Is there some reverse-backflip-flying-fuck-ten-dimensional-super-secret-decoder-ring-holder-only-negotiating-ninja reason that it’s smart to put chained CPI, which normal people will call “a cut in Social Security”, in Obama’s budget? Or is it as stupid as it looks? Because Democrats cutting Social Security is, in my narrow mind, always fucking stupid, not just because it makes old people eat generic instead of Alpo, but also because, come election time, Republicans will be yelling “you cut Social Security” while Democrats will be making wonky mouth noises in the style of an hour-long Powerpoint presentation demonstrating the effect of chained CPI on the fourth and fifth deciles of future recipients in inflation-adjusted outlier years.
Here’s how you “fix” Social Security: Make rich folks pay more Social Security tax. The end.
Is that so goddam hard?
Update: Just to be perfectly clear, it is, given the current state of Congress, not just hard, but probably impossible to enact tax hike into law. If you are really the “Party of Social Security” and you want to show it, it should not be hard at all to put a proposed tax hike into your budget, especially if it’s structured to kick in at $300K or $400K or some other big number, leaving a gap between the current limit ($113K or so) and the new “Social Security tax on the rich”.
muddy
Spot on.
Ben Franklin
I have nothing to say.
You said it already, mistermix
Marc
What is the actual impact? Or are we supposed to not care about that, and instead chant slogans?
schrodinger's cat
At some level I think Obama buys the centrist deficit reduction claptrap. I think it is because of his years at the Chicago School.
If this is true, it is an EPIC FAIL.
Schlemizel
You are right – please expect to be bashed as a firebagging moron down thread. Your insufficient fealty to common wisdom will be punished!
Alex
I agree that including chained CPI is a bad idea, but the “concession” is the rest of the budget.
Of course, it has already led to Republicans saying “Look, let’s just do the parts we like that you agree to do.” Which is the alternative to Republicans saying “Look, Obama needs to show he’s serious by including stuff that we like.”
Brendan in NC
Apparently it is. Because the rich might not spend as much money as they have been, or something…
El Caganer
Why is this a surprise? He’s said for a long time that he’s willing to make this deal. Did you think he was lying?
Napoleon
Obama is completely incompetent as a negotiator. It really is that simple.
maya
Cause as we all know, Social Security & Medicare were what got us into this debt-mess in the first place. Not two wars “off the books” or the machinations of Wall Street.
Some parts of Obama are truly idiotic. This and Holder appointment. A spineless jellyfish of an AG.
burnspbesq
Given what the Soviets used to call “the correlation of forces,” yes, it is so goddamn hard.
And you know that perfectly well.
Go troll somebody else. I’m not in the mood today.
Hill Dweller
They’re writing policy in pursuit of the Village’s approval, which is a fool’s errand. The Village will always side with the Republicans.
Moreover, the Republicans will never agree to a “grand bargain”, but will damn sure use the proposed cuts in campaign ads.
Comrade Dread
So we can expect the counter-proposal to be all of the cuts and none of the revenue, and then endless weeks of conservatives asking us why the Democrats are being so intransigent after the GOP agreed to all of the cuts the Democrats came up with.
Lovely.
The Dangerman
He can propose Cuts and Taxes from now until rapture, it won’t pass (taxes), so it’s meaningless posturing.
batgirl
It is as stupid as it looks.
I’m so disgusted I can’t look at the news today.
Republicans get what they want (cuts to social security) but get to blame the Democrats.
Ben Franklin
The Mighty Jackie Robinson, has struck out.
There is no Joy in Mudville.
moeizw
@burnspbesq: Because expressing outrage that Obama has pre-negotiated our retirement away is, of course, trolling. Kindly go fuck yourself.
J.W. Hamner
The “preemptive concession” negotiating strategy of Obama’s White House has always been super annoying, but this is the same deal he’s been offering for months now. If they truly don’t mean to move from this proposal (unfortunately doubtful) then it’s simply optics.
As far as substance… I’m on the side of those who want to increase Social Security benefits, but I do have to admit that such thing is about as likely as running across a unicorn.
foosion
This morning Boehner said “If the president believes these modest entitlement savings are needed to help shore up these programs, there’s no reason they should be held hostage for more tax hikes.”
Anyone surprised?
2014 might well be a repeat of 2010
Cassidy
I’m willing to see what happens. These kinds of things don’t happen in a vacuum.
c u n d gulag
Yeah, it shouldn’t take the Oracle at Delphi to forcast the future!
Of course, even though their fondest wish is to either eliminate or privatize SS (probably, the latter), if Obama actually proposes even a penny of SS cuts, the R’s do a 180 and scream about how Obama’s trying to starve Grandma, and how, like in 2010, with Medicare, THEY, and THEY ALONE, are the great protectors of the ENTITLEMENT programs they love!!!
And you can take that to the bank!
At least you can take THAT to the bank, since there may be precious little else you’ll have to take to the bank.
My suggestion is, let’s just wait and see.
It’s not like this isn’t something the President hasn’t been talking about for years, and the R’s still haven’t bitten at the lure.
Too bad, instead of “Chained CPI,” the President doesn’t realize that THIS IS WHAT WE NEED TO DO:
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/economy/report/2010/12/09/8772/building-it-up-not-tearing-it-down/
But, of course the ones supporting these ideas are all DFH’s, who were right about everything for the past 3+ decades, so, WHAT THE FECK DO THEY KNOW?
No, according to the “Serious People,” who say a transfusion of new blood will only eventually kill the anemic patients, they all know that what we need to do, is “GET AS MANY LEECHES AS YOU CAN, AND BLEED ‘EM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!’
That’ll cure ’em!
mistermix
@burnspbesq: It is not hard at all to leave chained CPI out of a proposed budget. If, at the end of a negotiation process, chained CPI ended up as part of a deal, I’d look at the deal and decide if it was good. But starting out with chained CPI in your budget, as a Democrat, a member of “the party of Social Security” is just stupid.
Tractarian
I think the idea is that, by drawing the ire of liberals like you and me, he can establish credibility among right-wingers in Congress and “centrists” in the media.
In other words, yes, it is as stupid as it looks.
Omnes Omnibus
Does anyone think this budget proposal has a chance in hell of being enacted? Tax increases will damn it with the GOP and chained CPI will keep liberal Dems away. It is posturing.
The Moar You Know
No. The reason is obvious. Obama’s budget has no hope of passing, or even being taken up. He’s very slowly and diligently hammering out a case that even the dumbest member of the public could understand – that the Republicans are going to do absolutely nothing for the next four years.
However, the public is a lot dumber than Obama thinks, and at any rate half of them are totally on board with the idea to torpedo the economy of the nation into smoking ruin just to show that uppity nigger who’s boss. Frankly, he should probably just go on vacation for the next four years. Nothing is going to get done. The GOP has the ability and the will to ensure it.
UncommonSense
It’s as stupid as it looks.
I want to shake him and ask him what he could possibly be thinking.
nastybrutishntall
all for show. na. ga. happen.
KeithOK
@Marc:
The acutal impact is that Democrats get crushed in the next election and Republicans have their way with the Country.
Don SinFalta
@Napoleon:
Or maybe he’s as smart at the ‘bots say he is, and this is just his policy preference. Remember, like Bill Clinton, he has a long post-presidential life as a plutocrat to look forward to.
Morzer
I blame Obama.
Oh damn!
After further review, the ruling on the virtual field is confirmed.
I blame Obama.
Seriously, this is astoundingly bad strategy and even worse tactics.
Rule One of American politics for Democrats:
If it gives David Brooks and Andrew Sullivan stiffies, don’t do it, don’t even think about doing it.
askew
@Marc:
Apparently not as people are already calling Obama Hitler over this. If you read the articles though, it states that the budget will have offsets so that low income people won’t be impacted by this change.
And Greg Sargent has it exactly right, if liberals are so against this change, you’ll need to argue how it is worse than the sequester. Because we are either getting this or the sequester. I think this looks much better than the sequester personally.
maya
Looking forward to Obama’s fireside chat with grandma.
Xantar
@mistermix:
It’s all posturing, though. We know the Republicans aren’t going to bite, and then Obama gets to go to the public and say, “I offered them a cut in Social Security. My own party is screaming at me in protest. And the Republicans STILL won’t take yes for an answer.”
Also, there are ways to do chained CPI while still protecting people who are dependent on Social Security after they retire. My understanding is Obama’s proposed budget does this. So while chained CPI isn’t a good thing, it may be the least bad thing. Discussion from Salon here. Even Paul Krugman thought it might just barely be ok depending on what Obama gets in return.
But again, since the Republicans will reject the deal out of hand, it’s all just posturing on Obama’s part.
jon
Nothing will change. The President will say he was willing to do This for That. The Boehner will say he was unwilling to do That even with This on the table. Nothing will change.
MoeizW
@askew: Liberals have been choosing bad policy A over bad policy B for 40 years. Look where its gotten us.
The Moar You Know
@foosion: Well, like all sequels, it’s going to be a lot shittier than the original.
Gotta hand it to the Orange One, that was slick.
Comrade Jake
It would bother me more if I thought there was some chance it would get enacted as legislation. The thing is, Obama appears fairly firm on the revenue side as well, which the GOP simply won’t accept.
So I think this is all posturing at the moment to make the GOP look unreasonable. Of course, I’m not sure what good it will do, as most of these assholes come from fairly safe districts where teh crazy vote.
cleek
something to keep in mind: switching to chained CPI would raise revenues, because SS isn’t the only thing affected by it.
http://www.salon.com/2012/12/19/the_progressive_case_for_the_chained_cpi/
but, i agree with those who say this is just a feint. the GOP isn’t going to accept any Obama budget. and Obama will then be able to say “Hey, i’ve done all i can do; they won’t take ‘yes’ for an answer”.
Omnes Omnibus
@Xantar: For this to work, the Congressional Dems and liberal groups actually need to raise a huge fuss.
Davis X. Machina
It’s a wonk-sabrmetric-technocratic tweak to a number that’s been kicking around for twenty years.
More Google ngram hits from 1980 than 1990 or 2000. A non-negligible number of prominent Democratic-leaning economists and policy types used to support it.
The attention paid to its practical political implications, and its becoming Son of Public Option are both recent developments.
KeithOK
@nastybrutishntall:
It doesn’t have to actually happen to hurt in the next election. Republicans can honestly say “Obama tried to cut your Social Security.” Democrats will have no convincing response.
MoeizW
@jon: Except when President Christie offers the same cuts, he can claim bipartisanship and have Democrats falling over themselves to support it.
pamelabrown53
@Omnes Omnibus:
I agree. No chance in hell this passes. It’s posturing to underscore the republicans’ intransigence when they try and wreck the global economy over raising the debt ceiling.
How can this be used against democrats? They’ve already rejected it in the senate and would NEVER vote for it. So that leaves using it against Obama like they tried with the Medicare cuts. Only problem is that Obama will never be on any ballot again.
askew
Here is an actual piece of news that will get lost in the vapors. Obama’s budget pays for universal pre-K with a tax on cigarettes. That I can get behind.
pamelabrown53
@KeithOK: The democrats “convincing” response. They broke with the president and voted against the cuts…only it will never get that far.
mistermix
@Xantar: Of course it’s posturing. But if you’re going to posture, pick a posture that’s consistent with the rest of your party’s messaging, instead of the cloudy diarrhea water message of “chained CPI”. That’s all I’m saying.
El Tiburon
Kind of hard to do this when President Obama WANTS to cut social security. It’s not that he is being forced to; he WANTS it so bad he can taste it.
Perhaps if the CHAINED CPI got an assault weapon and, well, you know, maybe he he would hit the pavement to NOT CUT social security.
But face it, Obama is a neoliberal with fiscal policies. He wants to cut social security, enact world-wide NAFTA, and keep Wall Street comfy and sleeping well at night.
