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What grade would you give O for his first term?

Obama's first term grade

  • Total voters
    99
  • Poll closed .
Milhouse said:
hard, but not impossible. a good leader would have found a way.
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I completely disagree with this. Regardless of leadership quality/ability I don't know of anyone of political persuasion who would have been able to level with the far right who isn't a member of the Republican Party. Hell they're mad at the moderate contingency of their own party, they're furious at Democrats.
 
RJKarl said:
Had the GOP in the House cared about America, we'd have under 8% unemployment and an improving infrastructure.
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I thought the Stimulus was going to do that for us?
 
Wakeforest22890 said:
I completely disagree with this. Regardless of leadership quality/ability I don't know of anyone of political persuasion who would have been able to level with the far right who isn't a member of the Republican Party. Hell they're mad at the moderate contingency of their own party, they're furious at Democrats.
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He campaigned as a center left guy, echoing Kennedy and Reagan. Then he gets into office and rams through a pork filled Stimulus and the ridiculous Obamacare, what do you expect the R's to do?
 
Wakeforest22890 said:
I completely disagree with this. Regardless of leadership quality/ability I don't know of anyone of political persuasion who would have been able to level with the far right who isn't a member of the Republican Party. Hell they're mad at the moderate contingency of their own party, they're furious at Democrats.
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um, hate to break it to you, but people who lead (in politics, business, schools, life, whatever) are able to convince people who disagree and intensely dislike them to do what the leader wants. that's the point. it's easy to get people who agree with you to do what you want.
 
The problem is that you can only grade him in relation to his opponent. That's the idiocy of Romney's campaign strategy front-and-center.
 
Go said:
He campaigned as a center left guy, echoing Kennedy and Reagan. Then he gets into office and rams through a pork filled Stimulus and the ridiculous Obamacare, what do you expect the R's to do?
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1. What is pork?

2. Why is Obamacare ridiculous? 2a. Was it less ridiculous when Mitt Romney did it?
 
Strickland33 said:
1. What is pork?

2. Why is Obamacare ridiculous? 2a. Was it less ridiculous when Mitt Romney did it?
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i think universal healthcare is coming, and i think it's probably a good idea.

but it's easy to make the argument that "universal healthcare" when talking about a tiny state is a lot different than "universal healthcare" when talking about a nation of 300 million people.
 
Strickland33 said:
2. Why is Obamacare ridiculous? 2a. Was it less ridiculous when Mitt Romney did it?
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Not comparable IMO. One is at the State level, one is National. A lot of it depends on how you view the responsibilities and sharing of power between States and the Fed. I support more liberal policies at the State and Local level than I do at the Federal level.
 
Go said:
He campaigned as a center left guy, echoing Kennedy and Reagan. Then he gets into office and rams through a pork filled Stimulus and the ridiculous Obamacare, what do you expect the R's to do?
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1/3 of the stimulus was tax cuts. that money would have been better spent for more infrastructure needs to aid to states and local governments.

Sorry he didn't send out $600 checks like the most recent GOP stimulus initiative.
 
Gipper Deac said:
Is their a grade lower than F? I mean the dude is a reverse racist with his good reverend wright best friend and a socialist. the guy is destroying the america my grandad fought for

Nobama 2012!!!!!
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yeah.. He is racist considering he was raised by a white woman!
How is America being destroyed?!?
Ohhhh ....Obama pushed thru a HC plan that was originated from Bob Dole
Foreign policy is the best it has been since Clinton
750,000 jobs lost every month has stopped
We are out of Iraq
Bin Laden is dead.
I hear this shit all the time from the Right Wing nut jobs but no facts just...he is socialist!!!
 
There's really no sense in arguing with people over whether or not anyone would have been able to break the Republican tactics in Congress.

I'd love to take suggestions on how Obama should handle it. The business analogy fails because the bottom line of most businesses is to make a profit and compromising makes sense in that regard. The goal of most Congressmen is to get re-elected and keep making money in this regard. There's no reason to compromise when the reason you were elected in the first place was to be a thorn in the Democrats' side.
 
Wakeforest22890 said:
There's really no sense in arguing with people over whether or not anyone would have been able to break the Republican tactics in Congress.

