Grade Obama

[BlueAlpha1]

I might take a lot of heat for this, as red pill people generally tend to be Republicans and right wingers. Be assured though men, I was one of the strongest advocates for Donald Trump and have taken a sharp turn to the right through Obama's 2nd term. In the current climate of our world, I am a changed man who will not vote Democrat for a long time despite considering myself an old school liberal (or in some aspects a libertarian)

With all that being said, I still like the guy personally. I voted for him twice and probably wouldn't do it over if I could, simply because we needed a Democratic President in 2008 after Bush drove the country into a ditch, and 2012 was really a throwaway election with not nearly the implications of this one.

I think his first term was far better than his second, so here are your 5 bullet points.

Final Grade: C+

-----------------

The Good
1. Obamacare (IN PRINCIPLE ONLY!!!)
The rollout was a "total disaster", and premiums and deductibles were so outrageous that I refused to buy health insurance. HOWEVER, the idea was noble. We ARE the only major nation that doesn't ensure healthcare for the poor and it was a national disgrace. Hopefully, Trump will fix this by "repeal and replace", with emphasis on REPLACE. Don't throw away the idea entirely so that poor people either die or go bankrupt, but make it better.

2. Killing Osama Bin Laden
In 3 years he got this done, where Bush FAILED for 7 years. Enough said here.

3. Leading the minimum wage increase
I've taken some heat on this forum in politics disputes over the minimum wage. Without rehashing why, I think it should be increased to $10 at the federal level and $12.50 in the country's larger markets. In some sense this was a failure by Obama, as the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2014 was introduced but NOT ratified, but he did urge the states to raise it, and 18 did. I was glad to see that.

4. Marriage Equality
Yes, I said it. I am not one of these neo-masculine brutes that wants to throw homosexuals from buildings like they do in Muslim countries. I don't care if gays get married because I never bought that argument that it undermines heterosexual marriage. It does not change the legalities of normal marriage ONE IOTA. It is simply about legal rights and guarantees for American citizens of a different lifestyle. Now before you come for my head, THERE IS A DIFFERENCE between marriage equality and the radical gay agenda. For instance, I am against gay adoption because that DOES undermine the family. The family unit is the key to raising successful children. Furthermore, the gay flags outside every bar, teaching kids about homosexuality in schools, this gender bathroom stuff is pure radicalization, which goes far beyond two gay people that just to live a private life.

5. Cuba
I understand the country was a dictatorship run by a despot who nearly went to war with the United States, but it's been 50 years. The Castro's are on their way out and hopefully we can encourage democracy, because just like Russia it's important we start GETTING ALONG with other countries rather than being on the brink of perennial war. No more sword rattling every other country. Let's get these non-threats ON OUR SIDE so if there is ever a real threat (which will be discussed below), we have world support.

*Honorable Mention
Stimulating the economy in 2009. That was a very important year for the country and we took for granted that our country rebounded when we could have devolved into a depression.

---------------------------

The Bad
1. Race relations
Far and away this man's biggest failure. He refused to help the black community and hold them accountable for their insane levels of crime, attacked police officers at every corner, propped up a domestic terrorist organization called Black Lives Matter and crooks like Al Sharpton, and let crime-ridden cesspools like Chicago get worse. And he has created an environment that allows people to be openly hostile towards white males.

2. Radical Islamic terrorism
He has refused to even use the words because he is an apologist for this death cult, because he once practiced Islam. There was an uptick in Muslim violence with attacks in Orlando, Chattanooga, San Bernardino, Minnesota, Boston, and the list goes on. Instead of telling THEM to assimilate, and allowing our law enforcement to properly PROFILE these people based on a CHOSEN IDEOLOGY, he told US to stop being "Islamophobic" thereby promoted the perennial Muslim victim complex. And while he did a lot to stop al-Qaeda which is essentially dead, out of it rose ISIS which is worse.

