...in the media's
ability to hold people accountable. Wow, what a
difference four years makes.
Four years ago
I wrote this entry with hope for a functioning
government. I was so impressed with how Obama ran
his campaign I believed we could actually have an
efficient government working for us.
And then "You
Lie!"
And then
obstructionist fillibustering breaking every
congressional record on the books.
And then "The
Continuing Birthers" leading to the most embarrassing day
in this country in my lifetime: A president having to
call a press conference to release a different
form of his fucking birth certificate so he could move
about his business (which happened to be killing Bin
Laden that weekend).
All the while a media
intent on "balancing the sides" so they didn't look
biased.
<throws
hands up>
However, what he
accomplished legislatively in the first two years is
staggering. And the areas where he had complete control?
His competence has been staggering and inspirational...
if only because of the juxtaposition to Bush. Foreign
policy decisions have been spot-on. He did end the war in
Iraq, he is ending the war in Afghanistan and he did kill
Bin Laden. And honestly? I have no issue with
drones. Yup, I said it. Do people not realize that
when MANNED aircrafts bomb they kill innocent
civilians too? In the game of war, saving
AMERICAN LIVES is first. That's why war is
fucking atrocious. That's why it's a last resort. It's
bloody and messy. Drones save American Lives. Don't like
it? DON'T GO TO WAR.
His response to
Hurricane Irene was exactly what it should be as was
Sandy (though Christie is a self-serving prick and blew
Obama specifically to further himself at the behest of
Romney). As was his response to the Gulf spill and Haiti.
I mean honestly? These are the easy things. No
president other than Bush in the past 100 years have ever
had an issue with this. It's honestly as if
Neo-Conservatives were TRYING to make the federal
goverment look incompetent so it would be easier to do
away with their services in years to come.
How's THAT for a
conspiracy theory huh? But why the hell else would Romney
talk about getting rid of FEMA?
GETTING RID OF FEMA?
For fuck's sake -and this man has half of the electorate?
And that's where the actual "Utterly Disappointed" part
comes in...
I was in a political
Facebook thread (I know, when will I learn) and
while others were speaking of the economy and what a
horrible job the president has done I brought up what he
walked into, obviously. A reply? "It's not like the
economy was rolling downhill when he came into
office."
(sigh)
Except that by every,
possible, metric - of COURSE it was. This isn't an
opinion or up for debate. The recession started in
December 2007 and then the economy crashed
ON TOP OF THAT in late September 2008. We
were staring at a depression of epic proportions. The
actions the administration took had historical
precedence, so I can barely give him credit for it! But
they did work. Every single person should be proud
of this picture:
That's not partisan,
those are the numbers. And since? Nearly 5 million jobs
gained in the last 3 years.
And I'll be honest,
Bush isn't really even to blame for what happened in the
September '08, 30 years of policy lead to that... but it
did happen. And when that stimulus went in, each
month, we lost less and less jobs until finally a year
later our head was above water. It was a MASSIVE CRASH.
And the unemployment rate hit 10.2% at the end of the
graph. Duh, we were still LOSING jobs. To say that
10.2% was Obama's fault is just ignorant. The stimulus
wasn't even BALLSY. It was what every single economist
and every single president would've done. You know, like
BUSH DID in 2001. It was the responsible thing
to do and it saved our asses.
And as has
always been the case, as the economy recovers,
jobs come last. So we "technically" ended the recession
in June 2009, our unemployment rate peaked in October
2009 and has come down slowly ever since. That's just our
starting point for debate. But you show this to a
Republican?
THEY DON'T BELIEVE THE BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS.
I mean, what the
fuck do you do then? What's 2+2?
JELLO.
Ok. Good day,
sir.
@!!?!?!?!
And why don't people
believe the stats? Because the media doesn't hold anyone
accountable to facts. Facts AREN'T PARTISAN, but to
our media? If it makes one side look bad? Better not
bring it up. Oh but they'll bring up the deficit! They'll
bring up the debt!
The budget deficit
for 2009 was over 1 TRILLION DOLLARS before Obama took
office. Do you understand what that means? That means we
would be adding 1 TRILLION DOLLARS to the debt every
year, no matter what. The bulk of the budget deficit are
the two wars, the two tax cuts and the medicare drug
plan. All things that take YEARS to correct. Which
again means, no matter who was president they were stuck
with those budget deficits. So my barometer for a good
president in that situation? What would the other guy
have done? What would McCain have done? How would he have
stopped those tax cuts and wars?
