http://www.slate.com/articles/news_...es_republicans_to_oppose_his_grand_plans.html I Dare You Obama challenges Republicans: See what happens when you oppose my grand plans. Barack Obama campaigned and won re-election without anything much resembling a second-term agenda. On the campaign trail, he called for greater tax fairness, more jobs, and doing something or other about immigration. Seeking refuge in even greater vagueness, Mitt Romney was in no position to call him out. Since the election, however, the president has been steadily filling in the missing pieces, asserting his renewed mandate on behalf of an ambitious, liberal agenda. As of last nightâs State of the Union address, no one can accuse Obama of lacking specifics. His proposals were many, detailed, and in a few instances unexpected. His speech was a deliberate effort to move the national conversation away from an endless budget battle that threatens to overshadow his second term. Looking beyond what he was right to call the âmanufacturedâ fiscal crisis that continues to preoccupy Washington, Obama offered a new program that was broader and more comprehensive than his first termâs. This includes the nightâs biggest surprise, a proposed hike in the minimum wage of nearly 25 percent, to $9 an hour, which would lift millions of workers out of poverty. The speech also proposed major new investments in infrastructure and early childhood education, a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, marriage equality for homosexuals, voting reform, gun control, a U.S.-EU free-trade zone, comprehensive tax reform, market-based rules on greenhouse gas emissions, national energy conservation goals, more research into clean energy technology, an accelerated troop drawdown in Afghanistan, and more. Most of this wonât even come up for a vote, of course. While a few Republicans have signaled flexibility on immigration, the current House leadership is unlikely to take up a minimum-wage law or new spending programs. Obama knows that and has incorporated the reality of obstructionism into his political strategy. His big speech set what he hopes will become a lose-lose trap for Republican legislators: accede to his agenda, or face his mobilized supporters in 2014. In his first term, Obamaâs message to the GOP was, âI will meet you halfway.â They refused to budge. His second term message is: âCompromise or pay the political price.â To the public, the implicit message was: âIf you want any of this stuff, Iâm going to need a Democratic Congress next time.â When Republicans won control of Congress in 1994, Bill Clinton responded with a long list of small-bore initiatives: gun safety locks, school uniforms, the v-chip, cellphones for citizen patrols, and so forth. Clinton wanted to show that he was still relevant and that he could still accomplish something even with a divided government. Obama, by contrast, has little appetite for legislative hors dâoeuvres. His program is designed to show not what he can do with a Republican Congress but what he canât do with one. The impossibility of getting much done at present lends itself to expansiveness, at least at the level of presidential rhetoric. Talking about what he would like to do, rather than what he can do, Obama is able to offer a broad agenda around the themes of equality and fairness that framed his second inaugural. At the same time, the president must avoid the charge that he is relapsing into old-school liberalism. Thus he framed his proposals on Tuesday evening as âsmarter governmentâ rather than bigger or more government. This framing is telling. Where Obama may be overreaching is in assuming away fiscal problems that are still very much with us. The American economy is in recovery mode and tax receipts are rising, but a vast structural deficit remains. Absent the kind of grand bargain Republicans are loath even to discuss, federal insolvency will pre-empt the kinds of investments Obama talked about last night. To the delight of his base, the president has found his progressive voice. Only in a context of fiscal rectitude can he use it to bring back government activism.
What has the GOP's 4 year obstructionist game plan accomplished ? Obama re-elected and the lowest Congressional approval rating in history.
This includes the nightâs biggest surprise, a proposed hike in the minimum wage of nearly 25 percent, to $9 an hour, which would lift millions of workers out of poverty. The speech also proposed major new investments in infrastructure and early childhood education, a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, marriage equality for homosexuals, voting reform, gun control, a U.S.-EU free-trade zone, comprehensive tax reform, market-based rules on greenhouse gas emissions, national energy conservation goals, more research into clean energy technology, an accelerated troop drawdown in Afghanistan, and more. ------------------------------------------------- Seriously lacking is maintaing our individual freedoms and constutional protections. Ya think min wage made this country great? We don't need a grand plan, a simple plan would do, uniting people. Not divide and conquer. Of course, this is all in my head. carry on.
Republicans have been doing that long before democrats.Southern strategy,welfare queens(codewords for blacks),anti gay equality,those evil brown people invading America etc . Those groups have now united and have the numbers to overcome the southern strategy boys now they want to cry about democrats using the same divide and conquer strategy that they used to use
I think dividing your enemy probably goes back just a hair farther than "dems" and "reps". : ) But the point is taken, it's not any "under Obama" nonsense.
Yeah, those freebies make life so good. I'm sure it's pride and pride alone that keeps you off the freebies.
I used to listen to KPFK in Los Angeles way back in the day. They are part of the Pacifica Network with two stations in California and one in New York City. They started one in Texas but somebody blew it up, go figure. I admired them for their balls, they started spewing communist propaganda in America in the middle of the Cold War no less. It was a freeing experience in a way. We were all conditioned to expect a nuke attack at any moment from Russia but here was Radio Moscow Jr. streaming insults at my sensibilities right from my speakers. I used to get high and start listening to some music but the next program would be put on by some insanely shrill leftists demanding all sorts of stuff and accusing all sorts of people.. Buzz Kill on steroids to say the least, they could make a paranoiac high get worse! Fast Forward fifty years and we are getting the same stuff shoved on our plates from the White House. I hope we can get through this shit with our constitutional rights intact.. more intact than they currently are would be good.
He bullshitted his way into office, it's the only way he can stay in power. About five years ago I found a wonderful matrix based on a few dozen political issues. I should have kept a copy. It showed what BO believed and what a typical voter believed. BO is on the other side of most issues from the typical voter and even from typical Democrats! The Left owns the MSM. There is no serious discussion of any political issues in the MSM. Were that not true we never would have heard of the guy.