But I’m just a firebagger, Greenwaldian dittohead so fuck me.
Omnes Omnibus
@pamelabrown53: I am presuming that Pelosi and Reid have been consulted on this and that they will make sure that enough people are scream at the rafters.
maya
With all the Euro problems real estate on the continent should be favorable for American ex-patriots. Are there any good Century 14 agents anyone can recommend?
Comrade Jake
BTW, I met with some DOE personnel from DC a few weeks ago and they said that the problem in Congress now is that a good number of Republicans actually like the way the sequester is working.
They want the cuts, and they don’t think they’ll pay a price at the polls for them because the narrative has effectively been set as “the sequester was the fault of both sides!” Unfortunately, this calculus is probably correct. So a safe bet here would be to count on the sequester.
Skepticat
I have never, ever been able to understand the income ceiling for paying into Social Security, much less why it cannot be raised. Well, of course, apart from the fact that those who have so much more might have to contribute as much as we peons. Heaven forfend.
MoeizW
@askew: So policy A you don’t like isn’t news and but policy B you do like is news? Nice deflection there.
Jasmine Bleach
@Xantar:
I’m sorry, but that Salon article sucks eggs. The best option for social security is to eliminate the payroll tax cap. That way, you make social security solvent until at least 2070 (or something like that), you’re not reducing benefits at all, and only people making over $110,000 per year are carrying any of the burden.
The article you cite doesn’t even bring it up, even though it’s been, probably, THE most common plan on how to make Social Security solvent.
And all that “all just posturing on Obama’s part” is going to lose Democrats the 2014 elections. Hope you’re satisfied with that, because Obama just handed Republicans a huge stick with which to beat them over the head with.
I mean, who are YOU going to vote for as a retired person? A Party who actually proposed to cut Social Security benefits (unnecessarily) and increase Medicare costs like Obama is proposing? Or a Party who fights against that?
mistermix
@Comrade Jake: I think this is right.
Xantar
@Omnes Omnibus:
Nothing wrong with that as far as I can see. If you oppose chained CPI, then make your voice heard. I’m just saying be aware that Obama is a politician and thus he sometimes does things for the sake of appearance and not because he actually believes it.
Comrade Dread
@nastybrutishntall: Doesn’t matter if it happens or not.
You now have a Democratic president on the record having made specific cuts to SS and Medicare.
The GOP will certainly run with that for all it’s worth. It doesn’t matter that they want to gut the whole shebang and chuck gramps into the tender embrace of the private insurance market and Wall St. They’ll run with it because it will hurt Democrats.
Cassidy
AHHHHHHHH! AHHHHHHHHH! AHHHHHHHH! AHHHHHHHHH! AHHHHHHHHH!
Wait? What are we screaming about today?
jayackroyd
@:
No he’s not.. He is working for the centrist position he has always suported. And this he’s taking hostages.
nastybrutishntall
Cool yer heads. JM spells it out.
Obama needs the midterms to be about insane, intransigent Reublicans vs. Dems working for real solutions. It’s an attempt at a wedge.
On the other hand, every single GOoper will run ads saying how s/he/it will never allow SS to be cut by that swarthy pretender in the White Man’s House, and so yes, please vote Republican. And it will work. All the teabaggers I know think Obama is out to kill all old people by taking away their gorram big government healthcare, and now they’ll believe the same about SS. But Obama is hoping that the non-crazy Indies will feel warm and fuzzy about electing a Do Something Congress and will somehow be able to overcome gerrymandering to get Dems in. Which, alas, will not happen.
So it’s just farting into the wind.
Jasmine Bleach
@KeithOK:
Yep. Exactly. And it won’t just be Obama. Republicans will say DEMOCRATS tried to cut your social security.
And they’ll be right!
Sloegin
Seems like 2-term presidents always manage to do something amazingly stupid early in their 2nd term. President apparently does not want to buck tradition.
Comrade Jake
@Jasmine Bleach:
Which would effectively represent a raise in taxes on families making less than 250k. In the past Obama has been dead set against this as well. I’d like to see him break this particular promise (after all, he’s not running again) but it may simply be what’s preventing it from even being discussed. I suspect there are a good number of Dems who wouldn’t go for it as well.
Xantar
@Jasmine Bleach:
I seem to recall there was a Ryan budget.
The Moar You Know
@Comrade Jake: No reason they shouldn’t. The DoD contractor community – which is already taking real hits from the sequester – is blaming Democrats for it 100%, and cannot wait to dump as much money as possible into Republican races next year so they can get the gravy spigot turned back on again.
The Republicans got cuts, get campaign contributions, and Dems got all the blame. They’ve got to be over the moon with happiness. I gotta say I think Obama may have fucked up royally on this one, thinking that the GOP would do anything to avoid cuts to the DoD.
Omnes Omnibus
@El Tiburon:
If this is so, can you tell me why? I am in the group who thinks that Obama is putting proposals like this out there to show that he is being “reasonable” and willing to compromise with no expectation that the GOP will take him up on them. Whether it is a good strategy or not is arguable, but I think it makes more sense as an explanation than that he has an unquenchable need to fuck people over.
@Xantar: I agree with you on Obama’s motivations and actions. I just think for it to work there needs to be a huge outcry from the D bench.
max
Or is it as stupid as it looks?
Yep.
Of course, as others have said, the entire point of this thing is to switch the entire system to chained CPI and get more tax money. Which was a popular notion back in the lateish 90’s in the Republican Congress.
The key thing is that the administration was sincere about locking in the Bush tax cuts below 250K and they were sincere about deficit reduction. So that leaves crap like this.
I’m telling you man, once Rob Rubin appeared on the scene immediately after the election in 2008, it was easy to forecast which way this would go.
max
[‘We’re still living with the economic wisdom of 2005, entombed in amber.’]
aimai
@askew:
But we already got the sequester. This budget does not affect the sequester.
The Moar You Know
@Jasmine Bleach: Which party is that?
The GOP is calling for the elimination of both.
Where this becomes a huge problem for Dems is now there is no longer a “lesser of two evils” to vote for.
MoeizW
@Xantar: Ryan who? Was he President or something?
El Tiburon
Just to be perfectly clear, it is, given the current state of Congress, not just hard, but probably impossible to enact gun reform into law.
Would someone please explain this to me? I will accept any reasonable and rational explanation. Yet Obama is barnstorming the country (good) for gun reform. Yet, for Social Security cuts, he is the one demanding them.
GregB
Depress the base and motivate the opposition is no way to win a mid term.
It worked out so well in 2010.
HelloRochester
Luckily, Annoying Orange doesn’t want the proposal anyways. WTF. After I read “Bailout” by Neil Barofsky, I just give right the fuck up. Until there’s a post-Citizens United Amendment we are just terminally fucked with oversight of capitalism. And if Hillary reconstitutes Bill’s Usual Suspects to run her campaign and transition, we will get more of the same.
Ben Franklin
@Comrade Jake:
Which would effectively represent a raise in taxes on families making less than 250k
That’s AGI, so the $200k cap will affect that group, but does it mean they have to resort to a catfood diet?
cathyx
It may be hard to enact a tax on the wealthy to add money to Social Security, but it’s not hard to leave it alone. Tell Obama to leave it alone and not weaken it.
Jasmine Bleach
@Comrade Jake:
You know, the payroll tax cut was just rolled back in January of this year (I experienced it personally). I didn’t hear much of a firestorm over that. This would be more of the same.
I’m not saying you’re not right–that some democrats might not support it. But, I really don’t think it’d be a huge deal. Obama already raised taxes on families making under $250k because he let that payroll tax cut disappear.
Xantar
@MoeizW:
You know, the Ryan budget. The thing that Republicans in the House are on record actually voting for?
maya
@nastybrutishntall:
More resonant.
White Trash Liberal
I just got through pitching a fit with my congresscritter and senators’ staff. I’m all for additional revenue, but not by harming a successful program that cares for our elderly.
No. Just no.
The Progressive Caucus budget is a great foundation. Mess with those numbers, tweak a bit of the overall, and send it forward unabashedly. Yes the media will declare it unserious, but these same clowns take turns ogling the fantasy Ryan plan which IS the GOP budget.
Might as well feed us red meat. 2014 is coming.
Jay B.
What is there to posture? What the fuck does that even mean? You idiots are so wrapped up in the absolutely meaningless minutae of political/media theater and “optics” and everything else you think is so clever that I’m shocked this post even made it to Balloon Juice. It’s a stupid fucking plan, full stop. People who need SS, poor and middle class alike, must have just about stopped moving. It’s BAD POLICY. That’s it. Not trade offs, not “maybe this is some brilliant gambit”, it’s fucking disgusting. That it won’t pass? God only hopes. Why offer it at all? No one, at all, will give anyone a cookie for proposing it. It’s the advancement of bad policy by a Democrat willing to sell out a successful program for no gain.
Fucking idiotic and immoral.
kindness
I really like President Obama even though he’s a FUCKING MORON as far as dealing with Republicans are concerned.
El Tiburon
@Omnes Omnibus:
Can you dispute this? I remember a year or two ago when bloggers like Digby started talking about this “Grand Bargain” Obama was proposing. It all sounded like some conspiracy theory. Yet, time and time again, Obama puts it back on the table.
Now, I guess rational arguments from the left can be made as to why he is doing this. I guess.
But,no, I can’t tell you why he is doing this. It makes zero political and zero policy sense. But, one must deduce he is doing this because he BELIEVES in doing this. Just as he believes in reforming the gun laws, he believes in cutting social security. That’s it. What else can it be.
Cassidy
Can we have an open thread so we can skip the Firebaggers Anonymous meeting. The coffee is cold and weak and the cookies taste like poutrage.
eldorado
this is why we can’t have nice things. no really, this is why we can’t have nice things.
taylormattd
His budget will propose the stupid chained CPI, but only if it goes along with a rather hefty tax hike.
So you tell me what is likely to happen.
Bad proposal? I kind of think so. But idk, I guess we’ll see. From my view, this is chicken little meltdown number 4,999,999,999.
Ms. D. Ranged in AZ
@Omnes Omnibus: I agree it’s posturing BUT as @Tractarian said, if it’s to gain some credibility with his haters, then it’s foolish. It bothers me that the President just can’t and won’t accept that they really don’t like him nor respect him and nothing he does will EVER buy him any credibility with right-wingers in Congress and “centrists” in the media. Maybe it’s an ego thing or in his heart he is a “people pleaser” that just can’t accept that some people in very crucial positions in the power structure will never like him and will always do everything in their power to stop him from being effective.
Jasmine Bleach
@The Moar You Know:
The Republicans will change their tune in a heartbeat if they think it’ll win them an election. They might not actually support SS and Medicare once they’re in, but they’ll use it to win.
White Trash Liberal
@Jasmine Bleach:
Removing the cap on payroll taxes was 2008 candidate Obama’s proposal. I remember praising it back then because he made the argument about how the wealthy should be proud of giving their fair share to keep our institutions strong. Sigh…
nellcote
@foosion:
because “progressives” really are that stupid. Instead of putting SMASH Nancy back in the driver’s seat they’ll just pout and sit home. NOT helpful.
Schlemizel
@Jasmine Bleach:
I’m truly sorry you can’t see the difference.
@Cassidy:
Well mixy, it took longer than I expected but you had to know it would. ANY discussion of ANY Obama proposal or public statement that is not 100% approving HAS to be firebagging.
Because that sort of strict adherence to the work of the bosses turned out so well for the country over the last couple of decades.
LurkyLoo2
Mistermax, your quote “”which normal people will call “a cut in Social Security””, the local news in the so called liberal SF Bay Area is already saying “Obama wants to cut Social Security” going across the ticker tape at the bottom of the screen. No explanation, just “Obama wants to cut Social Security”
Yes once again proving the Democratic Party snatches defeat from the jaws of victory.
