What if President Obama is right?

What if he delivers health care reform (spending), climate change (spending) and jobs/economic recovery (spending), and reduces the deficit?

Some people have devoted considerable energy to the notion that President Obama is wrong, but what if he's right?

HCR has been gutted, and he's freezing discretionary spending.

The President is proposing a small targeted freeze in some areas.

"HCR has been gutted, and he's freezing discretionary spending"

What?

Washington (CNN) -- President Obama will announce in Wednesday's State of the Union address that he's proposing to save $250 billion by freezing all nonsecurity federal discretionary spending for three years, according to two senior administration officials.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/01/25/obama.spending.freeze/index.html?hpt=T1

That "small targeted freeze" is just all of the discretionary spending.

Discretionary spending, when you have already promised not to freeze military spending, or veterans affairs spending (a good thing) or spending in several other areas, basically means freezing spending on social investment programs, emergency assistance, housing programs - basically anything that benefits the poor.

Since "they don't vote" anyway, they are an easy target.

The remaining programs you can "freeze" in discretionary spending, after all the things the administration says it will not freeze are primarily dominated by social welfare funding.

Public Housing and housing assistance in all its forms. Community Development Block Grants which fund and support a huge array of community social services, housing programs, food support, energy and rental assistance, adult educational programs (money management, working training, and so on) one time debt assistance and a host of other state and local programs and state and local agencies that depend on discretionary funding to survive. Non-mandatory education and early-education programs. And on and on.

After you remove all of the things the administation says they won't touch, the bulk of what's left is funding for social welfare services that poor people desperately need.

:rofl:

You hit the nail on the head there. There is no way that he's going to make the reich wing like him, no matter what he does.

This is worthy of a lifetime achievement award.

:rofl:

So many have already thrown in the towel. He didn't change the world enough, fast enough.


:sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm:

I am one of the do something croud, but we are not a large croud.

do something for Pete's sake, and do it now. We've been too long fiddling around with Health Care, we've got to pass something, right now. And if Obama can cut spending on something like Abstinence Only, for instance, or farm subsidies under which huge factory farms get the biggest boost, good for him and his economic team. We've then got to watch Congress who will see a cut in something effecting his or her state to make sure he or she doesn't put the spending right back in.

The budget breaking stuff will always be jammed in when Congress gets hold of the bill.

:eyes:

Of course nothing has even officially been said, and what might happen is unknown, and it might even be a good thing.

Go figure.

:rofl:

and so true.

.... read "The Audacity of Hope" pages 187-189.

No one should be surprised.

Easy peasy.

In the long run, spending now on all three is an investment in the future.

I'm still on a "wait and see" regarding the HCR, but I'm not optimistic. This sudden spending freeze has me very concerned because the timing seems more politically motivated than anything else. Would they be doing this if Brown lost in MA?

It's not a guess that makes us opposed to this administration's policy positions. It's disagreement with the direction (not the "speed") of such policies.

To those who oppose the policy direction of this administration and democratic national political leaders, the only way for this administration to be "right" it to change its policy direction.

Pretty simple.

In the opinion of me and my friends that stand together in solidarity, this administration can't turn out to be "right" until it changes direction and chooses to priorities the needs of poor and working class individuals and families ahead of the wants and whims of the financial elite.

Prioritizing the needs of poor and working class individuals and families necessarily means confronting head on the structural injustices intrinsic to our political and economic system.

Here's what that change in direction might look like:



Was that some piece of "ridiculous nonsense" written by some "FireDogLake idiot?"

No, it was FDR at the Democratic National Convention of 1936 (never in my life time have I heard any Democrat have the courage to speak such bold truth about the failures of the very structure of our economic system - instead they obfuscate, rationalize, compromises and cower)

n/t

The question is exactly as posed: What if Obama is right (meaning his agenda and direction)?

We've all see the criticism of policies, but what if Obama is right?

"this administration can't turn out to be 'right' until it changes direction "

So your conclusion is that he's wrong because he's wrong? What if he isn't?

It's no more meaningful than asking, what if conservative republicans turn out to be "right?" What will you do?

If you believe that the needs of ordinary families must be prioritized ahead of the whims of the financial elite, then conservative republicans - by definition - cannot be "right" - because the very definition of republican conservatism is based on something I believe to be both wrong and unjust.

In order to answer a question about "right" we'd have to agree on what "turning out to be right" means. The only way this administration could "turn out to be right" in my book would be to change policy directions radically. There's no other conditions in which it would be literally possible for the administration to "be right." The economy will likely turn around eventually. These two war will likely end eventually. Is that the definition of "turned out to be right?"

To me "right" means addressing structural injustices embedded at the heart of our political economic system. Any politician failing to address these structural failures cannot "turn out to be right" by definition.

But I'm not supporting a 3-year freeze and a piecemeal, suckier approach to healthcare than even the Senate Bill, to help him deliver promises.

They are obviously deciding I've got nowhere as a voter to go (and that is undoubtedly true).

But one place I may not go is to spend a cold day in November in Reno, Nevada as I did in 2008.

So he MUST be wrong! Let's pile on the one person who is busting his ass to fix the crap the Republicans dumped on us for 8 years (and longer). I'm disgusted with liberals right now. We don't need to go right, but we sure as hell aren't going to win tipping the boat all the way to the left.

or you don't belong. You must resort to ridicule or you're not kewl.

Poet!


:rofl:

little victims were anything but sad.

"but we sure as hell aren't going to win tipping the boat all the way to the left. "

How would you know?

Oh, I keep for getting you and I have a very different definition of "winning."

better for it..it's suffered horribly under bushcheney and with President Obama we immediately started dealing in reality and correcting it.

I don't care what the whining chorus of internetools have to say anymore.

It's "click your heels three times"

Game over. We're all going through the grinder. We are Soylent Green.

Remotely possible, but highly unlikely...and listening to him would probably not end well.

The country has a lot of needs that require spending, but we've got to get the deficit down as well. The President has to be able to multitask and Obama is capable of doing it.

What if I won the power ball? What if I really do get a pony?

trust me.