At last: America's wealthy will have a voice in the Obama White House

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/obama-pushing-behind-scenes-to-win-over-big-dollar-donors/2011/06/24/AGO5NGoH_story.html">Obama pushing behind scenes to win over big-dollar donors



I, for one, think that Obama has done a disservice by being so overwhelmingly biased towards the plight of working Americans. I hope that there's still time for him to re-engage with the wealthy, and help them to understand that they're not being neglected. It's the Serious Adult thing to do.

He's also the one who cherry picked the Emanuel statement that some love so much. Looks like he hit paydirt again.

or misleading?

OP that is false or misleading.

Thanks in advance.

Figure it out. No more kicking this subthread.

The West Wing charm offensive shows how Obama’s White House, which has eschewed Clinton-style traditions of feeding donor egos with Lincoln bedroom overnights and frequent phone calls from the president, is adjusting itself for a campaign that needs to overcome low approval ratings and a sour economy. >>

Low approval ratings? Nope. Sour economy? Yep and 61% think it's dubya's fault.

from small donors than he had at this point in his last campaign.

There's no way for him to win unless he raises a lot of money, unfortunately.

The very first president, George Washington was immensely wealthy landowner, as was Thomas Jefferson.

WTF has being wealthy have to do with anything? If I was a billionaire, I'd fork over $80M to match what the Koch Brothers have pledged to spend on defeating Pres. Obama.

Both Roosevelts were fierce advocates of working Americans, using their bully pulpit and twisting arms at every turn to help the 99%. I don't recall either of them selling access to the White House.

In any case, I updated my subject line to be more precise.

<< I don't recall either of them selling access to the White House. >>

My, the hyperbole! As if donors have never had "access to top West Wing officials" before! And "a possible food tasting with the White House chef"??!
How truly horrifying. :sarcasm:

Pssst! It's not as President Obama is selling nights in the Lincoln Bedroom. And how would you know what FDR did in those days behind the scenes? The press protected him and Eleanor. Were you his political confidant?

Reference please?

Thanks.

He was timid and caved to Republican pressure.

Also, "great presidents" aren't racists who put Americans of a certain ethnicity into concentration, er, I mean "internment" camps without a trial. FDR was the racial profiler to end all racial profiling.

Why don't you point out the specific language in Wikipedia that supports your claim, lest the casual reader think that you're just making stuff up.

Either link to something that demonstrates that "FDR's original SS plans were anemic", or scurry off.

Exclusions exempted nearly half of the working population.




FDR was clearly a timid, weak DINO who caved. He was a lousy president who obviously only cared about catering to well-off white males like himself. Evidently, he didn't care about the poor, female or black (he didn't do a damned thing to stop segregation, right?). FDR also commited war crimes when he racially profiled innocent Americans of Japanese ancestry, confiscated their businesses and livelihoods, and sent them to concentration, er, "internment" camps without cause or trial.

And it was a step forward for humanity.

Now Obama and many Democrats are working to gut Social Security. By any measure, half a step forward is far better than half a step back.

Night-night.

FDR caved to Republican pressure. Too bad FDR was such a weakling who was afraid to do what was right for America's poor and disenfranchised.

<< Now Obama and many Democrats are working to gut Social Security. >>

That's a false meme, and oddly enough, you never offer a shred of proof. Gee, I wonder why? :sarcasm:

Here are the facts: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=433&topic_id=697517&mesg_id=697517

<< By any measure, half a step forward is far better than half a step back. >>

Ah, then, you must really be happy about President Obama's historic passage of HCR. I've have to quote you sometime the next time someone whines about the lack of a public option. :)

"Now Obama and many Democrats are working to gut Social Security. By any measure, half a step forward is far better than half a step back."

You made this statement WITHOUT any proof. Please provide a link that substantiates this claim.

You have zero proof for your claims. How pathetic that you keep peddling these false memes. What is your purpose in doing so?

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just to make a case that our current Democratic president is in fact upholding this historical principles of the Democratic party.

The next thing you know somebody here will be trotting out the old republican line that it was Democrats that were responsible for the apartheid like conditions that existed in some parts of our country prior to the 1960's.

Unfortunately, our current president appears to believe that the republicans and their toadies in the liberal media will give him credit for saving the American economy if he gives away the store in the debt limit talks. Whatever he gives up will be hung around his neck like a millstone from now until the 2012 elections (and beyond if he is reelected). If he agrees to cuts in Social Security, his opponent in the general election will paint him as the man who trashed SS.