El Tiburon
@taylormattd:
Gee, wonder how this will play out. Benefit cuts to those who need it. Tax hikes on the wealth that will never go into effect or be repealed or so full of loopholes Rush Limbaugh’s ass could fit through them.
No, Obama should be talking about INCREASING benefits. Talk about throwing red meat to the base and pissing off the MSM and the right-wing. But that would take courage and leadership, two qualities, I’m afraid, this President does not possess.
Obama should be out there putting the screws to the Democrats and barnstorming the country agitating for increasing social programs right now. But…
Fred Fnord
It’s not stupid at all. It’s what he believes is necessary to fix Social Security. He’s said it over and over, he believes reducing Social Security benefits to be an important part of fixing the budget.
You can say (I certainly would) that this is an insane belief, half cargo-cult and half hippie punching. You can say that it’s awful politics. But you can’t say it’s stupid, if it is something he objectively wants to happen and so he put it in his budget.
Hopefully it won’t matter. There was already zero chance that we could recapture the house in 2014, and hopefully this won’t be the straw that breaks the Senate’s back. Because with 51 Republican senators we really will see how things could get worse.
Paul in KY
@J.W. Hamner: A unicorn that craps chocolate yogurt, being ridden by an ugly looking elf.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Good thing that there’s no possibility of the Republicans holding the debt ceiling, or something equally important, hostage for applying chained CPI. And they’d never, unlike the sequester, broadcast that it was Obama’s idea in the first place.
El Tiburon
@Fred Fnord:
Of course we can say it’s stupid. Just because he wants it to happen doesn’t protect it from being stupid.
Comrade Jake
I’m just curious as to what strategy people here think would *work* with Congressional Republicans? I’m not suggesting the current approach by Obama will work, but I’m hard-pressed to think of something that will.
I think we’re probably looking at deadlock until we have either a Republican POTUS or Democrats re-take the House and get 60 votes again in the Senate. Of course I would prefer the latter but, even assuming the Democrats do everything right, that seems unlikely.
Paul in KY
@cleek: Hope you are right.
Schlemizel
@taylormattd:
And if the chicken littles just sit quietly in the back how will the hawks know that what they are doing is not OK?
Maybe in 11D Chess setting the base on fire is the technique chosen to alert sleepy members that they will not get away with theft this time? Maybe if we do not run around telling people this is suicide they will think it is OK and let it happen? Maybe He has this all gamed out and knows it will work in the end but I don’t trust any politician to do what is right when I am not looking. I sure as hell want people to know this is a very bad idea and doing it will have some very bad repercussions.
But maybe thats what Obama wants. Either way being quiet and hoping for the best is not a good choice
Jasmine Bleach
@White Trash Liberal:
Yeah. It’s progressive things like that and the public option he supported in speeches why I voted for him in 2008.
Omnes Omnibus
@Ms. D. Ranged in AZ: I doubt that Obama has any illusions about the intransigence of his opposition. To me, this kind of play only makes sense if it is geared at showing “sensible centrists” that he is reasonable and the GOP is not. Sadly, they seem to need to see some pro forma hippy punching or, in this case, austerity mongering.
Eric U.
the problem I have with it is that the White House didn’t seem to learn from the disaster that cutting waste from medicare caused in the House. Of course, republicans don’t care about the truth anyway, so I’m not sure this matters
NR
I see the the Obama defense brigade is already here, displaying their magical mind-reading powers for all to see. They can read Obama’s mind, you see, so they just know that he doesn’t really mean it when he proposes cuts to Social Security. No, it’s all a super-secret eleventy dimensional chess plan of his to show that the Republicans don’t want to do anything, or something.
So you people complaining, shut the fuck up. You can’t look at what Obama actually says and does in reality. No, you’ve got to read his mind. Then you’ll get the real picture.
El Tiburon
@schrodinger’s cat:
What other explanation can there be?
Paul in KY
@KeithOK: If the Democratic nominee can’t come up with 834 other things the Republicans have tried to do to screw over grandma & working people, etc. then that person was never going to win anyway.
Paul in KY
@maya: Probably some nice fixer-uppers in Greece. Indoor marble & lots of open air.
Comrade Dread
@Comrade Jake:
I think a lot of us would say either complete capitulation or nothing at all. Which is why we’re continually stunned when the WH keeps trying to meet these people in the middle and is handing them ammunition.
Morzer
@Paul in KY:
I’ve got this lovely Parthenon that would suit you splendidly. It even has a bonus no-roof feature so you can soak up the sun all summer and build indoor snowmen in the winter.
Comrade Jake
@Fred Fnord:
That’s actually not the impression one gets by reading Josh Marshall’s piece today over at TPM. The indications are that Obama doesn’t actually think this is good policy.
Really his motivation seems to be much more based on obtaining a “grand bargain”. I agree with Josh that the wisdom of that seems suspect at best.
Most people seem to recognize that, long term, we have a balance sheet problem. Personally I’d prefer we just address that via tax hikes, but I fail to see what universe exists where that’s even possible. So the question becomes: who do you want to be the gatekeeper on a grand bargain – a Democratic POTUS or a Republican one?
Jasmine Bleach
@Schlemizel:
I know there’s a difference (in scale). But anyone should be able to make a sound argument that why should income under $110,000 (or whatever it is) be treated differently than income over that level? It’s inherently unfair, and there’s no reason for it. If we apply payroll taxes to income over that, social security will never disappear and everyone will benefit from it when they retire.
It might not pass this year, but put it to the vote, let Republicans reject it, and then campaign against them on it next year. Turn congress more Blue, and try it again each year until it passes.
Social Security isn’t in trouble until the 2020s anyways.
J.W. Hamner
Well Ron Fournier took the bait. Personally I don’t know how important it is for Obama to get the media on his side and admit it’s the Republicans are truly the ones being obstructionist… but if you do, then this tactic just might work.
El Tiburon
@nastybrutishntall:
The problem with this ‘show’ is it legitimizes the debate from the right-wing point of view.
The other, more serious, problem is there is NO guarantee it won’t not happen. Master Norquist has already given certain waivers for certain ‘tax increases’ and so some slight of hand could be in the works.
And also, as stupid as many of these teabaggers are, at some point, they will see how the politics could work for them. That if they let Obama demoralize the base further, they will reap the benefits come 2014 and beyond. And all they are giving up are some tax increases for the wealthy (mabye) that really won’t mean anything.
That it is on the table is something to worry about.
Omnes Omnibus
@NR: Actually, don’t shut the fuck up. If Obama actually wants to cut SS, people should be objecting mightily. If Obama is posturing for effect, then people should be objecting mightily. Either way, the response from the left should be to contact legislators to say don’t do it.
Ben Franklin
@Jay B.:
It’s the advancement of bad policy by a Democrat willing to sell out a successful program for no gain.
The Consigliere are hoping it’s just a strategy. The rest think this is what he really wants to do and and that’s the strategy.
Cassidy
@Schlemizel: I’m not talking about Mistermix, although I’m not exactly enthralled with his Freddie routine. I’m talking about the doom and gloom, “ZOMG! HE SOLD US OUT! WORSE THAN HITLER” histrionics going on in this comments thread. It’s the same old chicken little shit (h/t @taylormattd) that we’ve seen in every thread about Obama selling us out or slapping us in the face or throwing us under a bus or being digitally penetrated by T&H while unconscious or something. personally, It’s Friday and I’d rather talk about movies, video games, tv shows, the Invicta FC fight card tonight or anything than this regurgitated crap and dimestore psychoanalysis by a group of people who have proven, over time, to have enough psychosis and neurosis of our own that we sure as shit aren’t suitable to be diagnosing anyone’s mental status from afar. I mean fuck, we can’t have a conversation about rescuing a cat without some fucking dickhole showing up to drop a turd in the punchbowl. And this reading minds bullshit!? “He must want to get ready of SS….THAT’S THE ONLY REASONABLE CONCLUSION”, is the most unreasonable, unsupported dipshit conclusion anyone with half a toddler’s brain could have come up with before sucking down an 4oz sippy cup of jack Daniels.
It’s fucking tiresome and I’d rather hang out on my favorite blog, pleasurably interacting over some common ground and hsared interests instead of watching everyone void their bowels. I don’t know what the guy is doing. I do know that in all this, he’s the one who’s been trying to come up with solutions that involve a motherfucking functioning gov’t of some sort resembling some semblance of our democracy. I do know that the republicans/ conservatives/ libertarians in this country are doing everything they can to tank the economy and mangle our gov’t and ruin this country. They’re the motherfucking enemy. They’re the traitorous dogshit on top of a T&H that needs to be held accountable. The sooner that half you motherfuckers get that, the better we could be.
So, pretty please, how about a motherfucking open thread for those of us who don’t want to particpate in this tiresome, weekly wankfest ritual again.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Paul in KY:
The nominee may, as you say, come up with any number of slightly abstract examples of attempted Republican screw overs. OTOH, “Obama wants to cut your Social Security” fits neatly on a bumper sticker and it’s demoralizing as hell to people who saw Social Security as the one issue for which any Democratic president would go to the wall.
taylormattd
@Schlemizel: Huh?
MomSense
@Cassidy:
It doesn’t even matter what. Le freak, c’est chic!
shortstop
@KeithOK: This. It won’t pass, of course, but he gave them the tagline nonetheless.
schrodinger's cat
I think I need a nice long vacation from politics. Do some spring cleaning. Work on my research proposal and my blog. Plan my India trip.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@El Tiburon:
This.
askew
@aimai:
This budget would undo the sequester and replace the cuts with tax increases and different cuts. That’s the whole point.
Eric U.
@Skepticat: the reason for the SS tax cap is that there is a maximum benefit for SS and so if the tax doesn’t go away the rich people will fight SS. Of course, now that Reagan looted SS and they got their tax cuts over the last 3 decades, they don’t want to pay back the money they stole from SS and so this tactic doesn’t really work. It would only be fair that the rich pay SS taxes, because the ’83 tax increases that all of us have been paying since then have gone to lowering tax rates on the rich.
Of course, a reasonable estimate is the SS will be solvent into the future with no changes. Medicare is the real problem, but we could reduce that cost simply by implementing a single payer system for everyone.
The so-called “problem” with SS is that we would actually have to start drawing money from the general fund to pay back the money owed SS. Right now, we are still subsidizing the general fund with our SS taxes. It’s a little ridiculous to talk about a problem at this point.
schrodinger's cat
@Cassidy: I agree in general and I hope Obama is just posturing to show how intransigent the Republicans are. But his mouthing the rhetoric of the deficit scolds is depressing to say the least.
taylormattd
@El Tiburon:
Why do you think the chained CPI portion of the proposed budget is true, but think the tax hike portion of the budget is a lie?
Paul in KY
@Morzer: Whoa nellie! Must be a nice place with a name like ‘Parthenon’. I think it gives a home that extra level of snootiness when you give it a name. Especially a foreign sounding name or something with ‘oak’ in it. I bet if that place was called the ‘Oakthenon’ it might sell even faster.
Will google it & check it out.
askew
@White Trash Liberal:
Have you looked at the progressive caucus budget? It wants to close bases. That isn’t realistic at all. I like other parts of that budget, but the base closing is so unrealistic that I can’t take the rest seriously.
Ben Franklin
@Eric U.:
Of course, now that Reagan looted SS and they got their tax cuts over the last 3 decades, they don’t want to pay back the money they stole from SS
They call it a ‘promissory note’ and that’s just a piece of paper.
Chyron HR
@Ben Franklin:
I think my favorite piece of True Progressive Greenwaldian Firepup “logic” is that:
A) Obama is a tyrant who literally has people murdered on a whim.
B) He really, really wants to cut Social Security but he’s just too weak and ineffectual to get it done.
