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Politics: Is Obama Learning, or Was He Lying?

What do you think?

  • Obama just said what needed to be said to get elected. That is unacceptable.

    Votes: 9 45.0%

  • Obama just said what needed to be said to get elected. Totally Understandable.

    Votes: 5 25.0%

  • Obama is still learning - and accepting advice.

    Votes: 4 20.0%

  • Obama is groping in the dark.

    Votes: 4 20.0%
  • Total voters
    20
NYBamaFan

NYBamaFan

Suspended
Feb 2, 2002
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Blairstown, NJ
Obama made many promises that he said distinguished him from McCain during the campaign. His two biggest points:

* McCain supported the need to keep troops in Iraq until the job was done. Obama promised to have the troops home within 16 months.

* McCain supported Bush's tax cuts and said that they needed to be extended given the state of the economy. Obama said that they were wrong minded and needed to be ended. In fact, he was pushing tax increases for the wealthy.

Should any of us be surprised to learn that he has back-tracked from both positions before even taking office? We all knew that he was wrong - that he couldn't deliver on Iraq and that the economy needed the cash to continue to flow. The question - die he know?

I ask because I have a number of friends on both sides of the aisle, and they disagree. Some believe that he knew all along but said what he neede to say to get elected. Others say that he is just learning as he becomes more aware of the conditions that we face at home and abroad.

What say you?
 
Obama could have gotten up there and said he was going to implement full fledged communism and he would have gotten elected. People viewed McCain as another "George Bush" and Bush and his administration had become so disliked by the majority of the American public the republican party was doomed from the get go.

Things to remember about some of what Obama promoted during his campaign:

- Raising taxes and/or cutting credits for corporations only results in the corporation passing the tax increase to the consumer. I work for a big corporation and anytime our cost increase whether it be the product cost or a tax increase we simply raise our prices.

- Cutting tax credits and raising taxes in a bad economy isn't a way to get it going or build consumer confidence with respect to spending their money.

The people spoke. The majority got the president they wanted. That's the beautiful thing about our country. If he doesn't do what he said he would do then he'll have to answer to the people and the media that wanted him. The distance that lies between the line for the hero and the goat is razor thin. I've said it before. The "winner" of this election was the one that didn't get elected.
 
The biggest clue that something was amiss was the record amount of campaign money that Obama raised -- over $600 million. As it takes a lot of money to gain exposure and win campaigns, this was not a small feat which seems to keep getting dismissed.

His master is not the public who elected him, but it is a different set of masters who are very wealthy. As a sign of this, we only need to look at his initial cabinet appointments. Change you can believe in? It's the old Washington insiders. Obama says the change is him -- his ideas and his agenda, not of those who make up his cabinet. Does this sound realistic? Does Saban build his football team with coaches who has a different philosophy than he has?

I'm certain out of the thousands of bankers and politicians in the country, there are plenty wo have strong credentials to help guide the country as those he selected. The only difference is that the ones he chose know where the dirt is and are in the best position to keep it hidden.

Examples of things that must not be exposed to the public and, thus, hidden by the media?
1. subprime mortgages and predatory lending.
2. derivatives market.
3. market and commodities manipulation.
4. widening of the circumstances to declare martial law in the US.
5. consolidation of the oil sellers.
6. TARP.
7. $5.5 trillion lost through the Federal gov't.
 
I have always thought, and have said repeatedly, that he wasn't being truthful with respect to his intentions about withdrawing from Iraq. I'm glad to be right.

I'm equally happy to see that he's backtracking about taxes, although I didn't have the certainty that he would do so the way I did about his Iraq statements.

I don't really care which guy it is behind the desk, as long as he's doing what I want him to do. But I voted for "unacceptable" that he misled people, because it is.
 
I agree with BamaBuzzard that the real winner is the one that lost the election. Obama is inheriting a horrendous mess and I see little chance of this economy bouncing back in the next three or four years.

I really feel for the guy because now he probably realizes he has been thrown into the lion's den. He is going to be faced with the difficult decision of esculating the national debt with more and more bailouts, leading to runaway inflation, or ceasing the bailout money and let the nation suffer through a long and severe recession. I'm sure he already realizes that all those ambitious programs will have to wait until conditions improve.

He is OK for a year or so, but the buck stops with the President and the American people will grow short on patience when this severe recession drags on. That does not bode well for re-election.
 
jthomas666 said:
Fundamental incorrect assumption. Another underlying assumption--equally false-- is that the economic situation remained static from the beginning of the campaign until today.
Click to expand...

Sorry - you are correct on both counts (though everyone that has a basic understanding of economics knew that a tax hike anywhere would be very difficult on an already struggling economy), and the two items that I listed were used up until the very end.

So - let's get away from the economy. Tell me, what has changed in Iraq since then? ;)

I am not ripping Obama, just trying to make people aware that he is just a tool of the people who put him in office. If he still has ideals, they are being cast aside...
 
NYBamaFan said:
So - let's get away from the economy. Tell me, what has changed in Iraq since then? ;)

I am not ripping Obama, just trying to make people aware that he is just a tool of the people who put him in office. If he still has ideals, they are being cast aside...
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what you're referring to on Iraq but if you watched Obama on Meet the Press yesterday morning then you would know that he has changed very little on Iraq as far as what he wants to do as president.

He said back in June, I believe, that the first thing he would do on Iraq upon taking office would be to meet with the Joint Chiefs and ask them to put together a plan for responsible withdrawal from Iraq. Responsible draw-down of troops in Iraq would now be the objective. Yesterday on Meet the Press he reaffirmed his intention to do just that in his first week in office.