HE WOULDN'T HAVE. He would've privatized social
security and medicare to PAY for those tax cuts. The
Republicans have literally set-up a scenario of
bankrupting us to the point of taking all safety nets out
of the federal government simply to pay our bills. It's
like two parents running credit card bills up to $100,000
and paying for it with the kid's college fund. Rather
than GETTING ANOTHER JOB and
STOPPING THE EXTRA SPENDING. It's madness.
It isn't conservative and no one seems to get it except
the party that is SUPPOSED TO BE LIBERAL?
You now have Democrats sounding like fiscal
conservatives! Are we in a mid 1800s paradigm shift in
our party system? Would the people even know? No they're
too busy listening to Fox News point out how bad our
economy is now even though it's improving.
?!?!?
WHY THE HELL AREN'T WE ROOTING for
our own economy? Are Republicans so in love with their
idea that tax cuts are better than stimulus spending in a
depression that they can't just let it fucking GO for a
minute? Believe me, the electorate will forget the finer
details and you'll get re-elected down the road with the
"cut the taxes" bullshit. For fuck's sake. Your side
LOST. The stimulus WORKED. Trickle Down Economics
HAVEN'T WORKED. As a conservative that wants
desperately to get to streamlining our government,
PLEASE: Move, the FUCK, ON.
But honestly?
Why should they? Without accountability what's the
point? If they let you lie? If they continue to interview
you under false pretenses? Why should they be honest? I
mean these fuckin' guys are fillibustering
THEIR OWN BILLS that THEY CO-WROTE just so
nothing looks positive for Obama. Come ONNNNNNNNNN.
Keeping them honest Andersen? How do you ever let anyone
ever act like the stimulus didn't work on your show. Why
do you keep their mic on? What would Conkrite do,
brother? He would politley tell the idiot to go fuck
himself. No history book on the planet is going to say
the stimulus didn't work or attribute the 10%
unemployment rate to ANYTHING Obama did. It would be
an insult to HISTORY BOOKS. People don't even blame
Bush for the 2001 recession and it happened
ENTIRELY IN HIS TERM. And why don't they?
Because you'd have to be a fuckin moron to do that. He
had been in office 2 goddamned months.
Sorry, I'm just so
tired of stupid people. I'm just so disappointed with the
media and so tired of people rooting for politics like a
goddamn football game.
So where was I. The
election. This god-awful election cycle where I have
lost faith in this country in an unbelievable way.
FUCK our media. The people you serve
NEEDED YOU to keep the FACTS in the spotlight.
They needed you to hold people accountable. They failed
us with Iraq and they have failed us on the economy. And
they have failed us with the entire Obama administration
simply because the other side bitched and moaned because
they LIKED OUR PRESIDENT. For FUCK'S SAKE.
It's our goddamn elected leader. BY 200
ELECTORAL VOTES for fuck's sake. Man,
I have to stop saying fuck.
Breathe.
This is why Jon
Stewart is the best news source. Because he holds the
ridiculous accountable. And yes, sometimes it's Obama.
But most of the time it isn't. Is that because he's
partisan? No, it's because one side is more ridiculous
than the other. Though his bullshit "false
equivalency" rallies made me nuts a couple years
ago. He's still the smartest guy in the room
unfortunately.
We should all be
proud of the last 4 years. We should be proud we ended
the disaster that was Iraq. We should be proud of how the
HURRICANES have been dealt with. And can I say
something about global warming please?
I don't know if
climate change was to blame for Hurricane Sandy, but
I do know this: THERE WAS A
MOTHERFUCKING HURRICANE in
NEW YORK CITY that caused a BLIZZARD in
WEST VIRGINIA.
Ahem. Moving
on.
We should be proud
that we got through the recession and all economic
indicators are pointing positive (no matter how slow). We
should be proud that we have a starting point for health
care in this country after a century of trying to do
something. You want to be proud of our president and
understand what civil discourse looks like? Watch the
most impressive video I have ever witnessed when it
comes to our democracy and how it can
function...
...but you know what?
You won't. Because it's 90 minutes long. It's Obama
talking TO the Republicans and explaining to them that if
they continue to paint his centrist policies as radical,
it will make it impossible for them to govern. It's from
the end of January, 2010 and it is the most riveting
piece of political history that I've ever seen. It will
never happen again.
If that doesn't make
you proud of our president and even some of our
congressman (hell even Paul Ryan seemed respectful in
that), then you haven't the slightest idea the
rareness of Obama. Imagine Bush standing there.