Paul in KY
@Jasmine Bleach: I think it was a bargain FBR made with the rich/Repubs, who wanted to do their own investing (knowing they could get returns greater than what SS promised).
jon
@LurkyLoo2:
Where’s the victory? I’m not seeing any victory being stifled, only a President trying to work with the biggest little boys in the world. As any parent who dealt with toddlers knows, once you make it about winning, you’ve already lost. This is about governing, not winning.
(I don’t like it either, “it” being both the practical and political reality. But I’m not surprised at it too much, since Obama is Walter Mondale with Charisma rather than Huey Long with a Tan.)
Cassidy
@schrodinger’s cat: I get that. I’m just tired of the bullshit here and when our FPer’s get a firecracker up their ass.
I am not smart enough on economics or SS or chained CPI or any of that shit to have an educated opinion. I do know I trust the most accomplished liberal POTUS in the US since Lincoln said “I’m sending a certifiable maniac to your doorstep to burn the South down.”.
Omnes Omnibus
@jon: As I noted on a previous thread: That is the big dilemma of our time. How does one try to govern when a major chunk of the powers that be are actively opposed to a functioning government? Maybe it’s just me, but I am inclined to cut quite a bit of slack for anyone who I think is honestly trying to work through this mess.
Paul in KY
@Higgs Boson’s Mate: You can put theirs on bumper stickers too.
The best defense is a good offense.
chopper
@Jasmine Bleach:
dunno. i don’t remember goopers getting much traction on the issue back when clinton wanted to cut the SS cola and raise taxes on senior’s benefits to pay down the deficit.
kindness
So, proclaiming President Obama’s proposal as dumb means one is now firebagging?
So let me understand this then. Does that mean we are all OBOTS & Firebaggers?
One of the things I still criticize Republicans for is dishonesty. Not once while bush43 was president could a Republican disagree with a proposal from dubya (with the exception of Harriet Miers nomination to the SC). So, are some of you suggesting we progressive goose step to the same tune Republicans do, or am I just projecting on some of you?
Tonal Crow
I guess Obama is reasoning that Republicans won’t accept a dime of tax hikes, so the public will view his chained-CPI proposal as “moderate” and “bipartisan”, and the Republicans as extreme and unreasonable. It might work, depending upon how aggressively Obama and his surrogates frame it.
The main problem here is that chained CPI isn’t reasonable unless it accounts for SS recipients’ actual rate of inflation, which is generally *higher* than the overall CPI because health costs constitute a higher percentage of recipients’ costs than they do the costs of the average consumer.
That is, an honest chained CPI will probably *increase* SS expenditures.
Paul in KY
@Cassidy: I sorta like the FDR guy too, but I agree with your comments overall. Especially the burning down the Confedracy part.
El Tiburon
@taylormattd:
Never said tax hikes were a lie. But are you saying things like “loopholes for the rich” don’t exist? All I’m saying is if you are basing your policy on cutting benefits on the poor and working class in exchange for tax increases, what’s the fucking point? The poor and working class will suffer; the wealthy will figure a way around them or they will be repealed in a few years.
Shouldn’t the framing be: tax increases on the wealthy and benefit increases for everyone else?
lojasmo
@schrodinger’s cat:
Obama TAUGHT law at the U of C. He never attended there, and he certainly never spent any time in the U of C school of economics, which is what you are referring to.
El Tiburon
@kindness:
Welcome to the party, pal.
Any disagreement with Dear Leader is indeed Firebagging around these parts. Especially if it comes from He Who Shall Not Be Named. (Most other bloggers and pundits get a free pass…)
kindness
@Ben Franklin:
Actually it’s a Government backed Bond and you sound like a Teahaddist asshole when you use their framing ya know?
Paul in KY
@kindness: I thought that Repub tactic helped Batshit McChimpy get re-elected.
We are different & probably can’t be muzzled in that manner. I do think it is good politics to generally ‘ride for the brand’ & keep criticisms to truly staggering mistakes.
That is only my point of view.
cahuenga
@Fred Fnord:
No. Obama proposed raising the cap on SS during both election runs.
Six months ago: President Barack Obama revived a 2008 campaign promise on Friday, telling the crowd at an AARP forum that he would be open to raising the level of income on which Americans pay Social Security taxes.
Cassidy
@Paul in KY:
Don’t threaten me with a good time.
Omnes Omnibus
@El Tiburon: Oh bullshit. Even worse, tired bullshit.
lojasmo
Article linked is based on a single anonymous White House official
When did “news” become so palid, and when did B-J front pagers become so willing to be taken in by such crap.
This is trolling for firebaggers.
El Tiburon
@Omnes Omnibus:
Are you fucking serious? That is rich.
To be fair, I guess, around here you can disagree with Obama, as long as you are very polite and add in that Obama is the Best Prez Evah.
I have the battle scars to prove it. Not actual Fallujah-stle scares, but keypad-commando type scars.
chopper
@lojasmo:
clearly obama is really hell-bent on cutting social security. this is proven by the fact that he has not actually cut social security, or actually offered up anything close that isn’t tied to some policy that could never pass congress.
Cassidy
@El Tiburon:
Absolutely. We should also have universal healthcare. We should also have strict gun regulation. We should also have a well funded educational system. We should also have programs in palce to insure a child enver misses a meal. We should also have a society where women can do whatever they want with their na-na’s without it being anyone’s business. We should live in a society where women can pass out drunk without wonder if they’re going to wake up with someone’s dick in a hole. We should also live in a society where our LBGT citizens get to execture their gay agenda of waking up, eating breafast, going to work, coming home, playing with their kids and going to sleep pissed off they haven’t had sex in a week like every other married couple.
There are a lot of things that should be happenning. If we want those things ot be a reality, we should attack the people responsible for mkaing it not so.
schrodinger's cat
@lojasmo: I am aware, but this current brand of economics that has been in vogue since the Reagan years is the brain child of the Chicago School, Friedman, Lucas etc. Particularly the notion that deficit spending to combat unemployment leads to inflation. Google
Philips Curve and you will see what I mean. Their reach has been far beyond the halls of academe.
Obama spends an inordinate amount of time singing paeans to deficit reduction, see for example the State of the Union speech. Hence my conclusion that he does buy into the CW about deficits, which came about mainly due to the economists at the University where Obama taught Constitutional Law.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
I do think this is going to get a “you got played” call from me this evening (can’t call from work). Boehner is talking about how if Obama sees that cuts need to be made, they shouldn’t be tied to tax increases.
And I’m always defending him.
ETA: Along those lines, since chained-CPI is reducing the size of future increases, isn’t calling it a cut the same as Bush saying that not lowering taxes is the same as a tax increase?
El Tiburon
@chopper:
Ok, then what’s the game? Why offer up something that is not going to pass? If you are going to play that game, then why not offer up DOUBLING benefits to everyone.
Really such a stupid theory. Remember, Obama was proposing this shit WAY BACK when he still thought he could work with Republicans, you know, a year ago. So, anyone who believes he is playing some 11-dimensional chess is really delusional.
White Trash Liberal
@kindness:
You are being dishonest. The GOP base criticized Bush over immigration.
Further, it looks like this thread has plenty of anger and criticism.
Do firebaggers come into these threads with a script? Because I am seeing a lot of preemptive “don’t tase me, Obot” posturing in a thread where the majority of posters are disappointed and angry in this (anon sourced) news.
El Tiburon
@Cassidy:
Tell me if you can: what has Obama been doing these past few months in this regard?
Seems to me he is trying his hardest – using every tool at his disposal, to make something of real substance happen.
True?
Why can’t he do this for truly protecting Social Security? Answer: he can. Problem is he won’t. Why? Because he doesn’t want to. He wants to cut Social Security.
Is there any doubt to this?
cleek
@chopper:
oh you and your facts! they have no place in the approved narrative.
White Trash Liberal
@El Tiburon:
You have scars because you are Greenwald’s personal bodyguard on this site. You hold Obama’s feet to the fire but hold Greenwald’s testicles in a velvet cozy.
In short, when someone makes the squawking noises you like to hear, you dance.
kindness
For myself one of the things I wish Democrats would push is to eliminate the $109K cap on Social Security taxes.
Anna in PDX
@Omnes Omnibus: But why? It is stupid posturing, because these are very popular programs and no one who votes (except a very few really really rich people) wants them cut.
Oh wait, I just answered my own question. NEVER MIND!
Cassidy
@El Tiburon: I think you have a very black and white lens in which you view things. I think it’s entirely possible to have positions you believe in and positions you support without being contradictory.
Ruckus
@burnspbesq:
Who gives a flying fuck about your mood?
I’ll bet it’s less than two people in the entire world. None of them here.
cahuenga
@kindness:
Obama proposed this very thing, twice! Both times… as a candidate.
Funny that.
Anna in PDX
@kindness: The very rich do not have this on the agenda. So it is not on anyone else’s, except a few very liberal Democrats in the House/Senate.
Too bad there is no threat from the left like Communism any more, which is probably the only way FDR was ever going to be able to pass the new deal. It is so depressing, how can we ever stop the bleeding of government programs now?
gogol's wife
@Cassidy:
Beautifully put!
El Tiburon
@White Trash Liberal:
One of these is not like the other. What oh what could it be?
What is the difference between a BLOGGER and the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA?
Maybe I’ll shoot an e-mail to Hamsher and she can help you out.
taylormattd
@El Tiburon: Listen. You were the one who said that the dumb chained CPI in the proposal will happen, but the tax increases (which by the way reportedly “must be accompanied by higher taxes on the wealthy”) in the proposal will not happen.
But now you’ve changed the topic to hypotheticals about whether future Congresses might some day repeal those tax increases on the wealthy. Um, ok? Fascinating?
To the extent you are implying the deeply stupid chained CPI will happen, but the tax cuts on the wealthy will not happen, that question was answered in every story that has been written.
cleek
@kindness:
it’s $113,700 in 2013.
El Tiburon
@taylormattd:
Yeah, so what?
Do you remember a really big deal over 10 years ago when Bush slashed taxes for the wealthy that would expire in 10 years? And do you recall what happened after that 10 years?
Have you heard of ‘loopholes’ that the rich use so that people like Mitt Romney, who make millions, pay less than 15% in taxes?
Is this foreign to you, this concept of tax avoidance by the wealthy?
Now, do you recall a few years back when Social Security benefits were increased? Yeah, I don’t either.
My point is cutting benefits and increasing taxes is good for what? Especially when those tax increases will probably be negligible at the end of the day. Or again, what’s the point of increasing taxes AND cutting benefits?
Tonybrown74
@Cassidy:
All of THIS!
Yutsano
@Anna in PDX:
This is a fixable problem. In fact maybe it’s time to get the Socialist Party in the US some traction, although right now they have Bernie and no one else. But get them on a few schoolboards and some state houses…
A Socialist could win in Seattle. I have no idea why they seem to be completely invisible here.
Tonybrown74
@taylormattd:
You are arguing with a person who compared President Obama’s negotiating tactics with President Bartlett’s.
kc
But sadly easy to enact an SS cut on middle class and poor people.
MoeizW
@Xantar: So the Dem’s pitch in 2014 should be “Ignore the President’s budget; the guy who lost in November really wants to screw you.”
kc
@Omnes Omnibus:
It’s lousy posturing. What a terrible message it sends.
patroclus
I’m not a firebagger, but they seem to be correct in their analysis here. In negotiations, you don’t lead with your chin – it would be far better for Obama to hold chained CPI in reserve as something he might eventually agree to if and only if he got a LOT of good things (climate change initiatives, infrastructure investment, alternative energy money, immigration legislation, judges confirmation, the jobs act, increases in the FICA cap etc…) in exchange for it. Presenting it upfront is, as others have said, more likely to result in getting none of the good stuff and only this or something worse.
I realize it’s posturing, but Obama could do the posturing a lot better if he proposed a budget that didn’t include this and that more resembled the Senate Plan (which doesn’t include it) or, better yet, the House Progressive caucus plan.
