I was SO WRONG about ‘Obama for President’!
I’m thinking of turning my project of penitence – to write “I was SO WRONG about ‘Obama for President’!” 10,000 times with a dunce cap on my stupid head – into a charity sponsored run, with the proceeds going to the Egyptian people…
I was SO WRONG about ‘Obama for President’!
I was SO WRONG about ‘Obama for President’!
I was SO WRONG about ‘Obama for President’!
I was SO WRONG about ‘Obama for President’!
I was SO WRONG about ‘Obama for President’!
I was SO WRONG about ‘Obama for President’!
…
Hard work, you know!
posted by Gert @ 3:22 PM
10 comments
10 Comments:
I'm not a big fan of Obama, either, though for different reasons than yours. But here's my question: of the candidates running in 2008, who would have done a job closer to your liking?
Let me put it this way: in 2012 I'll still be rooting for the Weak One: 'better the devil you know', you see?
But the man's a thorough dissapointment to most people. I'm not sure I understand 'what went wrong'...
I think he's a good president domestically and a horrible president in foreign affairs. I expected him to be horrible on both fronts, though not as horrible as McCain, which is why I voted for Obama (though I voted for Hillary Clinton in the primaries).
Domestically, he's achieved quite a lot - health care, financial reform, the end of "Don't Ask Don't Tell", etc. Internationally, though, he has somehow managed to lose the respect of everybody from all across the political spectrum. That's what zero experience in international affairs will get you.
We Europeans almost solely judge American Presidents by their FP achievements, precisely because US FP is generally so weak, manipulative, self-serving and damaging. I’m not sure Obama’s lack of experience is a cause of much here: he seemed, right from the off, to have chosen a continuation of the previous FP.
One thing I think he’s definitely doing wrong is that he’s trying to be a ‘unifying figure’. In doing so he ends up pleasing few people on either side. He seems to be perpetually campaigning: someone should tell him he’s got the job!
With all due respect, Gert, have you been paying attention? Obama stacked his economic 'team' with the same banksters who'd brought the economy down in the first place. He has not progressed the Employee Free Choice Act, his 'health care plan' was nothing more than a gift to the insurance industry... The media present him as compromising with the 'right', but it's not a compromise - he's on their side. If you haven't been reading Paul Street, maybe you should have a look at some of his stuff: http://www.zcommunications.org/zspace/paulstreet
Do I think McCain would have been any better? 'The lesser evil is still evil.' If we want 'hope and change we can believe in', we're just going to have to pull our fingers out and take a leaf from the Egyptians's book. A Tahrir Square in every town!
Ernie:
I’m well aware that Emm’s blowing Obama’s ‘domestic trumpet’ is overblown but you should really take that up with him, not me. As regards an American Tahrir (or European) , whoever the Americans ‘elect’ next time won’t matter one iota in that scenario (if it comes to be). But for my own safety and mental sanity I still prefer Obama to Palin, Huckabee or what’s that LDS fellow called. Yep: my own selfish realism.
But I don't expect Emmanuel to make sense. And it was you who thought he wanted to be a 'unifying figure', which I took to mean effecting compromises, when he has been pretty unambguously and absolutely shamelessly prosecuted the right wing agenda.
I am not among those who reckon a more repressive regime inevitably radicalises people, but I fear I can't help thinking a Palin White House or the like might just serve the bloody Seppos a wee taste of their own medicine. It could be salutary. Who knows?
Hmmm… I just don’t trust Sarah ‘stupid girl’ Palin with the nukes, Ernie. Remember that Spitting Image episode in which Ronald Reagan accidentally pushed the Red Button instead of the alarm clock when he was getting out of bed? With Palin that might just become a reality...
Ernie, you don't expect me to make sense? Because I'm an evil Zionist, there's no chance I'll make sense even on issues unrelated to Israel, like Obama's domestic policy?
Gert:
"he seemed, right from the off, to have chosen a continuation of the previous FP."
Other than the fact that he hasn't pulled out of Iraq and Afghanistan, his foreign policy is very different from Bush's. He's much more into diplomatic engagement, especially with the Muslin world. He has, however, showed some arrogance toward other countries, including Europeans.
"As regards an American Tahrir (or European) , whoever the Americans ‘elect’ next time won’t matter one iota in that scenario (if it comes to be)."
Unless there's an anomaly like the 2000 elections, Americans will elect someone, not 'elect' someone. It's a real election.
Emm:
”He's much more into diplomatic engagement, especially with the Muslin world.”
Don’t kid yourself: up to this very moment he still hasn’t been able to utter the magic words: ‘Mubarak leave’. The administration is now pimping Suleiman, a torturer and lifelong friend of the die-hard dictator. Last time he was in Cairo, he was hailed as a saviour, next time he’ll be pelted with shoes…
I’m convinced that Obama’s early stances on Islam and the Arab world were designed to placate the Europeans: after Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld we needed some reassurance. And we got lulled into sleep again. But no more…
”not 'elect' someone”
You know I don’t have a high opinion of American democracy: that is a place where just about everything is bought and sold with Big Money (lobbies). See also how much money you need for American ‘elected’ officials to speak of the US/Israel relationship in terms of ‘unbreakable bonds’ and more to the point, to define ME foreign policy in function of one country only. Many Americans see the lobby system as perfectly acceptable, I find it abhorrent… Money buys influence in Europe and elsewhere too but in few places that factors as high as in the US…
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