3. Iran Deal
An extension of #2, it is a different wing of Islamic terrorism. The expansionist, Shia Iran is not inspiring lone wolf attacks in the USA like ISIS. In fact they are a sworn enemy of ISIS, but they ARE an Islamic dictatorship trying to usurp Saudi Arabia as the Muslim superpower of the world. Our army could finish off theirs in an afternoon, but they do have a very powerful propaganda machine and are trying to obtain the bomb, which would detonate in Israel in a heartbeat. Whether you like Israel or not, this would create World War III as we would instantly invade Iran, which would infuriate Russia. This was a bad deal as Iran should have been CRIPPLED by sanctions until they were reduced to a blip on the radar.

4. Immigration
In keeping up with this radical left idea of cultural relativism and open borders, he did nothing to secure the border. We now have up to 30 million illegals in this country stealing our jobs, smuggling in drugs, and committing crimes. But Obama did nothing because virtue signaling your "tolerance" to the world is more important than a country's sovereignty.

5. Radical feminism
The primary demographic trying to stifle free speech in public schools, creating safe spaces, stopping conservatives from speaking, and threatening the first amendment entirely are the radical feminists. Obama did nothing to stop these people who have made the American campus a joke.

THE COMBINATION OF THE 5 EXAMPLES ABOVE ARE, IN A NUTSHELL, WHY DONALD TRUMP GOT ELECTED. YOUR AVERAGE WHITE MALE SAW THE UNHOLY TRIO OF BLACK LIVES MATTER, RADICAL ISLAMIC TERRORISM, AND RADICAL FEMINISM AS A THREAT TO OUR COUNTRY'S VERY IDENTITY.

 

[zekko]

You gave him a C+, sounds reasonable, if you consider a C average. He wasn't that great, wasn't that bad.

I do think we need some kind of national healthcare program. The market ran things before, and the insurance companies took advantage, with all that stuff about preexisting conditions and whatnot. Obamacare was a half measure, and Trump wants to scale it back. I'm concerned that things will either go back to the way it was before (back to square one), or we'll just end up with a further watered down version of Obamacare.

Despite that paragraph, I generally lean to the conservative side of economics. But I think the country as a whole is/was liberal, so many places were so happy and positive about Obama getting elected, that it had a good effect on the economy, and that helped lift us out of that hole we were in in 2009.

 

[Billtx49]

D-
On the job training doesn't work for that position.

 

[BlueAlpha1]

I know I'm not going to be received well with ideologues in this review. Given the context of this forum, I'm probably going to get lambasted by right wing ideologues here who act like the man did nothing right.

At least it's refreshing to get hammered from the other side for once, as there really aren't any left wing ideologues here...maybe I'll post this as Salon too.

 

[taiyuu_otoko]

1. Obamacare (IN PRINCIPLE ONLY!!!)

Health care has to be created by scarce material (doctors, medicine, hospitals). Nobody has a "right" to stuff that somebody else has to make. Health care is not and cannot be a fundamental right. It should be left to the free market. People get sick, and people die. All health care systems are a con to trick people into thinking that they get get out more than they put in. Somebody ends up paying. We only get to pretend to get more out than we pay in because the U.S. holds the fiat reserve currency.

2. Killing Osama Bin Laden

Why exactly is this a benefit? Especially since you consider that Bin Laden was once on the CIA payroll (fact, not tinfoil hat theory).

Leading the minimum wage increase

There shouldn't be any minimum wage. It prices poorly skilled people out of the market. Any economist that DOESN'T in same way work for the government will agree.

https://fee.org/articles/3-reasons-the-15-minimum-wage-is-a-bad-way-to-help-the-poor/

https://mises.org/library/how-minimum-wage-laws-increase-poverty

Marriage Equality

This has nothing to do with the president. This is a supreme court issue.

