Writerbuckeye wrote:If we had a media like the one that hounded George Bush at every turn, you would not have had ANY of these appointments. They would have been uncovered early and killed.

But because the media has abdicated its role as watchdog and become protectors of Obama, we've seen too many examples like this.

As someone who got his degree believing in the critical nature of a healthy Fourth Estate -- and worked to further that (albeit on a local level) -- it disgusts me to no end when I see what the media in this country has become.

Preach it brother!

This guy is worse than I ever imagined, and I knew he was radical socialist (or worse).

The boat can't sink fast enough.

How would you grade the president so far in the following subjects?

Afghanistan
Health Care
Jobs

Afghanistan: D (While I like the surge tactic, publicly announcing a withdrawal date was beyond stupid, as was his explanation that a deadline had to be set. You can set a deadline privately with Afghan leaders; you don't have to tell the enemy what you're planning to do.)

Health care: F He wants a far-reaching program where government bureaucrats make decisions best left up to doctors and patients. He basically needs anything to pass so he can claim a political victory, which means we're going to get crap.

Jobs: F - His own economic people said the stimulus was desperately needed to keep unemployment from going over 8 percent. It's now over 10, so we rushed through a pork-laden bill that has done nothing to help like he promised it would. If there was something lower than F, he'd deserve it.

bigdaddy2003 wrote: How would you grade the president so far in the following subjects?

Afghanistan
Health Care
Jobs

Afghanistan F. General MCcrystal has publicly admitted that the number of Al Quada active operatives are less than 100. So let's spend another 30 billion dollars in patrolling a barren nomad country that has no army, no navy, no weapons...but are somehow an imminent threat to our country. It's well publicized....the reason why Islamic radicals want to kill us is due to our occupation of their lands. Obama gets a flat out F for buying the bullshit from the military capitalists that are behind this cherade.

Health Care. C. The system as we know it have many injustices. Not sure that the propsed changes will save money as was the stated intention.

Jobs. B. Not because his spending pakcages have failed, but that his spending has mirrored the stimulus practiced by virtually every president in economic crisis time since FDR was in power.

The real red flag on the growing joblessness...why hasn't this improved under the spending spree? The answer transcends partisan politics and the finger pointers.

American economics is is dire straits if the status quo is maintained.

bigdaddy2003 wrote: How would you grade the president so far in the following subjects?

Afghanistan
Health Care
Jobs

Afghanistan - C

Health Care - C- He's keeping his promise, although it's something the country doesn't even want at this point.

Jobs - F

I'm with WB... If I could give him something lower than an F here I would. Perhaps a "J," as in jagoff.

Writerbuckeye wrote:

CenterBHSFan wrote: Truly, I don't believe for a minute that President Obama condones anything like Fistgate. I don't believe that he knew the extensive backround of K.Jennings. That is the problem though. Alot of the guttersnipes currently working for the Obama administration weren't checked out very well.
And I think that's what President Obama is guilty for - not knowing enough about his staff/administration.

Certainly Obama must shoulder all of the blame for this guy (and Van Jones) even getting a position of authority -- but here is where not having a real Fourth Estate almost destroys the foundation of this country.

If we had a media like the one that hounded George Bush at every turn, you would not have had ANY of these appointments. They would have been uncovered early and killed.

But because the media has abdicated its role as watchdog and become protectors of Obama, we've seen too many examples like this.

As someone who got his degree believing in the critical nature of a healthy Fourth Estate -- and worked to further that (albeit on a local level) -- it disgusts me to no end when I see what the media in this country has become.

The libbberralll media was lock, stock and barrell with the neocons in beating the war drums without even a smattering of "where's the beef" on the invasion in Iraq. Yup...people like Judith Miller (author for the NYTimes) were complicit is the "greatest story ever sold".

Convenient for you to forget about that part of the last administration.

The media was in bed with the last guy.....until the truth came out about what a liar he turned out to be.

Oh please.

The media was only in agreement with Bush on Iraq because EVERY DAMN PROMINENT DEMOCRAT IN CONGRESS AGREED.

Take a long, hard look at EVERY OTHER ISSUE, and especially those related to the economy, and tell me how the media was in lockstep with Bush.

One coincidence does not disprove the facts about where the media's true allegiances lie.

When you make comments like those in this article it is easy to understand his problems --- he is either the dumbest person to ever occupy the White House, or he is turning out to be a liar of epic proportion.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/theworldnewser/2009/12/president-obama-federal-government-will-go-bankrupt-if-health-care-costs-are-not-reigned-in.html
Change we can believe in ...............

If only the boat could sink fast enough ...........

"Forty-six percent (46%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -21 That’s the lowest Approval Index rating yet recorded for this President (see trends).

For the second straight day, the update shows the highest level of Strong Disapproval yet recorded for this President. That negative rating had never topped 42% before yesterday. However, it has risen dramatically since the Senate found 60 votes to move forward with the proposed health care reform legislation. Most voters (55%) oppose the health care legislation and senior citizens are even more likely than younger voters to dislike the plan."

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/daily_presidential_tracking_poll

Footwedge wrote:The media was in bed with the last guy.....until the truth came out about what a liar he turned out to be.

What??

With the exception of just a very brief period of time immediately after 9/11, the media went out of its way to stoke the fires of Bush Bashing. Even "lib"ertarian guys like you gladly jumped on the bandwagon. Yee haw.