I'd love to take suggestions on how Obama should handle it. The business analogy fails because the bottom line of most businesses is to make a profit and compromising makes sense in that regard. The goal of most Congressmen is to get re-elected and keep making money in this regard. There's no reason to compromise when the reason you were elected in the first place was to be a thorn in the Democrats' side.
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Not push through shitty ideas would be a start. It's not like Congressmen in the past didn't have the primary objective of getting re-elected, but somehow they found a way to get things done through negotiation. This guy led off his presidency with the Stimulus, Cash for Clunkers, Chrysler & GM bailouts, and Obamacare. That's going 0 for 5 and then asking people to consider his future ideas. Wasn't going to happen, and the public told him in 2010 that it wasn't going to happen. Ramming through bullshit that nobody wanted and then crying "but now nobody won't work with me" is a bitch move.
 
2&2 Slider To Leyritz said:
Not push through shitty ideas would be a start. It's not like Congressmen in the past didn't have the primary objective of getting re-elected, but somehow they found a way to get things done through negotiation. This guy led off his presidency with the Stimulus, Cash for Clunkers, Chrysler & GM bailouts, and Obamacare. That's going 0 for 5 and then asking people to consider his future ideas. Wasn't going to happen, and the public told him in 2010 that it wasn't going to happen. Ramming through bullshit that nobody wanted and then crying "but now nobody won't work with me" is a bitch move.
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You mean shitty ideas like ones passed by the Senate but the "Hate Obama First" House keep from happening?

50% of GOP Senators voted for the roads bill last year.

Over 50% of GOP Senators voted for the Farm Bill.

On two major bills, the GOP House showed they hated Obama more than they love America.
 
Milhouse said:
um, hate to break it to you, but people who lead (in politics, business, schools, life, whatever) are able to convince people who disagree and intensely dislike them to do what the leader wants. that's the point. it's easy to get people who agree with you to do what you want.
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I agree with this to a certain degree, but circumstances certainly influence outcomes. We have this image in America of the great leader, the father, who can come into the room and sway opinions and make deals and, well, lead. But they have to forge a relationship across the isle with another influential leader in the other party, at least one, who can then influence his party and get the legislation passed. Obama has not been able to do this, as of yet. John Bohner is the most logical and most able (Mitch McConnell made himself perfectly clear, he was not going to be that leader), but Bohner is hamstrung by the numbers - he has 40 or so hardliners in the party that he cannot whip towards the center on anything. His party is divided, as someone just pointed out. He can't get the votes to get anything done with Obama. Obama has cachet, he is immensely popular, and I think Boehner was genuine in his desire to solve problems, but Congress is hamstrung by the far right and we get gridlock.

I'm not sure how you strike that against Obama's leadership abilities. The GOP of 15 years ago would make Obama look like Churchill in terms of leadership qualities.
 
Last edited:
what did people want in place of the stimulus? something obviously needed to be done to put some money into the economy since the private sector was still reeling. all 8% unemployment predictions aside, it did provide for a temporary bump in the GDP and helped keep people working. unfortunately once the recession ended the growth was/has been pretty weak so it hasn't replaced (or exceeded) the temporary bump that the influx of government spending provided.
 
I think people would have been happy with some visible results from the Stimulus. We supposedly spent $900 billion on new roads and bridges, yet nobody seems to know where they are. If we were just going to give away $900 billion with no tangible results, it would have been a helluva lot easier to just send people checks.
 
DeacHawk said:
what did people want in place of the stimulus? something obviously needed to be done to put some money into the economy since the private sector was still reeling. all 8% unemployment predictions aside, it did provide for a temporary bump in the GDP and helped keep people working. unfortunately once the recession ended the growth was/has been pretty weak so it hasn't replaced (or exceeded) the temporary bump that the influx of government spending provided.
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good post. The opposition to the stimulus has never really articulated an alternative. Do nothing? A different stimulus, perhaps, that focused more on infrastructure? Rebuilding infrastructure is never talked about from the right, at least not that I have heard, so Im not sure what they wanted? I guess it was slash taxes and spending, but that would have had a worse effect.
 
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