Cuba

What about his last minute reversal of the "wet foot, dry ground" policy that existed for fifty years? Essentially shutting the door on Cuban immigrants, potentially even killing them.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/12/obama-ends-cuba-immigration-policy-wet-foot-dry-foot

http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/265464/obama-caves-castro—again-humberto-fontova

Stimulating the economy in 2009.

False. Printing a bunch of money and giving to wall street bankers and faking GDP growth isn't "stimulating" anything.

As for the real-estate and banking crash of 2008, Mr. Stockman makes the case that nearly every policy response made things worse.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887324695104578415263903796402

 

[Bible_Belt]

There shouldn't be any minimum wage. It prices poorly skilled people out of the market.

Those damn child labor laws do the same thing to little kids. It's not natural to tell the free market whom it can and cannot employ. If we want to bring manufacturing jobs back to this country, we need to start closing our worthless public schools and putting those kids to work in a factory, at a wage that is low enough to be competitive on a global level, and without the artificial government-imposed burdens of worker safety, osha, work comp, and environmental laws.

 

[taiyuu_otoko]

Those damn child labor laws do the same thing to little kids.

Funny thing is all the stories about the holy government saving poor innocent children from being exploited by evil capitalists is mythology.

https://mises.org/library/forgotten-facts-american-labor-history

https://mises.org/library/trouble-child-labor-laws

The first advocates of keeping kids out of factories were women's labor unions, who didn't appreciate the low-wage competition.

 

[Bible_Belt]

there really aren't any left wing ideologues here.

I listened to a radio interview with an Ivy League political science professor, Columbia I think, who was basically their token Angry Black Man. He had more scathing criticism of Obama than I've heard from any white person. He basically called him an Uncle Tom, sellout to Corporate America. He said the Democrats had turned their backs on poor people and sold out to the rich and the military-industrial complex.

Personally, I liked Obama, mostly for all of his pardons of non-violent drug offenders, hundreds of them in his last year in office. I'm mostly a one-issue voter when I do vote. I'm against mandatory minimum sentencing and the growth of the prison state. I think all drugs should be legal, and I think the worst ones should be given out by the government for free. Free needles, safe injection sites - do all the drugs you want. We could eliminate 90% of crime in this country, almost immediately. The police and prison system would be free to focus on the few people who really do need to be locked up.

Eliminating the prison state is actually one of the official platform stances of Black Lives Matter, but they're too stupid to see it as more than a race issue. Most of the race issues in this country are actually class issues. When we can pit the poor blacks against the poor whites, it distracts both of them from noticing that they're poor. BLM was obviously Obama's biggest failure; instead of calling them out on their social terrorism, he supported it, which just made all the white people in the country hate him more. BLM is against unity. They want hate; that's what allows them to exist.

 

[speed dawg]

I'd give him a D.

Can't think of much he did right, but he also wasn't an unmitigated disaster either. He totally screwed up healthcare, he doubled down on stupid in Iraq, and he's not respected by ANY world leaders.

 

[logicallefty]

After Obama was innaguarated in January 2009 I took a calendar and counted 100 days from the day, and then wrote on the 100th day "Obama's deadline to impress Lefty ?". I told my gf at that time "He has 100 days to impress me." I was the most patient Republican there was, I truly gave him a chance. After 100 days I was indifferent. But then came July 2009 and the Beer Summit which was a huge kick in the groin for us police officers and a taste of the mentality of Obama to come.

Fast forward to now, the only thing Obama has done that even remotely had a positive contribution to my life was killing Osama Bin Laden, and that was very indirect but I am trying to give him credit where I can. He has done nothing else as far as I am concerned. Other than spend my hard earned tax money on vacations. For a guy who works three jobs and only takes one really big vacation about every 3-4 years, all those vacations are a big fat middle finger from him and his ***** of a wife and ****** daughters to me. Good riddance.