And perception quickly becomes reality in the information overloaded world of today. Regardless of what you say about Roosevelt, even though it may be factual, millions of Americans believe he saved their asses by implementing this insurance program. It isn't hard to envision Obama becoming the scapegoat for its demise.

<< If he agrees to cuts in Social Security >>

President Obama has already said he's against any Medicare and SS cuts in his SOTU and so has Nancy Pelosi and Democratic senators just today in their furious response to the Coburn-Lieberman suggestion to raise the retirement age to 67... unlike Bill Clinton, who bragged about wanting to cut SS only last spring at the right wing Peter "Let's Cut SS and Medicare" Peterson Conference. This year, Bill Clinton fretted about "do nothing" Democrats, said he believed Medicare should be cut and told Paul Ryan to call him.

Be glad Bubba isn't president now. I know I am.

But blaming him for being a weak kneed Democrat has nothing to do with what Obama does during the discussions over the debt limit.

Yes, I heard the SOTU address and I'm aware of what he said. I'm also aware that he has said the deficit is the most important matter facing the country (some might say it is jobs), and even that everything would be "on the table" during the debt limit negotiations. So frankly, I'm getting mixed signals. If he really believes these programs are worth preserving in their current forms, he should propose whatever fund raising mechanism he believes will keep them solvent. If he says he believes in preserving them and then agrees to cuts he'll have a lot of Dems pissed off at him and zilch support from the Republicans.

Again, trashing Roosevelt, Clinton or any other Dem says nothing at all about President Obama's performance.

President Obama has always been against cutting Medicare and SS benefits. What he wants to do is to cut waste and costs, as he said today in his news presser.

And what was in the interest of the American people as a whole. Further more it's not trashing when it's the facts. For minorities, Democratic Presidents weren't saviors but villains.

As far as the rest of your post it's nonsense. I think Obama is fully aware that Republicans won't give him credit for shit. He said it countless times that he's endorsed a few of their plans and they have actually dumped their own plans because he's endorsed it. However, what you and it seems so many others seem to ignore is the fact that unfortunately to get anything done in congress Obama has to deal with them. Obama is not a dictator. Dems don't' own the House and have a teetering lead in the senate. Unfortunately laws are made in the Legislative branch and not in the executive. Obama has to deal with them.

I'm a bit fed up with people assuming that Obama could have always ignored Repubs. He couldn't and can't. He's got to deal with them even if we don't like it. As for cutting medicare---The Dems aren't doing shit and I doubt Obama will go that far. However---the government has been at a standstill since the American people voted in Republicans.

All the information said on FDR is factual---he saved some and cared less about a lot. Sure it can be said Obama could be blamed----if medicare is gutted which I doubt. However the American people should take some damned responsibility for actually voting the demise of medicare/medicaid. Why do I say that? Because they voted the Republicans in power in the Senate and this is what the Republicans have always run on.

Nothing Roosevelt, Clinton or any other Democratic president did or failed to do has jack shit to do with what Obama does in his dealings with the opposition.

As far as dealing with the republicans WTF is he getting done now? I agree with you that he has to work with the republicans but that doesn't mean he can't fight back. He's been portrayed as part of the problem almost daily in our liberal media and I see almost no effective spin to the contrary from his administration.

What I think isn't important. Nor is what you think. What does matter is the perception of the American voter and if SS and/or Medicare winds up altered in any significant negative manner, President Obama will be the fall guy. And he will be hammered relentlessly for it next year by his republican opponent.

And nothing Roosevelt did has any impact on that.

Your strawman argument is not relevant.

criticism of the current President. But past Democratic President? meh

Yes, as long as they weren't minorities. His standing as a great President who cared a fuck about the entire American population is false. In the steps of our forefathers---he didn't care much for minorities.

and GDP grew 8% per year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nuElu-ipTQ&feature=related">Because he cared.

climbed back up over 25 percent and GDP fell.

Darn those pesky facts.

Thanks for telling us, onenote.



Bookmarking for the next time I hear about FDR's miraculous first term economy. :eyes:

And finding out how FDR screwed up in 1937.

Fortunately, no President would make that same mistake again.

