Okay, if Hillary was president today

I am quite sure she would be a good president, but I can easily imagine at this point in her first term, people would be asking, "Would Obama have been a better president?"

There would people on the left accusing her of being in bed with Wall Street and big business. After all, she was accused of that when she was a candidate. No matter who we elect, we will compare the president to the candidate he or she was, and have moments of "buyer's remorse". Of course, I believe that is healthy and necessary in a democracy. The thought of blindly supporting a president is frightening.

So no matter who we elect, I think its normal to wonder about how the other candidates might have turned out. Its an indication that our brains are still working and that we haven't become politically apathetic.

:shrug:

It shouldn't be "all or none" and expectations need to be realistic.

I am very critical of the administration in many regards, but I also give credit when its due. If we had a president that filled my every expectation, I would have to question my own mind.

Hell, we might have killed M*@mm@r Qaddafi already!

I was just thinking that it should be possible to take on this topic without the smashing and slashing it seems to provoke.

Rec.

such thoughts, but when I played with the idea, I came up with very similar scenarios. The republicans would have fought her tooth and nail, blocking every progressive move she tried. Then she would have been heavily criticized by the left (myself included no doubt) for caving and compromising.

There would have been variations and her messaging would have differed, but I believe it would be pretty much the same as it is now. For all the negativity Obama has gotten for being black (not REALLY American), she probably would have been attacked for being a woman (not strong enough).

I do wonder sometimes if she would have compromised as much. Somehow, I just dont see Hillary reaching out her hands to repukes, especially after what they did to Bill. But you are so right about her being attacked as a woman not strong enough.

wouldn't have compromised as much. She has too much experience fighting republicans and I think she knows most of their tricks.

She probably would have scored better on some things and worse on others, but in the end, the opposition would be the same, and they would have been as relentless with her as they are with Obama.

be going after her just as hard as they are Obama. Instead of race they would use her gender and her husband against her. They are out to destroy our party and it does not matter who is the president.

frustrations to him without some criticism.

We don't want to stay silent when we disagree, but at the same time, we don't want to feed the right wing propaganda machine. "Even his supporters are fed up with this president."

What's going on is that Obama doesn't have a huge pool of Liberal Dems or Dems with progressive view points or even Republicans who are progressive in thinking. I think we need to educate our people to vote properly and for the right things in our candidate that can help Obama.

Remember there is a division of power here. Obama does not make laws. He can't legal do that. The Legislative branch is in charge of that. If you want strong liberal policies we need strong liberals in the Legislative branch writing those policies and pushing for them and getting them through. If you look at the executive orders Obama puts forth, little to anyone would dispute the liberal wave of hand he takes. When he has the power to do it. Obama is not a centrist---not really from my view point.

What I see is a liberal person who realizes he needs to get a job done, at least for as many people as possible and keep government working (since having two parties at odds gets nothing done) and so he walks the center line to get some common ground. A man who is working to dispel DOMA, pushing for the rights of Native American women, and finished DADT is not a centrist or even a right wing guy. Unfortunately he doesn't have the back up and to many of our own people are the cause.

I think the citizens have to take a step back and take responsibility for what is going on in this nation. Ed Shultz fuckin' suggested, in order to criticize the President, that we shouldn't vote. He wanted people to boycott the Dems in 2010 to teach them a lesson. And obviously they did and this is what we got. Teabaggers. He pushed for it, and even said he would not vote for Dems. Teaching a lesson is equal to supporting a right wing agenda because the Right wing hijacked us.

Even our so called "liberal" pundits have failed us i think we have to take a step back and realize if we want change we take control of the Legislative body and Obama will be glad to sign those papers.

getting anything done and I'm sure history will be kinder to him than we are. I just wish he would communicate better with voters. FDR, JFK, and Clinton all were able to make that connection, but Obama falls a little short for some reason. I can listen to old Roosevelt speeches from the thirties and they are often still timely and relevant.

I don't know if it can be taught or if it just comes naturally to some people - actually Kennedy was a terrible public speaker in his early political career, so maybe it can be taught.

they couldn't hate. Going all the way back to FDR, they pull out the same or similar attacks. FDR was a "socialist" and/or "communist". What they lack in originality, they make up for in dogged persistence.

aren't going to challenge Obama for the presidency.

When people are disappointed, they tend to look backward and try to recycle the past, but it rarely works in politics.

threats. 14th amendment would have been invoked if it came to that. Everything else? Probably the same. And this is from a guy who wrote this in 2008: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x5114403

When Hillary we would have known what the attacks would have looked like, as we lived through eight years of them. The right tends to lack originality, so they pull out the same old tricks from their bag over and over again. When Obama they varied it a bit by making him look "foreign", not American enough to be president.

Of course all Democratic politicians are pinko commies when they aren't fascist dictators or godless perverts.

so people outside of DU, wouldn't pondering that.

One thing's for certain: Hillary would not be taking the shit Obama is willing to take.

"knowing Hillary" was a liability as well as an asset. Not all Democrats liked her, but as you said, we didn't know Obama so he didn't come with any baggage.

There are a lot of things that we can't know for certain, except that the right would have gone after her with as much venom as they've gone after Obama. Also, like you said, having lived through republican attacks for eight years, she wouldn't have taken as much shit. It does help to know you adversary well. As a matter of fact, I recall her saying that more than once during the campaign.