D-

 

[BlueAlpha1]

Health care has to be created by scarce material (doctors, medicine, hospitals). Nobody has a "right" to stuff that somebody else has to make. Health care is not and cannot be a fundamental right. It should be left to the free market. People get sick, and people die. All health care systems are a con to trick people into thinking that they get get out more than they put in. Somebody ends up paying. We only get to pretend to get more out than we pay in because the U.S. holds the fiat reserve currency.

I have no problem with you claiming healthcare isn't a right, but you better be consistent and say that speech and guns aren't a right too. And then we can just go on forever, and say that in theory nothing is a right and that government should barely exist to provide anything for a civil society. Then you're getting pretty close to anarchy.

What you far right wingers don't understand is that this country is already part socialist. The government provides public schools, police, firefighters, road, bridges, and yes, whether you like it or not, now healthcare. The vast majority of the time a service is going to be subsidized by someone who is not receiving the most amount of benefit from it. For instance, you pay taxes that go towards a firefighter's salary. When he puts out a fire at a poor person's home you paid to put out that fire in theory. And it sounds like you wish that were not the case, which is barbarianism.

Tell me something, are you okay with tens of thousands of veterans starving and freezing in our streets because you don't like your taxes going towards the VA?

Why exactly is this a benefit?

Because the criminal responsible for the worst terrorist attack in American history was brought to justice. That's why it's a benefit. Would it have been better if he were left alone plotting terror all over the middle east and eventually trying to bring another one here? Oh, let me guess. He didn't do 9/11, it was "The Mossad" or the Americans did it to themselves. Yes, tinfoil hat theory.

Especially since you consider that Bin Laden was once on the CIA payroll (fact, not tinfoil hat theory).

Totally irrelevant. It's a very flimsy argument similar to when people bring up the moot point that Saudi Arabia and America have diplomatic relations.

Person A: "Saudi Arabia commits human rights violations and must be stopped!"
Person B: "And they are allied with the United States too!"
AND!?

Countries change their strategic approach to conflict in world affairs all the time. At the time, the Mujahadeen was the enemy of our enemy called the Soviet Union, and thus was our friend. But when Osama bin Laden killed 3,000 Americans, things changed. That's what happens in war, kind of like when Hitler betrayed Stalin and Russia switched sides in World War 2. Would it have made sense for Russian citizens to denounce the killing of Hitler because he was an alley BEFORE invading Russia?

There shouldn't be any minimum wage. It prices poorly skilled people out of the market. Any economist that DOESN'T in same way work for the government will agree.

You're from Asia, right? So you're familiar with Chinese Apple workers living under corporate fascism, under slave-like conditions, working for $1 a day and hurling themselves off buildings? People like to covertly imply that China is still a communist country, when it's economic model is capitalism on steroids.

And that's the scenario what you get when you completely abolish the minimum wage. You're advocating fascism.

Let's just clarify something here - you're an extremist within an extremist wing. 80% of Americans want to RAISE the minimum wage. The steep minority of 20% want to keep it where it is. Almost nobody wants to abolish it, because they understand that low-skilled people working for $2 an hour in this country would result in violent revolution.

This has nothing to do with the president. This is a supreme court issue.

I'm well aware it was a Supreme Court decision, but do you know the phrase "happened on his watch"? This really isn't that difficult to understand.

What about his last minute reversal of the "wet foot, dry ground" policy that existed for fifty years? Essentially shutting the door on Cuban immigrants, potentially even killing them.

What about it? And answer my question if you're so opposed to diplomacy. Would it have been better if we were just at perennial boycott of these people? You're not a neo-con that likes being on the brink of war all the time too, are you?

False. Printing a bunch of money and giving to wall street bankers and faking GDP growth isn't "stimulating" anything.

The economy isn't great. Wages are down and underemployment is rampant, but unemployment is half of what it was under Bush. He also avoided a depression which there was real potential for. If George Bush had had a 3rd term, we would have been Spain or Greece with 25% unemployment and ATM's running out of money.