Ruckus
@Comrade Jake:
I agree.
And if Obama is trying to be a leader he understands that sometimes you have to give up something(something you like or not) to get something positive. He is the president of the country not just the president of stuff we like. I think the country may just be ungovernable. Every poll I’ve heard of likes/wants background checks, but we aren’t getting them. People rail against cuts in their Medicare, then vote for the people who say and intend to do just that.
Are people that stupid or is the system broken?
TenguPhule
Since when was this an either/or scenerio?
schrodinger's cat
@Ruckus: The MSM and their both sides do it reporting deserves a lot of blame for the present state of affairs.
Ted & Hellen
LOL
Ben Franklin
@kindness:
It was snark, and I’m glad I don’t sound like the President.
Ted & Hellen
@Tractarian:
LOL
Obot Holocaust
AnonPhenom
@Anna in PDX:
The Eurozone could hold some promise if they continue with the assinine policy of austerity, though I freely admit that given it’s history Europe could just as easily swing to the opposite extreme (see Greece/Golden Dawn)
Ted & Hellen
@Don SinFalta:
But hope and change.
TenguPhule
@Omnes Omnibus: One finds the leader of the opposition and makes a gruesome example of them. Repeat as necessary until they see things your way.
Davis X. Machina
@Yutsano:
As a 25+ year member of DSA/USA, and DSOC off and on before then, I still have to ask, in the depths of the Depression, with U3 above where U6 is today, it didn’t happen…. why would it happen today?
White Trash Liberal
@El Tiburon:
Hamsher is too busy managing her company’s liquidation so it can pay Drudge back.
I am sure you felt pretty mighty all-capping me the difference between the president and a journalist. However, you never fail to bring the cynicism to one side and the apologism to the other. You like to point to your scars coming from telling truth to power and getting hurt by mean old obots, when really it is that reasonable people dismiss you because you are a troll.
Paul in KY
@MoeizW: Their pitch should be ‘(Insert Repub you are running against) is doing his/her level best to try and ensure Social Security disappears for you and your kids. All that money will be given to big banks & fat cats!’
See how easy that is? Just repeat that day after day after day after day.
White Trash Liberal
@El Tiburon:
@El Tiburon:
Hamsher is too busy managing her company’s liquidation so it can pay Drudge back.
I am sure you felt pretty mighty all-capping me the difference between the president and a journalist. However, you never fail to bring the cynicism to one side and the apologism to the other. You like to point to your scars coming from telling truth to power and getting hurt by mean old obots, when really it is that reasonable people dismiss you because you are a troll.
Hill Dweller
Obama and his people are on record calling chained CPI terrible policy.
This is obviously strategic posturing for the Village. But I think pandering to the Village, especially by this President, is a fool’s errand. The Village hates Obama, because he doesn’t show them the deference they think they deserve, and nothing will change that fact.
Hell, Obama has more women in cabinet positions than any other President, yet Andrea Mitchell was attacking Obama for not having women in high profile positions on today’s show. Reality is irrelevant.
AxelFoley
The usual trolls and chicken littles are hollering over this.
Pooh
Serious firebagging itt.
A) none chance of passing
B) it’s not like he’s asking for nothing in return. The response itt is reminiscent of the food mafia screaming “fuck Obama” for signing the “Monsanto Protection Act”, or in the real world signing a continuing resolution which kept the lights and as such had a fair bit of other odious shit attached.
El Tiburon
@White Trash Liberal:
I’m still not clear if you understand the difference in the world we live in between a blogger and The President of the United States?
One BLOGS about different crap. The other is one of the Three Pillars that makes decisions that affect all of us and the world we live in.
So, the reason I hold Obama’s feet to the fire (when I believe he deserves it) is because he is the latter and not the former. I don’t idolize or worship him or put him on a pedestal. He is nothing more than a public servant carrying out the duties we elected him to carry out.
And I don’t think I so much defend Greenwald per se, but point out the rank hypocrisy and duplicity with the most of the commenters and a few of the front-pagers on this site. Their biases are more than well-documented.
Pooh
@Cassidy: this this this fucking this you circular firing squad simpletons.
jamick6000
@Cassidy:
heh indeed. so far so good …
lmao, Eisenhower was well to the left of Obama and more accomplished; many of Reagan’s budgets were to the left of this heap of crap Obama is proposing.
Rex Everything
Reality’s well known firebagging bias strikes again.
El Tiburon
@AxelFoley:
@AxelFoley:
Like this guy.
And this gal
And this dude
And this guy.
El Tiburon
@jamick6000:
Also too didn’t Brittney Spears say something similar?
phil
Obama is clueless.
taylormattd
@El Tiburon: My favorite part of this comment is that you are (1) enraged about the Bush tax cuts not expiring quick enough, while (2) simultaneously saying any tax increase on the wealthy is no good because someday it might be rolled back.
You are essentially saying this: “You can’t replace revenue taken via the Bush tax cuts by increasing taxes on the wealthy, because remember the Bush tax cuts??”
Omnes Omnibus
@El Tiburon:
Oh, I feel for you. I really do. The Dear Leader stuff is crap, and there is a far broader range of opinion here than you seem to be able to recognize. But keep holding Obama’s feet to the fire by posting comments on a blog.
Ruckus
@schrodinger’s cat:
True, but.
How do you know what the media told you 30-40 yrs ago was true? How do you know what Walter Cronkite told you was true? We had no way to check in anything approaching real time to check on what they wrote or told us. We do have at least some way to check now. How do you know it is worse today?
I think it is only because we can fact check and watch video to get it direct from the horse’s ass that we know when we are being deceived.
NR
@Cassidy:
Actually, you and the people defending Obama are the ones who think you can read his mind. Given that Obama has publicly proposed cutting Social Security, the only reasonable conclusion is that he wants to cut Social Security. But of course, you conclude something completely different. You conclude that Obama doesn’t really want to cut Social Security and it’s all just an eleven-dimensional chess ploy to make himself look good by proposing a massively unpopular policy. And you come to this conclusion, apparently, because you think you can read Obama’s mind and you just KNOW that he doesn’t really want what he publicly says he wants.
You really do need to stop with the mind-reading and start looking at objective reality.
Ted & Hellen
@Skepticat:
ex-fucking-actly
schrodinger's cat
@Ruckus: I have only seen Walter Cronkite in documentaries and stuff, not on TV when he was broadcasting.
ETA: I know that MSM right now, only comforts the comfortable, and you are right that I don’t know whether this a new phenomenon or an old one. I have however seen CNN disintegrate from a fairly respectable news organization to Fox Lite over the last 10 years or so.
Hill Dweller
@jamick6000:
The country was much farther to the left during Eisenhower’s term. The same could be said of Reagan’s term. Moreover, Reagan was dealing with a Democratically controlled congress.
Conversely, Obama is dealing with the most radically right wing House in congressional history. They will tear down the country if they thought it would help them politically. And the media will be there to rationalize everything the wingnuts do.
El Tiburon
@taylormattd:
What in The Fuck are you talking about? How am I enraged? Where do you even get that from?
I will try it one more time for you-because I like helping people like you.
My entire point is that taxes (especially for the wealthy) tend to get lowered over time, hence my comment about the Bush tax cuts.
My second point was, doing a trade-off on the backs of the poor and working class for the promise of tax increases is good how?
It’s like me telling you that your employer, Burger King, is going to charge more their Whopper but you are getting a pay-cut.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
This is bad politics, worse politics, and plain fucking stupid. But jeesus christ: Alpo?
Rex Everything
@Cassidy: The thing about “shoulds” is, they’re what you open negotiations with. You don’t compromise them all away beforehand.
Anna in PDX
@lojasmo: Why is the White House “trolling for Firebaggers”?
eemom
I’m with teh Mix this time. Fuck this shit, whatever the eleventy-dimensional strategerizing or “nah gunna happen” anyone comes up with to rationalize it.
Furthermore I agree with Krugman.
That said, what we need on these kinds of threads is an i.d. check. Or maybe limit them to hours when most 12 year olds are asleep.
El Tiburon
@Omnes Omnibus:
Well, maybe that is just to yank the chains of people like you. That you find it offensive says something about you, though.
I do admit, in the scheme of things, I am but a bottom-dweller on the political food chain. But one locust changes nothing. A swarm can do a lot of damage. So, I do think the overall mood of the liberal blogosphere can have an impact.
Also, I don’t believe you know any of my other activities outside of defending Greenwald on this very sweet Cat and Dog blog.
The Raven on the Hill
Isn’t it time to admit that the DFHs were right all along and the King can do wrong?
For an introduction to the problems of the chained CPI, see Rob Reich.
Ms. D. Ranged in AZ
@Omnes Omnibus:
So, why doesn’t the President acknowledge that and not bother wasting his breath on them too? This is really rhetorical and navel gazing on my part. It’s just an old frustration of mine and something that I will probably never get a real answer to unless the Prez decides to discuss it in his post-WH memoirs. Now I’m off to say the Serenity prayer so I can stop obsessing on crap like this.
Omnes Omnibus
@El Tiburon: The fact that I find childish name calling annoying says exactly what about me?
Anna in PDX
@nellcote: No, they will vote. The problem with democratic voters is the apathetic ones and the young ones who tend to get more excited to vote in the presidentials rather than the midterms. It is not us. We bitch on the internet but we also vote. I don’t know a single one of us liberal yelling people who does not end up voting every single time.
I am tired of Dems (not just Obama) calling for reform in Social Security which does not need “reform” at all except to raise the payroll tax cap. It has indeed contributed to moving the overton window to the right. Most people I talk to who are my age (44) think there will be no social seucrity by the time we retire. They have already given up. That means the wrong people are winning.
This is not only because right wingers keep trying to cut it. This is because “serious” “compromising” “bipartisan” establishment dems keep talking about it being in a crisis and it having to be cut to be reformed. They should start changing the conversation. Why do they keep agreeing with Republican framing that the program is in serious trouble and needs “reform” and cuts? This is NOT just Obama, it has been going on for years and is upsetting to those of us who reliably vote for and donate to Dems and are very aware that the Republicans are worse.
Why can’t they just support a very very very popular program openly? Why do they have to keep bluffing and faking and pretending to want to cut it if they don’t really want to?
satby
I think Booman covers this nicely
“Don’t Freak Out”
schrodinger's cat
@Anna in PDX:
To please Friedman, Brooks and Sullivan and totebaggers.
Rex Everything
@eemom: Forcing grandparents to eat cat food is regrettable, but it doesn’t begin to approach the pure evil ratfuckery of signing the same petition as Grover Norquist. Do I have it right? Is my moral compass aligned properly?
askew
Another interesting piece in Obama’s budget:
El Tiburon
@Omnes Omnibus:
First, calling Obama Dear Leader is not childish name calling. It is an indictment on you Obama bots. It may be childish in that I know it will get a rise out of you – but it is a shorthand for how many of you see Obama.
And why do you let it annoy you? Let me illustrate: in my so-called defense of Greenwald, I never let any slurs or name-calling annoy me. What’s the point? The only thing that annoys me is when people refuse to discuss the issues and go on tangential rants that have no purpose.
So what? I threw in a “Dear Leader” Big Deal – except it is to YOU because it’s about Obama. I doubt you get all worked up over slurs against Hamsher or Sullivan.
Yutsano
@Davis X. Machina: Interestingly enough, because the Soviet Union no longer exists. It’s much harder to demonise socialism when the best representation of it is Sweden, which by all account is a very lovely place to live.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I think we overestimate the cowardice and greed of “Democrats” as a whole, and underestimate their stupidity. Ed Rendell, for instance, will almost certainly never run for elective office again, and yes he is a Wall St lobbyist, but I’d bet both kidneys he believes in austerity like my Irish grandma believed the Blessed Mother heard her prayers.
rikyrah
I don’t mean to be funny, but did folks think there would be no consequences for the election of 2010?
