracy of the Antebellum South where the non whites remained at their lower station. Donald Trump is their perfect king, even using the word "reign" instead of presidency.

He is their hero and the Best Political Moment of 2015.


Sunday, December 20, 2015

Old Dixie Hwy. renamed for President Obama



I'd say this is a metaphor for about eight zillion things...:)

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Good Words

What I didn’t fully appreciate, and nobody can appreciate until they’re in the position, is how decentralized power is in this system. When you’re in the seat and you’re seeing the housing market collapse and you are seeing unemployment skyrocketing and you have a sense of what the right thing to do is, then you realize, "Okay, not only do I have to persuade my own party, not only do I have to prevent the other party from blocking what the right thing to do is, but now I can anticipate this lawsuit, this lobbying taking place, and this federal agency that technically is independent, so I can’t tell them what to do. 

I’ve got the Federal Reserve, and I’m hoping that they do the right thing—and by the way, since the economy now is global, I’ve got to make sure that the Europeans, the Asians, the Chinese, everybody is on board." A lot of the work is not just identifying the right policy but now constantly building these ever shifting coalitions to be able to actually implement and execute and get it done.

---Barack Obama, November 17, 2015

Wednesday, November 04, 2015