Your America is a scary place. It's some strange mix between corporate fascism and anarchy, where the "free market" totally reigns supreme, people work for slave wages and poor people die in the streets. Good thing you'll never nominate a candidate.

 

[BlueAlpha1]

After Obama was innaguarated in January 2009 I took a calendar and counted 100 days from the day, and then wrote on the 100th day "Obama's deadline to impress Lefty ?". I told my gf at that time "He has 100 days to impress me." I was the most patient Republican there was, I truly gave him a chance. After 100 days I was indifferent. But then came July 2009 and the Beer Summit which was a huge kick in the groin for us police officers and a taste of the mentality of Obama to come.

Fast forward to now, the only thing Obama has done that even remotely had a positive contribution to my life was killing Osama Bin Laden, and that was very indirect but I am trying to give him credit where I can. He has done nothing else as far as I am concerned. Other than spend my hard earned tax money on vacations. For a guy who works three jobs and only takes one really big vacation about every 3-4 years, all those vacations are a big fat middle finger from him and his ***** of a wife and ****** daughters to me. Good riddance.

D-

I think it is totally reasonable and principled position for a police officer to dislike this President. It was one of his biggest downfall's, always siding against the police even on bad evidence out of some sort of tribal solidarity with the black community.

I'm glad you gave him a chance. One of my biggest problems with right-wing ideologues (who are not as prevalent as the radical left, but still) was the hatred from the word go and their steadfastness in their conspiracy theories. A lot of them, tin foil hats and all, insisted he was always on the brink of abolishing term limits, taking guns, and declaring martial law. They called him a "dictator", which was idiotic. None of it happened.

There was PLENTY to critique, and I'm glad you kept it reasonable.

 

[amazingswayze]

There's a lot of provocative ideas on this thread so far. I'm glad we haven't gotten too aggressive yet. You guys seem to know a lot but at the same time, I'm not sure what to believe anymore when it comes to politics.
As expected, the average citizen is unaware or not well versed in politics. The only thing I can say for certain is that everything is a big pile of crap right now. Why? I'm not sure. One thing I do know however is that we spend wayyyyyyy too much as a country on war.

Why? There hasn't been war on US soil in any of our lifetimes. Obviously it isn't an immediate threat.

And how about nuclear war?

One crazy f*ck might launch a missle eventually but for the most part the world agrees that it's all over if anyone uses a W.M.D.

One thing I learned a while ago in a social studies class was that our country actually thrived under Bill Clinton, and operated under a budget surplus. What happened next? Bush.

Obama obviously inherited a huge mess. Not saying he made it any better but at least we aren't living in fear of a stock market crash. Bush's final days in office were a meltdown as far as I am concerned. And forgive me if I'm wrong because I was only 10 at the time, but he bailed out corporations who should have handled their own business.

I don't know anything about government, but one thing I do know is that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. I fear that it may be worse under Trump.

As for Obama, I'm still not sure if he made a great impact; and a lot of people like to call him a puppet, but I think he is a good man who handled his responsibilities well and did not abuse his power or use it foolishly. As far as I'm concerned he may be the only black president we ever see in our lifetimes so it will always be a warm memory for me.

 

[taiyuu_otoko]

I have no problem with you claiming healthcare isn't a right, but you better be consistent and say that speech and guns aren't a right too.

Health Care

I don't think you understood my point. You can't claim something as a right if it has to be produced by something else. If there was no such thing as health insurance, and everybody had to pay cash money, everybody would still have to come up with the cash to pay for their health. Would you be opposed to that? Or you do think some people should receive more than what they pay in return? If so, do you acknowledge that if some people get more than what they pay in return, then some people have to pay more than what they get? If so, who gets to choose who gets more than what they pay, and who gets less than what they pay?

Guns

Using my above argument, people should have the ability to buy a gun, if they have the money to pay. I also believe that health care should be like guns. No money, no honey. No insurance middle man in the middle.