Unemployment stayed below 20%. In fact, the highest it got was about the same as unemployment is today, when counted the same way.

FDR decided in 1937 that it was time to slash government spending to cut the deficit. That led to increased unemployment and dropping GDP. Fortunately, he realized that he fucked up and reversed course.

Thanks to FDR's example, it unlikely that any President would ever do something so stupid and destructive again.

During the depression the concern was getting men working. It was what was done back then. But if you want to blow smoke and give cover to an admin NOW that is weak and timid when it comes to taking care of the very people who put him in office -- I guess that's the way to do it.

Of course they are going to suck up to the wealthy and powerful now. They know they ahve utterly failed in aiding the middle class. So it's far easier to pay attention to the group you share limos with. And those blacked out windows make it easy to *forget* those who put you in that limo in the first place.

:boring:

FDR went to war both in the Pacific and in Europe. Didn't even ask Congress for permission.

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FDR was a tool of state capitalism, if you look at the allegations from leftist agitators like Norman Thomas and William Foster, as well as puerile demagogues like Huey Long and Charles Coughlin. His entire approach toward establishing standardized labor practices in the early half of his administration was wrapped up in the National Industrial Recovery Act, which allowed industries to collude and write their own operational codes (often at the expense of smaller competitors). Labor organizations barely had a seat at the table, if at all, and this was an approach that FDR believed in until the day he died. It was only the overturning of NIRA by the Court, and the subsequent passing of the Wagner Act, that modern Federal labor laws came into being.

But he managed to make up for signing the Wagner Act into law by appointing Henry Morgenthau to Secretary of Treasury, who was a notch above Andrew Mellon (Hoover's Secretary) in terms of forthright advocacy for working Americans. One of the worst decisions FDR ever made, and we're talking about a guy who thought it was a grand idea to toss 110,000 people into concentration camps, including almost 70,000 American citizens (because, apparently, the only thing we had to fear was fear itself a Japanese Fifth Column).

Then again, he made some damn fine speeches and got a lot of good things passed even though he made some (pretty serious) mistakes and took constant potshots from whining agitators and loud-mouthed back-benchers in Congress.

Feels a bit familiar, somehow.

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Never been done before. Never.

Un. Rec.

The snickering from behind the counter will be free, of course. On the house via Citizen's United.

out of touch on this as well ... :eyes: :sarcasm:

Any size tea is 99 cents for a limited time.

out of touch on this as well... :eyes: :sarcasm:

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pile up a bundle of cash and not fight back? Some people are always saying Obama should fight back, but when he does he gets a thread with a messed up subject line.

I just don't get this over the top criticism of Obama. Elections matter and if Democrats don't stick together and fight the Republican machine then what will happen?

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Large AND small donors. What would the OP have him do? We have to deal with the Koch Bros., KKKarl Rove, ALEC, and these stealth PACs posing as harmless non-partisan entities.

Not to mention the concerted effort by Republican state legislatures to suppress the vote by making it MORE difficult to register.

K&R...even though it gets harder and harder to K&R...stuff that Obama does that seems to be so anti-democratic....

Have to hope that if we PUSH BACK HARD...he will TURN... Wishful thinking...maybe...I did believe in Unicorns...but not that much that I'd be deceived by Magic Stuff. MAGIC STUFF...that was the DREAM of some OBAMA...

Obama disappointed us. I keep dreaming he'll change.

Are you disappointed by President Obama's homelessness initiative and his effort to streamline union membership efforts, too?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=433&topic_id=697458&mesg_id=697458

He grew up in Hawaii and Indonesia and his mother had Ford Foundation Grant that allowed him to attend Private Schools and Colleges.

He's very different from what we here in the States have had to deal with. He's a "Multi-National" and has a very different way of looking at the world. He prefers "GLOBALIZATION" to "LOCALIZATION."

He is just a product of his upbringing. Not to blame him...but he just doesn't really understand what we here in the STATES are dealing with.

His mother lived on food stamps while he was young.

He went straight out of college to become a community organizer on the streets of Chicago in a very poor neighborhood for about $10,000 a year and only paid off his student loans two years prior to running for president. His father-in-law was a blue-collar worker who never missed a day of work.

I'd say Pres. Obama knows more about "working America" than FDR or JFK did.

:eyes:

I guess whatever works, eh?

Here you go, Manny: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2urV4VgK-8&feature=fvsr