ALL politicians are liars including your own Ron Paul who claims, for example, to be Republican but only for purposes of political expediency in much the same manner Arlen Specter "became" a Democrat.

It's always more fun to be on the winning team.

It's the DC Way.

QuakerOats wrote: --- he is either the dumbest person to ever occupy the White House, or he is turning out to be a liar of epic proportion.

See above.....

You know what's funny is that I've been reading the American Recovery and Reinvestment act and there is a lot of strong hate against things that those on the right should like it seems:

288 billion dollars of the price tag comes from tax cuts.

144 Billion went to state and local governments so they don't have to increase taxes to fund their governments (since they can't deficit spend).

If you took out the tax cuts, the bill wouldn't have cost all that much more than the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008.

Then again, If the Congress just would've passed the 432 billion in tax cuts, do you suppose that those on the right would have supported it? Typically those on the right have not cared about adding to the deficit so long as this is done via tax cuts instead of spending.

Also, it seems weird that it was marketed as a job saver/creater when in 2009 the CBO estimated it would only offset any free-market unemployment by 2.3 million at most.

The bill primarily seems like tax cut/indirect social spending bill rather than something like FDR's New Deal bills.

Directed tax rebates/credits are handouts. They are the same as government spending. If you don't cut tax rates, you aren't cutting taxes, you are giving handouts.

Writerbuckeye wrote: Oh please.

The media was only in agreement with Bush on Iraq because EVERY DAMN PROMINENT DEMOCRAT IN CONGRESS AGREED.

Take a long, hard look at EVERY OTHER ISSUE, and especially those related to the economy, and tell me how the media was in lockstep with Bush.

One coincidence does not disprove the facts about where the media's true allegiances lie.

I repeat...the media was in bed with Bush/Cheney and the rest of them in power. Some day you partisan hissyfitters will come to understand the realization that American government is run and controlled by the corporate oligarchs...and their liaison is through the media.

It's been that way for a long time.

But do carry on on how the media only cowtows to left. It's fascinating entertainment.

Footwedge wrote:But do carry on on how the media only cowtows to left. It's fascinating entertainment.

Be entertained all you want but if you were intellectually honest, you would admit there is CLEARLY a left-leaning bias in the mainstream media a vast majority of the time.

I saw someone on one of the major networks mention something about the President's approval rating improving the past few weeks, and much to my surprise I went to Gallup and that is actually the case. I had not been paying attention to them really but the general trajectory of things seemed down to say the least with the madness of healthcare and now this attack.

According to Gallup, the President's approval bottomed out for the 3 day period of Dec 4-6 at 47% approve, 46% disapprove.

For the newest period of Dec 27-29 he is up to 53% approve, 41% disapprove.

It is not a huge increase, but does anyone have any ideas as to what has at least temporarily turned the corner for him? I can't point to any event that would be considered bounce worthy, but 6 points in 3 weeks is somewhat of a bounce I guess. What say everyone else?

IggyPride00 wrote: I saw someone on one of the major networks mention something about the President's approval rating improving the past few weeks, and much to my surprise I went to Gallup and that is actually the case. I had not been paying attention to them really but the general trajectory of things seemed down to say the least with the madness of healthcare and now this attack.

According to Gallup, the President's approval bottomed out for the 3 day period of Dec 4-6 at 47% approve, 46% disapprove.

For the newest period of Dec 27-29 he is up to 53% approve, 41% disapprove.

It is not a huge increase, but does anyone have any ideas as to what has at least temporarily turned the corner for him? I can't point to any event that would be considered bounce worthy, but 6 points in 3 weeks is somewhat of a bounce I guess. What say everyone else?

Gallup has been having some pretty significant swings both up and down over the past month...no idea why.

I really don't think less than a year is a long enough timeframe to judge Obama's performance on the whole. For example, any tangible gains/declines economically are hard to gauge based on what his administration has done.
I did vote for him and agree that some of his actions (or inactions) have been a bit puzzling, but to put it in a sports context, I don't blame Eric Mangini much for the Browns' ineptitude of the last 10 years. Just lots of things to fix.

IggyPride00 wrote: I saw someone on one of the major networks mention something about the President's approval rating improving the past few weeks, and much to my surprise I went to Gallup and that is actually the case. I had not been paying attention to them really but the general trajectory of things seemed down to say the least with the madness of healthcare and now this attack.

According to Gallup, the President's approval bottomed out for the 3 day period of Dec 4-6 at 47% approve, 46% disapprove.

For the newest period of Dec 27-29 he is up to 53% approve, 41% disapprove.

It is not a huge increase, but does anyone have any ideas as to what has at least temporarily turned the corner for him? I can't point to any event that would be considered bounce worthy, but 6 points in 3 weeks is somewhat of a bounce I guess. What say everyone else?

Perhaps people approve of him not being on T.V. and just hiding away in Hawaii?

This discussion has been dormant for too long.

We can't let the most opaque administration in American history off the hook this easily!

This AP article just about sums it up:

Promises, promises

Historically, the amount of taxes collected as a % of GDP has been surprisingly stable despite disparate tax policies, literally like +/- 1%, which is to say @ +/- $100B.

Taxes is hardly the issue. Spending is the issue. The key would be true growth policies that no one in Washington seems to have a clue about.

One Big Ass Mistake America