Free Speech

This only applies to "publicly owned property" not private property. The above two examples (guns and health care) involve exchanging private property (money) for other private property (drugs or getting cut open by a professional). Free speech doesn't exists on private property.

Fire Fighters

And it sounds like you wish that were not the case, which is barbarianism.

Nope, you the absence of government provided services is not barbarism, it's private solutions to the same problems.

For example, absent a government paid for fire department, there would still be firefighters, who would likely be employed by insurance companies, AND would be much more efficient that public fire fighters. Why? Because that guy's house that burned down is now going to have to be paid for by the insurance company. But if the insurance companies had their own private fire fighting companies, they would INCENTIVIZED to put out the fire before it destroyed the guys house. In fact, there would not likely be a fire in the first place, since the insurance company would do regular fire checks as part of the insurance contract.

Tell me something, are you okay with tens of thousands of veterans starving and freezing in our streets because you don't like your taxes going towards the VA?

You're using examples that are structurally different than health care. Veterans agreed to a contract, and the government is not fulfilling their part of the contract. That's different from politicians promising things to get elected and then expecting taxpayers to foot the bill.

economic model is capitalism on steroids.

I'm pretty sure you don't really know what capitalism is. When I advocate for no minimum wage, it's because I've been swayed by learned economists who explained it clearly and succinctly


For Example:

https://www.amazon.com/Walter-E.-Williams/e/B001H6W1VW

You'd do well to read a few books on economics .

but do you know the phrase "happened on his watch"? This really isn't that difficult to understand.

So you want to attribute everything to a president that happened on his watch? You SURE you want to use that as pro/con evidence for Obama's presidency?

There's plenty more BAD THINGS that happened in America from 2008 to 2016 that "happened on his watch."

Here's just a few things that "happened on his watch"

Cuba

QUOTE="BlueAlpha1, post: 2397226, member: 124552"]What about it?[/QUOTE]

Cubans may die because of Obama's last minute decision, that's what. That doesn't bother you?

Would it have been better if we were just at perennial boycott of these people?

Boycott of "which" people? The Cubans who are busting their ass to get here? Or all the other immigrants? Are you NOT in favor of Trumps immigration plan? Are YOU supporting open borders?


War With Cuba

You're not a neo-con that likes being on the brink of war all the time too, are you?

So, if we don't have open borders with Cuba we're going to war? When did that happen?

The economy isn't great. Wages are down and underemployment is rampant, but unemployment is half of what it was under Bush. He also avoided a depression which there was real potential for. If George Bush had had a 3rd term, we would have been Spain or Greece with 25% unemployment and ATM's running out of money.

I disagree. And I recommend (again) that you do some reading on economics rather than just repeating what sounds good to support your argument.

Your America is a scary place. It's some strange mix between corporate fascism and anarchy, where the "free market" totally reigns supreme, people work for slave wages and poor people die in the streets. Good thing you'll never nominate a candidate.

Lots of contradictions on one sentence. I don't want this thread to turn into a wasted lesson on economics that would end up falling on deaf ears, since you've more or less made up your mind.

But just a few points.

Smaller governments would make corporate fascism impossible, because it's the governments (bribed by the corporate fascists) that make the LAWS which protect the corporate fascists.

But your argument is essentially one of socialism over capitalism, based on the same arguments people generally use. Not original. Without governments, the strong evil people would dominate and exploit the weak and innocent people, and it's up to advanced and morally superior thinkers like you to point it out to us knuckle dragging, right wing fascists.

Just remember this old and true saying, young warrior of righteousness:

If you're in your twenties and your'e not a liberal, you have no heart.

If you're in your forties and you're not a conservative, you have no brain.


verily verily I say unto thee, young defender of the weak, seek the the truth, and the truth shall set thee free:

https://mises.org/library/capitalism-and-socialism

https://mises.org/library/socialism-economic-and-sociological-analysis

The Law - Frederic Bastiat

 

[samspade]

C+ sounds about right. He didn't screw things up any worse than they already had been, but he didn't do anything monumental besides the ACA. Whether you agree with it or not, Obamacare was a major accomplishment.