Tone in DC
@Hill Dweller:
It won’t pass. Everyone should see that and know that. This is the most do-nothing Congress in HISTORY.
Second, it is very much bad optics. No doubt about that.
Last, dealing with a batshit House means, to me, there are NO winning options. Just degrees of losing.
Anna in PDX
On a parallel discussion over at the Lawyers Guns and Money blog I kept asking “what is the upside of O doing this” and one of the people saying he is playing 11 dimensional chess (Joe from Lowell) answered me and said, as near as I can figure it, that he is doing this just to make the Reps more unpopular. And that part of what makes this policy effective is that the lobby for social security (and I guess people like me) freaking out reminds pols that trying to cut ss won’t fly (he used the term “third rail”).
So, OK. I hope he is right – the ironic thing is that if this particular pro-Obama theory is true, we should all be doing exactly the screaming we ARE doing. So we are playing right into his hands. So weird.
Hoodie
@patroclus: Obama’s trying to talk a jumper off a ledge, not negotiating. This “offer” is mainly to get attention from a distracted press and public that has the attention span of a 3 year old, and to build up some kind of momentum for 2014 and beyond. Christ, we had 20 six-year olds made into hamburger just a few months ago and we can’t get anywhere on even background checks and magazine limits. Anyone who thinks you can negotiate — tough or otherwise — in this environment is kidding themselves. America is nucking futs right now.
It seems unlikely that Republicans would agree to this, because they want to be seen as cutting benefits for poor folks who don’t vote for them, not benefits for old folks who do vote for them. Even if by some miracle they agree to a deal, this is the least damaging of possible alternatives (privatizing, raising medicare eligibility age, voucherizing medicare, etc.). Again, Obama is just trying to look like the adult in the room.
If you’ve been following Duncan Black, the unspoken looming crisis arises from the transition from defined benefit pensions to 401(k)s. I remember my employer making that change about 20 years ago, so I would imagine the shortfall of retirement income will hit with a vengeance in about 5-10 years. A shitload of folks will have nothing but SS to rely on, and they are not going to be able to get jobs at age 67, no matter what dimwit pundits like Bobo think. Obama may be thinking it’s better to look like the guy who was willing to give something to keep SS basically intact. Yes, SS should be expanded, but you can’t sell that until Americans see themselves, their parents or their grandparents trying to get by on it.
JayJohnstone
@taylormattd: +1
Omnes Omnibus
@El Tiburon: I know it is meant as a slur on so-called Obots, but it really functions as a cursory dismissal of any point being raised by the alleged Obot. As for me, I tend to defend Obama because, flawed as he is, the alternatives to him were unspeakable. I am willing to back a guy who is with me on 80+% of things and let him slide on a number of things if it means that someone who is with me on maybe one out of 1000 issues – and then only accidentally – is not the one making decisions. YMMV.
Joel
@cleek: Welcome back.
Joel
FYWP!
Heliopause
Yglesias: “Administration officials say, somewhat confusingly, that we shouldn’t understand this proposal as reflecting Obama’s vision of ideal policy. They think that would be unproductive at this point. So they want to outline what they consider a good faith effort at compromise, based on a blend of tax increases and entitlement cuts exactly as they’ve been seeking throughout the various iterations of grand bargain talks.”
It would be interesting to know what they think “ideal policy” is. Not that we’re going to get it, they can caution us with a hundred caveats about compromise and balance if they want, but just tell us what the ideal policy should be. That would be nice to know.
Yglesias goes on to say that this proposal is mainly for the consumption of the centrist press. If that’s true one wonders why they bother, since the centrist press is at least as intransigent as the GOP.
sherparick
1. Policy wise incredibly bad. See Duncan Black a/k/ Atrios at Eschaton. And all the austerity when the jobs report indicates a stalling economy and even more disinflation (gas prices are falling as growing supply and weak world wide demand is starting to reply the 1990s on that matter, which is both good and bad). Rents that have been rising the last two years have flattened, again, as demand softens and more units come in supply. The Stupid, It Burns.
2. Politically, incredibly stupid as well since except the Media Village and the 1%, everyone is against cutting SS Benefits. Boehner is his statement already labeled them the “President’ Proposed Cuts” as hostage for tax increases. The Republican Ads will write themselves next year and Tiger Beat on the Potomac will be saying how clever. By the way the VSPs will say “very weak cuts” and “poor leadership” when the Democrats rebel.
3. But it is what the President has wanted to do since 2007 if he could get a bargain to solve the “Deficit.” He is a Rubinite on economics and it is always the early nineties in Bob Rubin’s world.
4. Call your Democratic Senators and Representatives and state that no more money, no more volunteering, except for their primary opponents if the vote for such a catastrophe.
Hill Dweller
@Heliopause: As I was saying upthread, chasing Village approval is a fool’s errand, especially for this President. The Village will spend far more time pushing shit like the President missing jumpers at the Easter Egg Roll and/or calling Kamala Harris attractive.
They hate the President because he doesn’t court their approval in private. Validation is all that matters to the thin-skinned children in the beltway.
TG Chicago
@askew:
Oh, so we should applaud this awful Obama idea because it’s supposedly slightly better than the previous awful Obama idea?
Look, Obama has long wanted to cut social safety net programs. He’s said so for a long time. The sequester was his first attempt to force the cuts. It didn’t work, so this is the second attempt.
I’m not going to golf clap him for doing awful things even if they’re a little less awful than his first idea. Here’s a thought: maybe Obama should never do stuff that’s awful! If he can’t manage that, then he should do nothing at all.
dollared
@Rex Everything: This. We’ll never have all of Cassidy’s wish list if the President we elected won’t fucking advocate for them.
jl
Applying chained CPI to social security is applying a potentially acceptable fix for one group of people (average person) to the wrong group (elderly). Why not propose the right fix: correct inflation adjustment for elderly, which would probably increase Social Security payments overall, which would be a good thing right now.
I don’t see the usefulness of trying to show good faith compromise with people who believe, or say they believe, that 1 plus 1 equals negative three. What kind of good faith compromise would work, and that also has any chance to produce successful results in the real world. Something like, ‘OK, let’s say 1 plus 1 equals negative one, OK, please?” Eff that.
Dwight D. Obama and his cowardly lions have built up some political capital on public perception of reasonableness. At some point you have to face fools and/or liars and see if you can beat them in arena of public opinion. We have an ugly status quo that is baseline. I don’t see the downside of confronting unreason with reason, when the only good faith compromise that might be accepted would make things worse. And, public opinion on Social Security funding has public support. Gee, when public opinion supports the correct policy option, why not back public opinion to the hilt?
Hate to say it, since I am prejudiced against the arrogant little squirt, but MY has this right.
ranchandsyrup
Things didn’t happen exactly like I would have wanted to, maybe cuz I don’t fully understand.
Commence circular firing squad.
That’ll show ’em.
chopper
@El Tiburon:
this isn’t 11 dimensional chess. this is playing to the middle. it’s very common in politics.
jl
@sherparick:
” He is a Rubinite on economics and it is always the early nineties in Bob Rubin’s world. ”
What? Obama is a… what?I forgot the internet term for die hard HRC and Bill Clintonites. Well, sadly, on macroeconomics, it is probably true.
That is why I call him Dwight D. Obama when I am cranky.
Ted & Hellen
@Jay B.:
A to the fucking MEN
chopper
@El Tiburon:
the difference isn’t that one is a blogger and the other is the potus. the difference is that one guy you like and the other guy you hate. that’s about it.
El Cid
I think many liberals and Democrats are quite optimistically thinking that 3 or 4 or 5 years from now, average voters will remember this particular sequester fight as clearly as they hear people telling them (at that future moment) how they’re getting less in their Social Security check than they would have.
Ted & Hellen
@kindness:
Then, since that is a HUGE part of his job, why do you “LIKE” him?
dollared
@Hill Dweller: Well then. In your view, the president of the US is powerless and the descent into our future as a fascist proto-Mexico is pre-ordained. Do I have that right?
Or could it be that our president, who does not have to run for reelection, could be a strong advocate for liberalism, drive a sharp, sharp definitional choice in 2014 and at least try to force a realignment? Nah, protoMexico here we come.
Hill Dweller
@TG Chicago: I agree the sequester sucks, but as I’ve asked repeatedly, what would Obama do if the Republicans defaulted? It would have been devastating for the economy; the media would have blamed it on Obama; and he likely loses reelection to Willard.
Look, the Republican party is full of radicals, but the media refuses to say it out loud. That leaves much of the public believing this is just typical partisan bickering. Consequently, the wingnuts are free to pursue truly crazy policy and pay no price for it. No modern President has had to deal with this level of crazy.
For the record, I think chained CPI is dumb policy and bad politically, but we’re in this position because the country is full of stupid people.
Cassidy
@NR: I haven’t tried to read anyone’s mind. I said that I trust the guy. And I’m sorry, but you and your lot are the last people to be talking about objective reality.
chopper
@Anna in PDX:
i dunno. i will say that the president has squeezed a hell of a lot more blood from the GOP turnip than any of us armchair negotiators have. still not sure about this tho.
TG Chicago
@Omnes Omnibus:
I am in the group that thinks that if you want to be seen as “reasonable”, you probably shouldn’t do stuff that is enormously unpopular amongst ALL Americans, regardless of political affiliation.
ericblair
I gots me an idea. Why don’t we wait for the actual budget document to come out, instead of relying on what the AP boneheads are reporting that Some Unnamed Guy Who Might Be Involved In It And Telling The Truth But Who Really Knows says about it. Or go ahead, it’s Friday.
Ted & Hellen
@Cassidy:
Aaaaand it’s a wrap.
jl
@chopper:
” this is playing to the middle. ”
I disagree. Playing to the middle of what? Not public opinion on merits of policy alternatives. So, what is left? The middle of Washington DC Verdun that is the current political landscape? But there is no middle, there is a political no-man’s land between the two trenches. A poorly planned foray into that invites a ruthless counter attack: mass media shelling, followed by poison pundit gas and lying propaganda campaign on the home front.
The GOP have insisted on bad and macroeconomically risky status quo baseline with their approach to the sequester so far. They will try to blame the adverse results of that status quo on the Dems.
Time to confront the GOP head on and confront them politically. We may have to live with the sequester baseline for an indefinite time. Start effort to beat them like a rug in 2014. Elections have had consequences, and we need to remind public that elections will have consequences.
Cassidy
@Rex Everything: @dollared: Progress takes time. I think we’ve done pretty damn good the last few years.
cleek
@Anna in PDX:
the payroll tax cap is not going to go up. next idea.
Hill Dweller
@dollared: Huh? Could you quote the part of my post you’re responding to?
cleek
@ericblair:
waiting is for people who don’t have anything better to do on a Friday afternoon.
schrodinger's cat
@jl: Hear hear! I am damn tired of this centrist pablum from the administration. Obama cannot win over the idiots in the media, or the GOP just give up already and fight them, you can’t compromise with people who want to destroy you.
dollared
@Cassidy: Yeah. Increasing the defense budget. making the Bush Tax Cuts permanent. Effectively pardoning Wall Street and the Torture Regime. Facilitating further media consolidation and institutionalizing government by money. Slowing down judicial appointments to a record low level. Making private insurance mandatory for health care. Awesome…..
jl
@cleek:
I don’t see the difference between your attitude and pre-emptive surrender.
A national health insurance program was not going to happen when TR proposed it, so I guess the proper response to ‘is not going to happen’ was to give up?
jamick6000
@Hill Dweller:
I agree, my point was that it’s pretty silly to say that Obama is the most liberal president since Lincoln.
Bobby Thomson
@Hill Dweller:
Yep.
Another installment of really smart people doing really stupid things.
? Martin
Yes, because nobody will support it, including the GOP, but it makes Obama look willing to do difficult things.
