ROLLING STONE: The Case for Obama-A Truly Historic Presidency

[kpete]

The Case for Obama
The charges are familiar: He's a compromiser who hasn't stood up to the GOP or Wall Street. But a look at his record reveals something even more startling — a truly historic presidency


When the history of this administration is written, Obama's opening act is likely to be judged as more impressive than any president's — Democrat or Republican — since the mid-1960s. "If you're looking at the first-two-year legislative record," says conservative American Enterprise Institute scholar Norman Ornstein, "you really don't have any rivals since Lyndon Johnson — and that includes Ronald Reagan."

........

Taken together, Barack Obama's achievements are not only historic in their sweep but unabashedly liberal. By contrast, President Clinton's top legislative victories — NAFTA and welfare reform — catered to the right wing's faith in free markets and its loathing of big government. "When you add them all together, it's clear that Obama's accomplishments have been underrated," says Brinkley. "Saving the auto industry, health care, getting out of Iraq — these are big things for the progressive movement."

.................

But heading into November, it appears that the president's high-minded and seemingly sincere disdain for politics could prove the undoing of what he has fought so hard to accomplish. Yes, he has succeeded in moving the Senate to action — but along the way he has fumbled the support of his own electorate. Progressive activists in the party remain convinced that Obama could have won even grander victories, if only he had been willing to fight harder and compromise less. Having deeply invested in the image Obama sold them as a candidate — a new breed of politician, determined to bring radical transparency to Washington and open up government to average Americans — they have experienced his reliance on backroom negotiations as nothing short of a personal betrayal. And instead of working to soothe disgruntled supporters, Obama and his inner circle have flamed the discontent by telling liberal critics to "stop whining" and "buck up."

"It's somewhat inexplicable why his record hasn't been communicated better, particularly the health care bill," says Goodwin. "That's the responsibility of the president — and we thought of him as such a good communicator." The mishandling of the politics of health care reform, adds Wilentz, has cost Obama dearly. "Where was the moment?" he says. "There should have been goose bumps: health care! But it didn't happen. What should have been a crescendo was a diminuendo. You have this great accomplishment and everybody feels terrible — because of the politics."

MUCH MORE:
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/17390/220013

[JamesA1102]

1. K&R! nt

[Tippy]

2. K&R

[madmax]

3. If he walked on water

they'd bitch he couldn't swim. LBJ said something like that...



I like the article but, I've heard it criticized by various pundits.

Don't give a rat's ass about what anyone says about my Prez. He isn't perfect but, he was ELECTED not selected and he's doing the best he can imo with the shit load of a mess bush left him with. :rant:

[joeybee12]

4. K&U

Good Lord...hrc as a progressive victory...gimme a freaking break.

[cbdo2007]

5. And this is just getting started - we've still got 6 years left!!

[jaxx]

6. A Truly Historic Presidency

Yes, it is. Less than 2 years into it and President Obama has already brought big changes to the country. He does it his way, but it gets done. I think that is some of what bothers the naysayers, he isn't the status quo everyone has gotten used to and expected.

K&R

[madmax]

7. k&r

[WilliamPitt]

8. This is refreshing.

:)

[Demeter]

9. Halloween is NEXT Weekend

This is pre-emptive trickery.

[JamesA1102]

10. Trickerly???

[JamesA1102]

11. K again nt

[donheld]

12. I read it today - very enlightening.

[izzybeans]

13. He deserves criticism but he also pays what my former students called the

"black tax". (i.e. Having to go astronomically beyond expectations to get an average grade). I have no idea if this concept has any import beyond the midwest, where it is a common part of "the veil".

No President has scared the right wing so much with such little fury, and yet in two years more has been accomplished than in the past 16.

I'm always struck by Clinton supporters complaining about Obama moving DADT closer to repeal than anyone since their favorite candidate signed it into law. The irony there is tragic. Though I understand the fury of some, we are so close, so they deserve to display their impatience. But the ironic tension there is part of the tax I mentioned. Anyone that points it out must pay it before crossing the bridge.

[nevergiveup]

14. Great observation and spot on.

Few will admit it but what you say is the truth.

[Hannah Bell]

16. there's truth in the "black tax". but i personally don't consider hcr as a great victory.

i consider it a step toward full privatization of health care.

[izzybeans]

26. .