His foreign policy was a joke. The man has dropped tens of thousands of bombs in seven nations. The US's obsession with the Middle East is baffling.

 

[BeExcellent]

This graph is really all you need to know. It's all bad news. I give Obama an F- because of these graphs.

Student loans are so high in combination with salary erosion that you basically are turning the working middle class into the indentured poor with no way to get out from under that debt.

Don't get me started about spiraling university tuition. The US should do what Mongolia does: For the young people who can earn admission to one of the top universities in the world, guess what? Mongolia pays the bill. This means they reward the hardest working bright minds in their country. Its achievement based. Let's reward achievement again in America. What a concept.

See how food stamps increased on the graphs above? Welfare subsidies in general ballooned under Obama. I'm a landlord. The calls I have gotten for section 8 housing units increased dramatically during recent years. But the Feds learned in the 1970s a hard lesson and got smarter than building and running housing projects anymore. The Feds have learned that when you give people something for free they do not respect it, they don't value it, and they destroy it. You don't see new federal housing projects going in all over any more because the people who lived there didn't care about the properties and the properties were ruined very quickly.

So the government fixed them only for them to get ruined again in short order. Obviously if you are having to spend $10,000.00+ or more every time you give someone a benefit for free it doesn't take very long to figure out that you are wasting money giving them something they feel entitled to and yet won't value or take care of. I only have 1 section 8 unit for this very reason. Tenants can ruin my property without being accountable and I'm expected to lose money while subsidizing the free loading tenant. No thank you. I'll rent to people who are willing to work. They respect themselves and my property much more than the welfare people. And I get to make a profit, which is the whole reason I am willing to put up with the details.

I work in healthcare. The insurance companies and the hospitals are laughing all the way to the bank about Obamacare while patient care gets worse, access gets more limited and doctors are forced to close their doors. Patients are just an income stream to the hospitals. Obamacare allows for maximum fleecing of the federal tax roles.

Healthcare is not a right. No more than food or shelter is a right. Education is also not a right. High wages are not a right. Move somewhere that tries to succeed in installing those policies evenly. Communist Russia anyone?

The Obama administration reinforced the WRONG behaviors in society. Why? People getting mailbox money overwhelmingly vote Democratic. They vote for the party who gives the freebies. They want to keep their freebies so an easy way to increase your voters is to give people more freebies. This also feeds into class envy, which is the real root of BLM and Wallstreet sit ins and all that other nonsense. They don't care that accepting the freebies is unsustainable. They care only for their own self interests and vote accordingly.

People need to be too busy earning a living to camp out in Wall Street sit ins for weeks on end.

Think about this. In my town ALL the fast food places have help wanted signs. Nobody goes to work there. Why is that? It's easier to sit home and collect a check from welfare because you get the same or more money with zero effort by sitting home not working. This is reinforcing the WRONG behavior. Slash the welfare roles, the food stamp roles, the housing voucher roles and the disability roles (plenty of disabled people can do SOMETHING to earn a living) and voila! Your low wage workforce is back. Now they actually will have to earn a living instead of living off me. Raising the minimum wage is not the solution. That drives labor costs up and drives employers to other nations. Companies don't have to do business here people. Obama created a business climate so hostile that he accelerated the corporate business exodus, raised taxes and expenses (thanks Obamacare).

Let's do what the Netherlands do with welfare recipients and the uemployed. Let's pick them up on buses and require them to pick up trash on the highway or some other task that would otherwise cost tax dollars in exchange for their welfare or unemployement check. People wouldn't want to do that? Exactly! They'd get back to work rather that be required to do something in exchange for their subsidy. The leisured poor would not be "cool" anymore. They'd go back to work.

I could go on and on and on.

