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He was only granted that much good will because he was 1) Anyone But Bush 2) A very good orator with a brilliant 2008 campaign staff 3) Black That none of the

He was only granted that much good will because he was 1) Anyone But Bush 2) A very good orator with a brilliant 2008 campaign staff 3) Black That none of the above contribute to satisfying governance should come as no surprise. I am (naively?) surprised that his administration turned out to so enthusiastically continue and expand the Bush era policies. It gives some credence to the idea that the administrations themselves are not primary drivers of policy. Or that power enjoys power and will forevermore. FWIW a prominent member of Northern California's ACLU told me she believes that prioritization of healthcare is what has sidelined civil rights in this administration. I do not find her explanation entirely satisfying.

hga 13y ago
I wouldn't say he's a great "orator" as that's been classically defined. He's quite good at reciting a speech with teleprompters, and if he removes enough mental censors he speaks very well, but tellingly on the subjects. In-between he's pretty famously a disaster. A lot of people who looked at his record and background were not in the least surprised that he "so enthusiastically continue[d] and expand[ed] the Bush era policies" As you posit, it has to do with power.
pessimizer 13y ago
and 4) he offered an enormous amount of liberal populist rhetoric, maybe the most since Roosevelt, and people were sick of the last 30 years of post-Reagan corporate centrist/triangulationist bullshit. >she believes that prioritization of healthcare is what has sidelined civil rights in this administration I think healthcare was more important for this administration to deal with than civil rights, which aren't rapidly declining except due to the disaster that both healthcare spending and lack of health care has done to this country. It's affecting black people a lot more than others mainly because of our relatively tenuous hold on the middle class. Problem is that he used up all of his goodwill on the healthcare fight, using rhetoric to push it as if he was conjuring up a new utopia, but just managed to entrench insurers and corporate rent-seekers more into the process, and to only mildly increase the footprint of coverage. The main benefit of what he passed is that it will slow the growth of healthcare spending just enough to make it difficult for conservative-libertarian scum to paint Social Security as an immanent danger anymore. To celebrate this exceedingly minor victory, he's been trying his level best to cut Social Security by raising the retirement age, changing the inflation indexing, and acknowledging dopey schemes like means-testing. The worst part is IMO, he thinks that cutting ("saving," in centrist rhetoric) Social Security is going to be his legacy, and that history is going to view him as a hero for it.

hga 13y ago

I wouldn't say he's a great "orator" as that's been classically defined. He's quite good at reciting a speech with teleprompters, and if he removes enough mental censors he speaks very well, but tellingly on the subjects. In-between he's pretty famously a disaster. A lot of people who looked at his record and background were not in the least surprised that he "so enthusiastically continue[d] and expand[ed] the Bush era policies" As you posit, it has to do with power.

pessimizer 13y ago

and 4) he offered an enormous amount of liberal populist rhetoric, maybe the most since Roosevelt, and people were sick of the last 30 years of post-Reagan corporate centrist/triangulationist bullshit. >she believes that prioritization of healthcare is what has sidelined civil rights in this administration I think healthcare was more important for this administration to deal with than civil rights, which aren't rapidly declining except due to the disaster that both healthcare spending and lack of health care has done to this country. It's affecting black people a lot more than others mainly because of our relatively tenuous hold on the middle class. Problem is that he used up all of his goodwill on the healthcare fight, using rhetoric to push it as if he was conjuring up a new utopia, but just managed to entrench insurers and corporate rent-seekers more into the process, and to only mildly increase the footprint of coverage. The main benefit of what he passed is that it will slow the growth of healthcare spending just enough to make it difficult for conservative-libertarian scum to paint Social Security as an immanent danger anymore. To celebrate this exceedingly minor victory, he's been trying his level best to cut Social Security by raising the retirement age, changing the inflation indexing, and acknowledging dopey schemes like means-testing. The worst part is IMO, he thinks that cutting ("saving," in centrist rhetoric) Social Security is going to be his legacy, and that history is going to view him as a hero for it.