I agree. I'm thoroughly disappointed in how that went down. I have the audacity to hope that he isn't the last President to work on health care. Or that he isn't finished. But its just a hope. There is nothing concrete behind it.

[Hannah Bell]

36. so far as the black tax goes, i was suspicious in the first place as to why the party decided the

worst economic situation since the depression was a good time to select its first black presidential candidate (& a fairly inexperienced one as well, without a personal power base or long list of favors to call in)

doesn't make sense to me.

[BuelahWitch]

52. I didn't understand why all the push for an "historic" candidate (Obama or Clinton) either

Nor the need for a "war hero" in 2004.

[midnight]

62. Hannah or izzy could you explain to me this midwestern insight into the "black tax"

I get that it is about grades, but why the midwest? And why the beyond effort to achieve an avg. grade?

[dotymed]

15. Yes, I voted and worked for President Obama's election.

I cannot consider his HCR as a victory.
When you say you will not settle for anything less than a public option and then never attempt to get it.....also there was NO language that kept premiums down. So, we have handed the (should be illegal, for-profit) health care insurance industry, millions of new "customers" and their response has been to greatly INCREASE premiums.
I know the whole, "we have to start somewhere" meme, this was a shitty way to begin the (hopefully inevitable) universal health care we deserve.

[krawhitham]

43. You have to start somewhere, and no one else got it started but tried for the last 60 years

and Obama got it done.


Give credit where credit is due. Canada's HC was not all that good when it started. They took a starting point and slowly improved it. Which is what we have to do. But after 60 years of trying we now finally have a starting point

[BzaDem]

17. But of course, according to some here, his legislation somehow MADE US WORSE OFF!

K & R to Rolling Stone for seeing the obvious, and not living in an alternate reality where up is down and good is bad.

[Erose999]

24. I now have a mandate to buy healthcare I can't afford. I am indeed worse off. Thanks, Obama!

Also, don't even get me started on his DEFENSE of DADT. Actions, as we all know speak louder than words.

And he is also pushing for greater "domestic surveillance" powers. Assanations of American Citizens without even bringing charges against them. The continued operation of GITMO.

Makes me sick. Its laughable that anyone would call Obama a progressive.

[krawhitham]

44. Far to many freeper trolls around here

[creon]

51. yes there are

[MadHound]

18. People keep pointing to things like health care reform and the stimulus

As examples of Obama's greatness, but frankly they are examples of his greatest failures. A mandated monopoly with little in the way of price controls and no public option is not a liberal victory, it is a corporate victory, specifically a victory for the insurance industry. And the stimulus was simply too little and filled with too many tax cuts to do any real good.

But Obama does have his echo chamber that continues to try and spin straw into gold.

[theaocp]

19. +1

And now the chickens come home to roost.

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2010/10/20/despite-once-secret-deals-with-obama-hospital-association-turns-against-democrats/

[BzaDem]

21. The same crap was said about Social Security after FDR enacted it. They faded into irrelevency

as will the tiny minority of the Democratic party that doesn't think HCR/FinReg/stimulus were major progressive victories.

[Romulox]

23. Bankster bailouts as Obama's Social Security? A bit far-fetched!

[dflprincess]

28. What industry was FDR protecting with Social Security?

Obama & the Congressional Democrats sold us out to the health insurers. We need access to care we got a mandate to continue buying the same shoddy products from the same old crooks who make their money by blocking access to care.

And, if there had been any real interest in financial reform, Glass-Steagall would have reenacted with some tweeks to cover the new scams Wall Street has come up with.

[Hannah Bell]

37. um, people complained because social security mandated the purchase of retirement plans

from private insurers?

[BzaDem]

38. No, they complained in general that it wasn't progressive and should not pass.

There will ALWAYS be a tiny subset of the left that believes that every law isn't progressive. That doesn't make the subset relevant.

[Hannah Bell]

39. in whose revisionist history book?

[KossackRealityCheck]

55. monopoly ?

I've heard this before. Could you explain this? I thought a monopoly was when only one company was in a particular market.

Does the bill get rid of all the insurance companies except for one?

[BzaDem]

63. Many people here take liberties with the usage of the word monopoly.

They think when only private sector corporations are in a given business, then the "private sector corporations" have a "monopoly" in the business (because no Government corporation exists in the business). In other words, to them, there is no such thing as competition BETWEEN private sector corporations, because they all collude/etc. The only way to get competition (to them) is to have the government compete.

