White House Scorecard for 2009: Why Obama Gets at Best a 'C" Grade

[Better Believe It]

White House Scorecard for 2009: Why Obama Gets at Best a 'C" Grade
Merely being better than Bush is not how you get a good grade
By Brad Reed
January 7, 2010


.... Obama has not had a stellar start. In fact, I'd argue that the most disappointing part of the Obama presidency so far has been its ordinariness. Despite a lot of initial progressive hype, Barack Obama campaigned as an establishment Beltway Democrat and so far has governed no differently.

The biggest mistake of Obama's presidency so far has been limiting the scope of the fiscal stimulus that Congress passed earlier this year. When Obama and his economic team were crafting the stimulus plan, they essentially decided to make a Goldilocks policy that would be neither too hot nor too cold. The thinking was that too much stimulus would be too hot and would lead to higher inflation and larger budget deficits, whereas too little stimulus would be too cold and would result in a massive depression. So instead, the administration compromised with "centrists" in the Senate to get a "just right" policy that would gradually walk the economy back from the cliff but that would still leave massive unemployment in its wake.

Similarly disappointing has been the administration's kid-gloves treatment of the financial industry that caused 2008's economic meltdown. As Rolling Stone writer Matt Taibbi has depressingly documented, Obama's inner circle of economic advisors is larded with officials who have bought into Washington consensus economic dogma. The result has been that bailed-out banks have grown rich on taxpayer dollars while doing virtually nothing to increase lending to small businesses.

And then there were the health care bill negotiations. The big problem here was that the White House refused to get its hands dirty in policy negotiations and left many of the key provisions in the bill up to the Senate. This, combined with the fact that the administration had cut sweetheart deals with the pharmaceutical lobby, ensured that Senate "centrists" would be able to gut the portions of the bill that were opposed by special interests despite being politically popular. This is why the final Senate legislation contained no public health insurance plan, no Medicare buy-in and no drug reimportation.

Read the full article at:

http://www.alternet.org/politics/145007/white_house_scorecard_for_2009%3A_why_obama_gets_at_best_a_%27c%22_grade

[ima_sinnic]

1. a C is too generous for lying, corporate ass-kissing, & throwing We The People under the bus

[grytpype]

2. :cry:

Oh why didn't Obama bust up the mean corporations like he didn't say he was going to???

:cry::cry::cry::cry::cry:

It's making me cry and cry and cry!!!!

[ima_sinnic]

4. aww, Ignore is trying to say something

don't be shy, speak up!

:rofl:

[Kolesar]

6. We didn't have an economic collapse with 25% unemployment

[Better Believe It]

7. A few trillion bucks to the Wall Street fat cats stopped that!

Now they'll only give us the Great Recession!

[Kolesar]

8. I've been through worse

1980-1984

[freddie mertz]

3. Mr. Reed is a generous grader. nt.

[T Wolf]

5. Maybe a "C" graded on the curve established by Idiot Son. nt