One thing I learned a while ago in a social studies class was that our country actually thrived under Bill Clinton, and operated under a budget surplus. What happened next? Bush.

The above is a rather revisionist view of the Clinton years that fails to tell you the whole story. Reaganomics set the stage for the budget surplus. This is empirically measurable. The real reason Clinton gets credit for both the budget surplus as well as the successful "Welfare to Work" program has nothing to do with Clinton initiatives and everything to do with the 1994 Congress where the Republicans got majorities in both the House and the Senate. Newt Gingrich was House Speaker. The Republican Congress passed the budget resolutions (after shutting the Federal government down several times) and Clinton did not want to sign the measures. Clinton, however is not stupid. Clinton now gets credit for two of the most fiscally conservative moves in recent history. Gingrich and the 1994 Republican Congress was the reason why.

What gets me so jazzed about Trump is that Newt Gingrich (the architect of the 1994 Republican bills that led to Clinton's budget surplus) is going to be an inside adviser to President Trump. This is why he wasn't given a cabinet post. He's far more important to Trump than that. Trump himself was a Reagan Democrat and knows that Reaganomics works because it worked for him as a major employer. Paul Ryan is of similar mind to Gingrich regarding economic policy. All these things working on concert bode well for the US economic prospects.

Obama was smart (like Jimmy Carter was smart) but an ideologue. Trump is a pragmatist and understands economics as a businessman and employer of people at all socioeconomic levels. Notice today in his speech, President Trump said rather unfavorable things to the "establishment". That's the elite. It includes Republicans as well as Democrats. The next 4 years will be very interesting. I am looking forward to the economic boom that bringing the corporate tax rate down to 15% will create. Capital investment will come ashore so fast your heads will spin. It is not a zero sum game. Wealth creation is going to be a priority again as will be American exceptionalism. Its about time.

Rant over.

 

[TheVirtualMind]

C+ sounds about right. He didn't screw things up any worse than they already had been, but he didn't do anything monumental besides the ACA. Whether you agree with it or not, Obamacare was a major accomplishment.

His foreign policy was a joke. The man has dropped tens of thousands of bombs in seven nations. The US's obsession with the Middle East is baffling.

The IDEA behind the ACA was pretty good. The implementation and outcome of it were not.

 

[Bible_Belt]

If healthcare isn't a right, do I have a right to catch a contagious disease, and give that disease to you and your family? Because that's what's going to happen if you take away my healthcare. Maybe you think the poor should suffer and die because they're poor, but they are going to drag you down with them. Contagious disease makes health a public issue, because it affects everyone, even rich people.

 

[taiyuu_otoko]

If healthcare isn't a right, do I have a right to catch a contagious disease, and give that disease to you and your family?

It's my responsibility as an adult human to know about health risks and to take precautions (like buying my own insurance that fits my own needs on the private insurance market) to keep that from happening.

The thing about being a human on planet Earth is that sh!t tends to happen from time to time. You can't predict them, and you can't keep them from happening. But you CAN buy insurance to at least pay for them if they do happen. But the thing about the ACA is now I CAN'T buy "just" the insurance to cover unexpected and catastrophic illnesses and events. I HAVE TO buy insurance (which according to the supreme court is a tax, and not any kind of health plan) that covers EVERYTHING.

I know the government would like us to believe that it's their job to protect us from the scary stuff but that's just a ruse for us dumb voters to give them as much power as they want.

And the typical, knee jerk reaction to any kind of "free market" is, "you hate poor people and you want them to die."

But many people that are poor today are poor BECAUSE OF the government. (NAFTA, welfare dependency, huge welfare cliffs, etc.)

Besides any kind of system based on wealth transfer is unsustainable, as those on the receiving end tend to increase over time, and those on the paying end tend to decrease over time, or at the very least avoid paying for taxes.

Unfortunately, in these debates people tend to confuse what they think SHOULD happen with what is actually possible and sustainable.

 

[YawataNoKami]