Obama: I Would Be Considered Moderate Republican In 1980s - ABC News

[bananas]

http://abcnews.go.com/ABC_Univision/Politics/obama-considered-moderate-republican-1980s/story?id=17973080

Obama: More Moderate Republican Than Socialist

By JORDAN FABIAN (@Jordanfabian)
Dec. 14, 2012

President Barack Obama believes that if he were president 25 years ago, his economic policies would make him a moderate Republican.

During an interview with Noticias Univision 23, the network's Miami affiliate newscast, Obama pushed back against the accusation made in some corners of south Florida's Cuban-American and Venezuelan communities that he wants to instill a socialist economic system in the U.S. The president said he believes few actually believe that.

"I don't know that there are a lot of Cubans or Venezuelans, Americans who believe that," Obama said. "The truth of the matter is that my policies are so mainstream that if I had set the same policies that I had back in the 1980s, I would be considered a moderate Republican."

<snip>

Some on the left have long argued that the president's policy beliefs closely resemble moderate Republican views from the 1980s and 1990s. Ezra Klein made the argument in a 2011 column, citing his adoption of the individual health insurance mandate, an idea developed in conservative think tanks. Will Saletan of Slate made a similar argument this year.

[yourout]

1. Sadly true.

In far to many ways.

[Buzz Clik]

2. Right. And Bill Maher said that Reagan would be considered a leftwinger today.

It's a rhetorical gimmick aimed at making a point, not a political statement.

[Renew Deal]

3. Well that settles that

ha!

[OKNancy]

4. this was posted on DU Dec 14th...

anything new?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014336360

[bananas]

6. Thanks, I didn't see it.

And when I searched for it, I found things like this thread, ironically locked for being "over-the-top": http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=433x258567

[Enrique]

8. that lock is ridiculous

DU should be embarrassed. Maybe that's why they moved to the jury system, so they didn't have to make such bogus locks themselves.

[bananas]

7. There's no video in that thread - here, you get to see and hear him say it

with your own two eyes and ears.

[exboyfil]

5. He says it

Even Reagan would have problems in today's Republican party. It all started with moderate George Bush saying in 1988 - Read my lips, no new taxes. He lost the 1992 election, and most Republicans have not been rational since that election.

Would Obama support the 1983 Social Security deal? Look at the liberal Dems who voted for it or which did not vote.

http://www.ssa.gov/history/tally1983.html

That legislation essentially created a $3T slush fund on the worker's backs for federal spending and kicked up the retirement age 2 years (also on the worker's backs).

Life expectancy has gone from 73.7 at birth in 1980 to 78.5 in 2009.

[marble falls]

11. And where would the workers be who had their pensions stripped or no pensions without SSI?

[NorthCarolina]

9. There was a time here on DU when pointing this out

would have invited immediate condemnation by our resident third-way crew. To be real, this 'revelation' certainly cannot be as a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention.

[marble falls]

10. More like a moderate 70's Republican, and so was Bill clinton. I have had NO trouble voting for ...

either one. But like others have said, stating this a couple of months ago would have gotten you kicked off DU.

[sulphurdunn]

12. The closest

we ever came to having a liberal government was during the New Deal and that was only possible because The Great Depression scared the plutocrats shitless that the peasants would revolt. They've been taking steps to undo the New Deal and to make certain the peons know their place ever sense. It's been a long hard class struggle for them that finally accelerate with the election of Ronald Reagan and has exploded since the collapse of the Soviet Union.