Of course, when there is more than one without a dominant player, that is not a monopoly by definition.

There are indeed some states that have one dominant player. (They tend to be small states.) But there are many states (with large populations) that don't.

I think a public option would have been great, because health insurance has a particular property (where the bigger you get, the better discounts from providers you can muscle, which means you get even bigger). It is essentially economies of scale, on steroids (though not because of greater efficiency -- mainly because of greater negotiating power).

But the idea that states with multiple reasonable-sized health insurance companies have a "monopoly" is a ridiculous notion, and incorrect by definition.

[KossackRealityCheck]

64. Thank you for this explanation

I thought the sentence seemed a bit fishy.

[Scurrilous]

20. K & R

:thumbsup:

[Beetwasher]

22. "...not only historic in their sweep but unabashedly liberal"

Damn straight they're Liberal.

[colsohlibgal]

25. Really?

I read through the part on health care and saw nothing much about costs. It's the huge elephant in the room. Some people will maybe be in better shape than they were but others likely won't. And my guess is that most of the time we'll still be bled dry so some CEO can make 15 billion instead of a paltry 13 million.

I'm not saying he hasn't done a few good things. He has been better than what we had (mostly, see below) but how hard is that?

This writer blows over him choosing the Goldman Sachs in and out of government Rubin wing hacks instead of people like Reich and Liz Warren, and him hiring a chief of staff that views me and other true progressives as "retards". He completely squandered a huge amount of political capital out of the gate, when he had bigger margins in congress than Dubya.

We're still being spied on, people are still being thrown in detention centers with no due process and at a higher rate than Dubya. He's waffling on DADT.

So I'm not even seeing a glass half full, I'm seeing a glass maybe 15% full.

[onehandle]

27. All of which will come to an abrupt end on November 2nd.

The orange man will be calling the shots for the next two years.

[ProSense]

29. "The orange man will be calling the shots for the next two years."

Yeah, too bad Howard Dean isn't DNC chair. Democrats would win by a landslide.

[spanone]

45. dream on

[AtomicKitten]

30. Good read. Thanks for posting. nt

[Name removed]

31. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[zipplewrath]

32. Friggin' hillarious

They virtually acknowledge every short coming and failure and then basically imply that it doesn't matter. And the characterize every legislative victory as "historic" just because it happened. They also use every number they can maximize to make it sound historic, and ignore every possible prediction that it won't reach those numbers. And they basically totally ignore the two wars he continues to fight, only seeing fit to acknowledge the one positive in them, he actually managed to execute Bush's SOFA in Iraq so far. Half of what they claim are historic achievements are things that haven't even happened yet. In one case even acknowledging that the outcome is actually unknown:

Obama has taken heat from progressive critics — much of it deserved — over the weakest aspects of his effort to reform Wall Street. It remains unclear whether the new law — the most sweeping overhaul of financial regulations since the Great Depression — will do enough to rein in high-risk trading and end the era of Too Big to Fail.

The White House couldn't have written a more slanted piece if they tried.

[jonnyblitz]

34. damn I am glad it wasn't just me! that article certainly WAS

a steaming pile! :crazy:

[zipplewrath]

35. It is one of about 3 basic versions

We keep seeing these "defenses" of Obama, and they fall into about 1 of 3 categories.

1) Keeping the bar low: It usually involves phrases like "most progressive in a generation" or "in 40 years" or some other mildly vague expression. Look, we haven't had a progressive presidency since maybe Carter. That only lasted 4 years and in many way suffered greater economic woes than Obama arrived to deal with. There was little "progressive" about Clinton and in fact left us with many of the issues we deal with today including the banking mess, DADT, and DOMA. The last significant progressive presidency we had was LBJ, and Obama ain't anywhere near that successful or progressive. And he seems to be channelling LBJ on war.

2) Counting accomplishment that haven't happened: This article was big on this, presenting future outcomes, that aren't clear or guaranteed, as accomplishments. And it will simultaneously ignore potential negative outcomes. Only potential positive outcomes are predicted, and negative ones aren't even mentioned.