It’s politics. It’s not real. Obama knows it’s not real. It’s your kid threatening to run away if he doesn’t get that bag of gummy bears, or North Korea threatening to nuke LA if they don’t get whateverthefucktheywant. But Obama is counting on the left freaking the fuck out, and seniors freaking the fuck out to their Congressman, and this will go nowhere, but he can look like the adult in the room to the villagers rather than Paul Ryan. Haven’t we learned yet that the surest way for something to be opposed by the right is for Obama to be for it? What other Dems are behind this? Almost none? Who the fuck thinks this is going to happen?
chopper
@El Tiburon:
yes, many here view the president the same way north Koreans view Kim il-sung. Do you actually listen to yourself?
Cassidy
@dollared: Wow, talk about dishonest and selective. Okay then. I know who not to try and talk to.
dollared
@Hill Dweller:
Clearly, there is no hope and the president of the US is powerless.
Bobby Thomson
@cleek:
Increase the payroll tax cap. Seriously. If nothing is going to pass anyway, let’s propose good policy and not these doomed attempts at compromise. And keep doing it until we elect a majority.
? Martin
And I will again note that Social Security Disability Insurance is bankrupt in 3 years. That’s part of Social Security and nobody is willing to deal with it. SSDI will, on it’s current trajectory, also start to bankrupt SS Retirement. The only people that believe that SS isn’t in trouble are those people willing to permanently end SSDI in order to save their own retirement. I think that’s bullshit, but there are a lot of dishonest voices on the left on this one.
Ted & Hellen
@nellcote:
You mean NANCY IMPEACHMENT IS OFF THE TABLE SMASH?
Bobby Thomson
@? Martin: It’s not going to happen. But we’re going to get bludgeoned with it in the 2014 elections.
cleek
@jl:
the payroll tax cap is not going up. the GOP will not let such a thing through the House.
this should be so obvious as to not even need stating.
if the goal is to ensure that SS is solvent in the long term, and raising the payroll tax is off the table (which it is, for at least the next 18 months, if not longer)…. next idea?
schrodinger's cat
@? Martin: But why give credence to ideas that should be dead. I can’t count the number of times Obama has repeated the deficit monger meme of a country being like a family and having to live within their means. Yes the US budget is exactly like my family budget, because I can print fiat money in my basement which is the de facto global currency.
? Martin
@Bobby Thomson:
So? We got bludgeoned with it in the 2012 elections and we came out ahead.
Hill Dweller
@dollared:
There is a chasm between the difficulties I described and your silly post.
That said, I’m all ears. What can Obama do, other than stand firm when Republicans continue to hold the country hostage? He can make speeches, as he did this week, which the media will dutifully ignore. He can, and has, proposed policies. He can go around congress with executive policy, which he has done.
What else do you suggest?
? Martin
@schrodinger’s cat:
Because we don’t get to decide what ideas should be debated. The folks that buy the ink get to decide.
But also because of what I said in 266 – how do we fix SSDI? Nobody is willing to deal with that – or even talk about it. Nobody. It pisses me off. We have people that are dependent on SSDI (people on this site) and it pays out twice what it takes in. It’s going to start peeling tens of billions out of SSR to stay solvent, and then SSR will be in real trouble. How do we solve that problem? Or are we to just end SSDI as a program to save ourselves the burden?
FlipYrWhig
@Skepticat:
It’s set up that way so that the program works less like redistribution, because that feels like “welfare” to people. It’s part of the same thinking that leads to SS benefits being indexed to your lifetime earnings rather than based on need. Which taken all together means that SS is very much out of sync with the principles of progressive taxation and redistribution. Which also means that defending it in its current form leaves a lot of things unquestioned and basically unequal.
I would gladly increase SS benefits at the low end of the scale and pay for it by lifting that cap. But that also makes it more “welfare”-ish. There’s part of the dilemma right there.
Anna in PDX
@cleek: Well, but you guys are saying that the negotiation tactic of offering up chained CPI is not gonna happen either. So why not offer the *good* policy instead of the bad one, since neither have a hope in hell of passing? The program is popular with voters, right? It seems to me if the Pres is really proposing things he knows won’t fly, that he thinks there are two possible things he can get out of it.
– He can support a popular program (SS) by offering to raise the cap (not the tax itself, except on people who are dodging paying it right now) and the reps will say no. This is for some reason an option he has not even considered and that you are saying is ridiculous.
– He can offer up sacrifices to the popular program, and terrify us, and the reps say no anyhow. In this scenario, he will look like he was willing to compromise.
And he thinks looking like he’s willing to compromise is a much better idea politically than merely supporting the most popular government program we’ve ever had by making the rich pay their fair share of it the way the rest of us do.
Well, he’s president and I am not. I definitely do not think he is stupid. I just think he disagrees with me on the merits of the program.
Maude
@schrodinger’s cat:
When Obama announces chained CPI, you can get upset. This is game.
When Obama proposes something about Social Security, the Repubs are going to accuse him of cutting SS. They did that with Medicare and the benefits weren’t cut.
The budget hasn’t passed both Houses of Congress and Obama hasn’t signed it.
Nothing has happened.
The game is called how to outwit the Republicans.
About the deficit, when Obama talks about cutting it, that takes away the Republican talking point of Obama only spends and won’t confront the deficit.
jl
@cleek: Unless I missed some big news, there is no solvency problem with Social Security, at all, over next 18 months, or to 2016.
So, what difference does it make. I would advocate economically sensible fixes to long run Social Security funding problems (that are decades away) now.
I would start educating public on correct ways to think about Social Security, which have policy implications are consistent with their policy preferences now. And use that to confront the GOP starting right now.
I would not cater to insane innumerate GOP BS in any way.
FlipYrWhig
@Hill Dweller: the country of that era was “more left” on white poverty, and pretty much on no other issue.
dollared
@? Martin: And you are wrong. Simply wrong. The portion of the Trust Fund related to Disability will be exhausted in 3 years. Benefits will then come out of the general fund, as it did before 1986. You’re a smart guy, Martin. Don’t be a shill for Pete Peterson, out of ignorance.
jl
BTW, TPM says Boehner has already rejected chained CPI fix, who went on to say that if it is a good policy idea on is own, why does Obama not just go ahead and propose it separately from budget negotiations.
So, gee, if you deliver a big slow straight fat one over the plate, even a guy like Boehner can hit it.
So, this kerfluffle was nice while it lasted. Unless Obama takes the rejection of his bad policy proposal to try a compromise with something even worse and more incorrect.
Edit: I guess I would be no good at politics. But if I were an office holder, I would make it a very public position of mine that I can compromise on arguable and debatable policy preferences, but I cannot compromise on incorrect arithmetic and demonstrably false positions.
schrodinger's cat
@Maude: I am not upset about this SS bit in particular but don’t like the fact that Obama spends a lot of time repeating the tired old deficit monger memes, thus lending them more credence than they deserve.
FlipYrWhig
@jl: the economically sensible fix is… to reduce benefits that go to upper income people. And, when you propose that, suddenly everyone says that grandma has to eat cat food on an ice floe.
dance around in your bones
@Cassidy: This.
I can’t even count how many threads have been wasted by the “Obama is selling us out!” and then it turns out….nah. It’s tiresome, repetitive and I generally skip these threads, or at least commenting on them.
Jeebus, I’d like to see anyone here deal with these insane Republicans and do a better job. And I don’t want to hear ‘bully pulpit!’ ever again.
Anna in PDX
@? Martin: Isn’t the best way to fix this issue to have more stimulus spending so there are more jobs and people who can’t find work aren’t going on disability? What do you think is a good solution to this?
And, do you think it will continue to rise at the present rate or do you think it has something to do with the overall economy? My partner actually works at a housing nonprofit that helps homeless senior citizens and meets lots of people who are in their 50s and are trying to get on disability because they can’t find work and are still a couple of years from retirement. They won’t stay on it forever. And presumably they’d rather work, because it is not a lot of money and will not make them very comfortable.
What do you think should be the policies under discussion to deal with/fix SSDI? Do you think it needs to be cut/made even harder to get than it is (it’s already hard enough that there is an entire lawyer industry around applying for it)? Or do you think it needs to be expanded and funded? Or do you think we have to work on the underlying cuases for why more people are going on it? That would be an interesting discussion.
FlipYrWhig
@jl: I don’t remember Obama ever proposing this idea “on its own.” No one would, it’s stupid. It’s there as part of a bigger plan. Which may also be stupid. But it’s not the “chained CPI bill.”
El Tiburon
@Tone in DC:
Okay, so we have a consensus that it will never pass and it is just posturing. For what reasons again?
Is he hoping to get some support for something else along the way?
Why doesn’t he then posture about raising SS benefits? Seems like that would get him a lot more praise while pissing off the same people.
Hill Dweller
@FlipYrWhig: The 1956 Republican platform is floating around the interwebs. Compare it to today’s Republican platform.
The current Republican party is radical by any modern political standard.
Anna in PDX
@FlipYrWhig: I understand why they don’t means test it. That makes it seem like a program for poor people – like welfare.
Mike Lamb
@dollared: The chained CPI is a terrible idea. No question. And there’s not a ton of upside in proposing it even knowing that it won’t get enacted.
However, I’ve got to ask–if the President really and truly wants to cut SS/Medicare, and the snarky rejoinder to GOP intransigence is “Oh, it’s too bad the POTUS is powerless”, then why haven’t the cuts happened? It appears that the argument is that POTUS can enact policies by circumventing Congress in some fashion. So shouldn’t the cuts have occurred some time ago if that’s what he really wants?
? Martin
@jl:
So, there was $154B, and it’s losing $26B per year (that loss was projected to increase to $40B last year, but I don’t know what the real number is). So, yeah, this is a real problem.
SSR is still adding funds to the trust faster than it’s paying out. So that part is fine. Should SSDI make up their deficits from SSR? Should SSDI benefits be cut? What’s the solution?
El Tiburon
@Omnes Omnibus:
You seem to be saying that I don’t back Obama. I did vote for him twice, so I did back him, correct?
This is where I think you and your brethren (and I mean that in the nicest way) get it so muddled up: that I and others harshly criticize Obama on certain issues of great importance (slashing Social Security, drone warfare) you take it that we don’t support Obama.
Or worse, that criticizing Obama will somehow empower the Republicans and then we all lose. In other words, better to keep our mouths shut so as not to aid the enemy.
So, I can say without irony or hypocrisy, that Obama has been e very good President. He has also been a terrible President. And since he is President, I believe he needs to hear the criticisms (when justified) louder than a pat on the back when he does the right thing.
jl
@FlipYrWhig: There are a half a dozen economically sensible, and equitable fixes to social security.
I don’t think means testing upper income individuals for benefits, after they have retired is one of them. Social Security is a social insurance program, you start paying premiums before you know what your wealth will be at 65.
Hey, maybe going to the public and explaining stuff like this to the public would make a difference over a couple of election cycles.
The GOP hacks and propagandists and media pundits would explode and accuse the Dems of political campaigning. So what? They would lose in the long run.
GOP has deep corporate pockets that fund false propaganda for decades without seeing any payoff. That has given them a PR advantage has set up a false and incoherent frame for economic debates the encourages the Dems to propose demonstrably incorrect and counterproductive and wrong policy proposals like the Chained CPI fix doodlysquat we see today.
dollared
@FlipYrWhig: Actually, no. They were to the left on the rule of law, on the rights of workers, on anti-corruption, on the proper mix of for profit and not-for-profit activities in the society, on the proper role of intelligence agencies, etc. etc. yes, there was racism and sexism, but the purpose of eliminating those vices was not to establish a right wing society where 90% could be co-equal peasants. So yes, the past was well to the left of today.
jl
@? Martin:
“What’s the solution?”
There are several solutions. Why not suggest an economically sound and equitable one, and start campaigning on them?
Good macroeconomic policy that discourages economically motivated applications is one of them. Quick implementation of health care reform is another. Increase payroll tax cap is another.