Imagine Romney. Seriously, imagine Romney having that
Q&A session. Obama is the essence of leadership, and
that video proves it. And about .00000005% of the country
will ever watch that entire thing because their attention
span is horrendous.
Now should we be
angry about NDAA? I think so. Though I honestly
don't know what the hell you do when you come in AFTER
NDAA is signed and need to choose to sign it again.
I honestly don't know. Which is why we bitched so loudly
about the civil rights atrocities of the Bush
Administration. 'Cause once they're in?
HOW DO YOU GET RID OF THEM
without putting our country at risk? If you can tell me
how I'm happy to get on the anti-Obama bandwagon when it
comes to NDAA. As of right now? The only things that have
pissed me off in the 4 years he's been in office is the
Christmas Day Bomber
(WHO WAS ON OUR LISTS BUT STILL GOT ON THE PLANE)
and this crackdown on State run medical marijuana
dispenseries. You're gonna lose Colorado because of that
one Barry. What the fuck? I assume it was some
"Agreement" with big Pharma to get the helath care
law passed but I have no idea obviously. Anyway...
that's about it. He's a great president. He's done some
big things. He has gone through unbelievable shit that no
sitting president has had to deal with. I mean, we
hated Bush for WHAT HE HAD DONE. They hate
Obama for what they THINK he did. Huh? Socialist?
Any idea how offensive calling Barack Obama a Socialist
is... to an actual Socialist? It'd be like calling CeBe a
CAT. SHE ISN'T A CAT.
Grrr.
And this election?
There isn't a choice. There isn't a debate, and anyone
who thinks there is has about 5 years of brainwashing to
remove and doesn't actually know that. Nor do they care
because the BUCKEYES ARE 10-0.
GODDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD.
Sorry. Seriously I
just... am so done with this shit. I am however,
proud as hell of Obama's first term and how much he was
able to pull off even with The Fillibusters. Should be a
name of a band. But in 2014, our electorate won't kick
out the obstructionists. It'll be the same bullshit. You
know, because compromise is so awful. That thing that
EACH AND EVERY ONE OF US DOES IN OUR DAY-TO-DAY
LIVES. Heaven forbid those fucking senators do
it.
GODD. Why am
I this angry? I'm actually not. I'm sitting here
sighing while I type, barely a stress in my
shoulders eating cookies. It's actually just exhaustion
at how obvious what I'm writing is and how HORRIBLE our
media is at HELPING the discourse. That's what
I want. We at least need someone to moderate the
FACTS (Thank you Candy Crowley). Someone to stop the lies
(not the spin, let 'em spin to their heart's content) and
move the conversation FORWARD. Not "Obama" forward,
SOCIETY forward.
Different from 2008,
I have Obama losing Indiana, North Carolina,
Colorado and Florida ending up with a 294-244 win.
However? I think he could lose Virginia and New Hampshire
pushing that to 277-261 very easily, but he's not losing
Ohio and he's not losing Pennsylvania. And hell, even
Florida might flip in his favor... it really is all over
the place. But after 6 straight months of the 538 blog,
and a belief in the poll averages because they're
uncannily acruate... I have an identical map to Nate
Silver's except for Colorado. I think he's
underestimating how big the marijuana issue is. I think
the national will be 51%-48% Obama and I will say
the following as one sign of hope. Sigh...
If the Republicans
continue the obstructionist bullshit for the entirety of
the next term? Clinton will win 400+ EVs against Rubio in
2016. And then at some point I have to believe
sanity takes over and we go back to electing moderates.
We get back to the old debates about liberal vs.
conservative. You know, the ones where I can
actually be conservative again? 'Cause the shit happening
now is so off the right/left scale we're all aliens. And
that's what kills me, 50% of this country is NOT in line
with today's Republican party. They just don't know it
shifted. If the people voting for Romney actually
understood what has happened to the Republican Party in
the last 20 years and what they are actually standing
for? They would be mortified. Obama has been a
center-right president in his first term and will most
likely be a center-left president in his second term.
I expect to continue being proud of him and his
attempts at piecing together a better union. I look
forward to the end of Afghanistan, the implementation of
Obamacare and at least one legitimate scandal. You know
it has to happen (and it sure isn't Benghazi, jesus
christ Republicans - our embassies got attacked so many
goddamn times under Bush - what the fuck already). Here's
hopin' the scandal is Biden. 'Cause I don't want to
see Obama the day after Michelle gets done with him if
it's him.