3) A complete lack of accurate presentation of critics points of view: Their summary of the complaints of critics are often bordering on strawmen, usually either picking some extreme critic, or paraphrasing a point badly, eliminating the substantive aspects of the critque.

[Individualist]

47. It's Orwellian

[chervilant]

33. POTUS...

not a job I would want to take on...

I'm beginning to suspect that whoever was elected on that fateful day Mr. Obama became our President would have become a lightning rod for controversy and criticism. We have a defining set of expectations about our 'world leader,' grounded in decades of past presidencies, and the very inception of this nation. Spice that up with the epic fail that was the Bush administration, and most of us have waited with bated breath to see how the new guy would measure up to our high expectations. We're still waiting...

That being said, we tend to forget that we're living in exponential times, and that our technology allows us to witness, discuss, dissect and judge every event as it is happening. We the People sometimes cannot see our forest for the trees...

Finally, we humans are facing a catastophic shift in our global economy, with all the repercussions we MUST anticipate in every aspect of our lives. We know it's here, despite the fact so many of us are still in denial. Many of us who've long recognized this inevitability fervently hoped for a leader who would think outside the box, and innovate. We haven't seen that in Obama. So, some of us whinge...

I want Mr. Obama to experience Thaddeus Russell. Maybe that will motivate him to wade into uncharted territory, and be the change we STILL hope to see. A girl can hope...

[Name removed]

40. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Egnever]

49. Yes cause he could just snap his fingers and make it so

With the senate he has to work with I am amazed he got anything done.

[Egnever]

50. double post

The new IE has some Issues.

[creon]

53. nice rant

well played

[zenprole]

59. Many thanks

Of course, it was censored by DU - putting the democracy back in the, something, um...whatever.

Was it the Jann Wenner comment that tripped the wire? ('cause people never use profanity on DU!)Or was it the harsh, clear sting of the truth?

More often than not, DU serves as an off-ramp - squelching talk that might lead to taking action. The parallels with the right are noteworthy, and it's a privilege to monkeywrench on occasion.

[soryang]

57. He blew an historic opportunity

I agree with your view 100 percent. I will vote for democratic candidates that walk the talk, not the ones who let the lobbyists write the "reform" legislation.

Millions of Americans dispossessed from their homes, out of work, hungry or going bankrupt because of their so called "health insurance" don't give a rat's behind about alleged historic legislation.

The DLC wants to play for corporate donations but they don't want to face the consequences.

[zenprole]

60. Walking the DU plank

Like Tim Robbins once noted after voicing unwelcome notions and acting on them, with talk like that you won't get invited to all the great parties. Or did he mean 'Parties'?

[Hekate]

41. Kick and Rec

[deacon]

42. k + r

[Scurrilous]

46. Kick

:kick:

[Individualist]

48. The article is more appropriate for The Onion than for Rolling Stone.

[zenprole]

61. Monty Python's Yes We Can

"Like it, centurion, like it!" - Ben the Prisoner

[creon]

54. not easy

No one ever said that this was going to be easy.
Obama came into office with a huge economic meltdown; a recession and a freclosure fraud crisis; two wars, one of which does not want to end; a laundry list of "must do" -- do this now!; a fractious, disorganized and undisciplined party composed of people who despise each other; a political oppsotion that cannot cooperate < The GOP is incapable of cooperation>.

The economic mainstream has no solutions to a recession; it, basically, never has had any solutions. And, never will. The ones that do have solutions are ignored. The economy will have to fix itself.

Of course the legislation that was passed satiisfies no one: look who is in the HoR and Senate. What do you expect?


I do not expect anyone to be satisfied with Obama. He is hated by the Republican voters; he has disappointed the progressive faction. Sometimes I wonder about Hillary Clinton, and how people would have reacted to her. I suspect that the reactions would be similar.

[indimuse]

56. KNR!

;)

[SammyWinstonJack]

66. ROFL!

That cartoon.....:rofl:

[JamesA1102]

58. Cognitive dissonance

Dissonance is aroused when people are confronted with information that is inconsistent with their beliefs. If the dissonance is not reduced by changing one's belief, the dissonance can result in misperception or rejection or refutation of the information, seeking support from others who share the beliefs, and attempting to persuade others to restore consonance.

Reading some of the responses to this great article, it seems some are suffering from this.

[underpants]

65. Kicking for later read