As far as Obama being a tool for people who put him in office, this is true of EVERY SINGLE POLITICIAN that has ever been elected after a campaign that relied on funds outside of his or her own personal funds and/or public funds. You don't get large campaign contributions on the assumption that you'll not show favor for the contributor. However, this is not always a bad thing depending on the contributor - one just has to be careful that their intentions at least somewhat align with your own. I think Obama has done a decent job of this.

Regardless, this is why our country desperately needs campaign finance reform and why electing judges is such a terrible idea.
 
I do not think Obama has a clue about what is going on in Iraq. This explains his constant "change" on his positions about the Iraq war. His floundering on economic issues is not helping either. The economy has been in a steady nose dive since election day.

Obama owes. He is in some serious debt to alot of people both in country and abroad. This election was bought and served up for him. This is what will shape his policy. He is basically a puppet on a string with Michael Moore, Streisand, the banking institution and who knows who else at the controls. No other POTUS has ever accepted the kind of money he has during an election. We already know about Fannie/Freddie. Find out his other major contributors and you will know which way he plans to lead this country.
 
Tider@GW_Law said:
As far as Obama being a tool for people who put him in office, this is true of EVERY SINGLE POLITICIAN that has ever been elected after a campaign that relied on funds outside of his or her own personal funds and/or public funds. You don't get large campaign contributions on the assumption that you'll not show favor for the contributor. However, this is not always a bad thing depending on the contributor - one just has to be careful that their intentions at least somewhat align with your own.
Click to expand...

Money influencing elections has certainly been a problem at the very least during the Carter vs. Ford election.

Would it be begging the question if I were to ask who chose whom?
Did Obama choose his major campaign contributors or was it the other way around? If it was Obama who chose his contributors, then why did he collect more money than anyone in the history of politics? If it was his contributors who chose Obama, then what is it that Obama will do that McCain will not when elected that is of paramount importance?
 
RhodeIslandRed said:
Money influencing elections has certainly been a problem at the very least during the Carter vs. Ford election.

Would it be begging the question if I were to ask who chose whom?
Did Obama choose his major campaign contributors or was it the other way around? If it was Obama who chose his contributors, then why did he collect more money than anyone in the history of politics? If it was his contributors who chose Obama, then what is it that Obama will do that McCain will not when elected that is of paramount importance?
Click to expand...

It goes back way further than Carter vs. Ford.

The reason Obama & Clinton raised so much more money than Repubs was simple: people want to back the winning horse. Take Pharma for instance, for the past 8 years Pharma has contributed quite a bit more to Repub campaigns than Dem campaigns, for obvious reasons (e.g. fear of increased fed regulation). However, during this past election cycle, Pharma contributions were higher for Dem candidates than Repub candidates for the simple reason that it knew the Dems were going to win - b/c I can assure you that no deals have been made. These contributions may have bought Pharma another seat at the table during contentious FDA rulemaking, but that's about it, which is not much considering what it would have gotten with past administrations Dem & Repub.

A lot of major contributors don't ever get anything in return for their huge donations - they just want to be personally assured of the candidate's plans for the future and the party's platform in their areas of interest. These are usually the contributors that the candidate will contact and they don't typically contribute unless they feel good about your chances of winning.

Obama made huge gains in contributions over past elections because of his incredibly savvy staff and emphasis on grassroots organizing. The number of volunteers that Obama utilized was staggering and allowed for an incredible number of self-sustaining field offices. He rewrote the textbook in this regard and I guarantee that you'll see almost all future presidential candidates attempting to follow this roadmap.

I think McCain continually shot himself in the foot from the get-go by repeatedly making terrible hiring decisions on key senior staff positions (e.g. I think he went through 2 heads of staff within his first 6 months that left him with barely enough cash on hand to keep his bus running).
 
Campaign contributions over $1k & lobbists = legalized bribery.

If we are to learn from the last few presidents, all of whom were puppets of large corporations, we need to focus on the reform of campaing financing and the elimination of lobbies.

Ideals have no place at the dinner table anymore...
 
Tider@GW_Law said:
...I'm an Obama supporter and I voted for him solely on his policy positions.
Click to expand...
In exit polls, voters for Obama voted for him because he represented a change but could not articulate his policies. In fact, many were duped into saying that they supported "policies" that the pollsters attributed to Obama but were really McCain's or Bush's. I will try to find the link...
 
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCipmnYCKB0]YouTube - What Happens When You Ask Harlem Why They Support Obama?[/ame]

Here's some of Stern's experiment.
 
NYBamaFan said:
In exit polls, voters for Obama voted for him because he represented a change but could not articulate his policies. In fact, many were duped into saying that they supported "policies" that the pollsters attributed to Obama but were really McCain's or Bush's. I will try to find the link...
Click to expand...

It was pretty wild what some of the Obama supporters were saying. Obama does not even know what his policies are. He has not been told yet. You are right. He ran on "change" and this along with ACORN and his new found money brought him a lot of votes. The only "change" I see him bringing to the table is his plan to save the economy by generating new jobs. He plans on hiring new people to "change" out government lightbulbs with more energy efficient lightbulbs. Couple this with his plan to employ our new college graduates on road crews rebuilding the the nations's highways. This guy is brilliant! Another FDR. His appointments do not represent much "change" either. They are all just Washington throwbacks.

Obama has a broad history of "pay to play" politics. He owes a lot of people for this election. It will be interesting to see who controls his agenda.
 
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