The dumb and incorrect Chained CPI fix just got shot down by Boehner. What was the point of that? What was gained?
Nothing except selling yourself into incorrect and inequitable public policy that you will have to explain yourself out of later after your bad policy proposal is thrown back in your face with a double dog dare to go ahead and do it anyway if it is the correct policy.
? Martin
@Anna in PDX:
Yes, stimulus spending will help enormously. But SSDI has also become a place for abuse of the system. It’s unnecessarily difficult for people with legitimate disabilities to qualify and its carrying too many people that actually can work.
My solution would be to add a new mandate – all employees must carry 12 months (24, whatever) of private disability insurance. That mandate can split with employers (that’s how it is with OASDI now), or be shifted entirely to employers, or whatever. That’s all negotiable. The private insurers would do the initial disability screening. If they’re willing to carry the person for a year, then SSDI would extend benefits automatically when that year is up and then take care of documenting the disability for themselves. But that would weed out a lot of the false claims. It would also take a pretty significant pressure off of SSDI by not having to cover that first year (some people only go on for a year, and they wouldn’t cost SSDI anything). Since a lot of these disabilities are due to the workplace, it’s a suitable solution.
People that would qualify without work (kids, seniors, etc.) go through the existing mechanism.
I would pair this with a minimum wage hike and a stimulus package, along with employment reforms – make it illegal to run credit checks before hiring, or require the person have permanent housing, and so on. It’s a lot of those things which are causing people who are on the edge of disability from being able to work, and causing them to opt for the disability route. These changes would cost nothing other than enforcement.
cleek
@jl:
but there is over the long term. we can kick the can down the road, or we can fix the problem now. personally, i’m a fix-it-now kindof guy.
dollared
@dollared: @Mike Lamb: Um, because he’s saving it for his special legacy – THE GRAND BARGAIN. Oh, and because Congress has to pass it. He can’t just rob Grandma without Congress agreeing.
? Martin
@jl:
To get it shot down, of course. Boehner doesn’t actually want entitlement reform, because this was the easiest of all reforms to accomplish. Good to know.
Hill Dweller
@dollared: Do you think any of this would be happening without the wingnuts controlling the House?
MomSense
There is way too much poutrage on this thread.
The sky is falling. The sky is falling. The sky is falling.
If, as some here say, the President wants to cut SS and Medicare sooooooo badly and the Republicans definitely want to cut (dismantle is more accurate) it–why hasn’t this happened yet?
Some of the latest polling shows that a majority of Americans, even a majority of Independents, trust the President over House Republicans on the economy. A majority also blame Republicans for gridlock. In a midterm election, these Independents are a must win voting block.
This is politics. If you are a leftie or lean left–brace yourselves because there will be a lot of twists and turns between now and Nov. of 2014 and we have to focus on winning the House, keeping the Senate and taking as many state legislatures and governorships as possible. It really is that simple.
some guy
what happened to all the BJ regulars who shouted at the top of their lungs in October that Obama would NEVER EVER EVER cut Social Security?
fucking idiots
jl
@? Martin:
OK, if you are talking political eleventy dimensional chess. I strongly disagree with that approach to political strategy and tactics, but not in the mood to argue that out any further. I have stated my case on that, and I guess I have to agree to disagree with a lot of commenters on this thread.
Omnes Omnibus
@some guy: Has it been cut yet?
Hill Dweller
@some guy: Having read way too many of your posts, I know you’re in no position to ridicule anyone’s intelligence.
It’s painfully obvious this is political posturing from Obama. He knows the wingnuts will never agree to any of this as long as it is paired with revenue increases. For the record, I think it is bad policy and politics, but it’s not hard to see their motive. Hell, Obama and his people are on record calling chained CPI bad policy.
I’ll bet the farm Obama will leave office without touching SS.
MomSense
@El Tiburon:
They only show up for DRONEZ, cat fud commission, chained cpi or public option.
dollared
@Hill Dweller: No. But the president could choose among many responses. Surrender is not my first choice, but then I’m a crazy guy who believes the president should use his huge advantage in public opinion to isolate the crazies and drive them out in 2014.
Omnes Omnibus
@Hill Dweller:
Yeah, I think there is an argument to be had over whether ostensibly putting SS on the table in any form is a good idea. While I tend to think that is is not, I am pretty sure my political instincts do not match those of the Obama team.
Hill Dweller
@dollared:
Is there any doubt Obama wants less Republicans in congress? Hell, other than their hardcore supporters, does anyone want Republicans in congress?
We’re arguing tactics, but the desired goal is the same.
El Tiburon
@cleek:
What is “long term”?
SS is solvent for the next 30 years or so, then will continue to pay out 80% after that.
So this “kick the can down the road” nonsense is straight out of the RNC playbook.
There is nothing wrong with SS. You are falling for the hype. To fix it is very simple: raise the cap or get rid of it all together.
David Koch
“Party of Social Security”?
Politically, what does that get us?
Non-minority seniors voted 61-39 for Romney/Ryan even though they wanted to end Medicare as we know it.
Non-minority seniors vote against their economic interest by landslide numbers over and over again.
So if they don’t care about their own economic interests and if they won’t reward people who do, then why bother.
Fuck’em. You can expand social security and medicare and they’re still gonna vote against us.
Why should we stick up for them when they don’t appreciate it?
Now, if you want to talk about this in terms of substance and economics, that’s a different matter. But if you’re framing this politically, let’s live in reality, we had an election only 5 months ago and the vote was clear, white seniors, who you want to cater to politically, voted against you and to cut off their economic noises in landslide numbers.
El Tiburon
@Hill Dweller:
It would be nicer if he left office making it stronger and changing the framing to increasing the benefits.
Funny how we would consider it a win if we just left as is without beginning to change it in a more progressive manner.
Omnes Omnibus
@El Tiburon: A good amount of what needs to be done by the administration is fending off the depredations that the far right wants to inflict on society.
cleek
@El Tiburon:
ummm… are you sure you’re OK with that? are you sure that’s a sign that there’s “nothing wrong” with SS ?
80% is a MUCH bigger cut than you’d get with the chained-CPI change.
To fix it is very simple: raise the cap or get rid of it all together.
right. but that’s politically impossible. it is an imaginary pony.
David Koch
We’re in this mess because of the Iraq war and Bush’s tax cuts (not even mentioning the unfunded prescription drug plan).
You know who were the biggest supporters of those rotten policies… seniors. Again, buy overwhelming numbers they were the Boy-King’s Amen chorus.
Shouldn’t seniors have to take some of the responsibility and pain of their reckless and criminal political positions?
Perhaps they’ll be more reluctant to support future
crusadesinterventions.Mike in NC
@David Koch: Nah, seniors would be totally cool with a foolish new misadventure overseas since they wouldn’t have to participate.
Hill Dweller
@El Tiburon:
Have you been in a coma since 2010?
Strengthening SS would require lifting the payroll tax cap. Can you envision that happening without Dems taking over congress?
TG Chicago
@Anna in PDX:
Hear, hear. I was about to say the exact same thing. The two primary Obama defenses in this thread are in clear contradiction with each other.
JGabriel
I’ve started a White House petition:
Go there and sign it if that’s a sentiment you can support.
.
Ben Franklin
@Omnes Omnibus:
A good amount of what needs to be done by the administration is fending off the depredations that the far right wants to inflict on society.
some guy
@TG Chicago:
Contradictions is what the BJ Center Right Fight Club is all about.
-Obama will never cut Social Security
-If Obama proposes to cut SS it is only a negotiating tactic
-The negotiating tactic is actually a good thing
-Cutting SS is also a good thing
-Shut up and clap lopuder
TG Chicago
@Maude:
Huh? Where have you been living the past twenty years?
Republicans will NEVER drop their talking point that Democrats are the party of high taxes and big deficits–even though these are contradictory concepts and deficits went up bigtime in the Reagan and W administrations. They’ll keep saying it and the media will keep amplifying it.
These are the rules of the game. Anybody who has been paying attention knows this. NOTHING EVER will take away these Republican talking points. Democratic efforts to take them away over the past twenty years have been entirely counterproductive and have played right into the GOP’s hands.
Kay
I don’t like this as a political tactic or substantively, but it must be said that it is not 2010 because Obama isn’t running again. That’s a different scenario.
Congressional Democrats got nothing for the midterms, is the truth. They aren’t supporting anything that is going to be broadly politically popular, so they had a problem, going in.
If I were them I’d run against Obama on Social Security. It’s not like they have any brilliant big populist ideas they’ve come up with themselves.
Ted & Hellen
@Cassidy:
So get the fuck out of this thread and stop reading it, douche nozzle.
David Koch
@El Tiburon:
Why?
What would that get us?
Some of you are still locked into the pre-Nixon southern strategy mindset that seniors vote of Democrats. They don’t. Not in generations.
Reagan raised the retirement age from 65 to 67 and made benefits subject to income taxes for the first time in history. Depending on your income tax bracket, your benefits are cut by your marginal tax rate (ie roughly 15%). 15 percent is a pretty big cut. And despite those draconian cuts, St. Ronnie swept the senior vote, as they punished the guy who wanted to raise taxes on the rich in order to reverse their benefit cuts.
So what would be nice about helping seniors out, they don’t seem to care.
mclaren
When I predicted years ago that Obama would tack hard right immediately after being inaugurated for his second term, the gullible dupes infesting Balloon Juice laughed and laughed and laughed.
Not so funny now, is it?
Omnes Omnibus
@TG Chicago: Because the assumption is that Obama is putting this particular proposal on the table to appear “reasonable” and seem like the adult in the room in the eyes of the centrists who care about that sort of thing. In order to do that, he has to offer something that the right wants to show that he is willing to compromise. If he suggests the House Progressive Caucus budget, the centrists will scream both sides do it. Boehner has apparently already torpedoed the proposal because of the tax hikes. So the question becomes, how does it play out?
El Tiburon
@Hill Dweller:
Oh, okay. So it’s not even worth starting to change the conversation? You know at one point in time SS was embraced by Republicans. It was only after an onslaught by the right-wing that it changed. So, we can’t even begin the fight one step at a time?
How fucking awesome would it be if Obama, when he is out on his (unwinnable??) tour to change gun regulations that he would also tout just as strongly how important SS is and that they can take it form his cold dead fingers?
How fucking cool would it be if he embraced SS and owned it and put it out there? How jazzed would the left be? And how infuriated would the right be? A win-win-win all the way around.
Nope. We have a dem Pres. putting cuts on the table. And everyone over here is like, “well, you know, what can you do?”
WE can do a lot if we decide to.
David Koch
For people who are against this, what are you gonna say when Elizabeth Warren votes for it?
Keith G
A lot of folks that some would call apologists say something like this:
My problem with this is that I am certain in times like this, leaders need to step up and make a strong affirmative case.
Obama has one of two teaching jobs to do: Either why chained CPI is a bad thing or why it absolutely must be done.
David Koch
@JGabriel:
link or it didn’t happen
NR
@Cassidy: The objective reality is that Obama has proposed Social Security cuts. You and your fellow Obots think that somehow means he doesn’t really want the cuts. Because you apparently believe that you can read his mind and you know what he really wants even when it directly contradicts what he publicly says.
I am looking at reality. You are looking at your fantasy based on the idea that you magically know what Obama is really thinking. That’s the difference between us.
TG Chicago
@MomSense:
Because nobody wants to take the political heat for it.
Yup. And by requesting cuts to SS, Obama just gave the GOP a great shot at winning that must-win block.
askew
@Kay:
They can run on gun control, immigration, and a plan for jobs. All of which are popular in the country and opposed by GOP.
TG Chicago
@David Koch:
I gather you’re never planning on growing old, then?
Hill Dweller
@NR: The reality is said cuts, which the Obama people are on record as calling awful, are paired with revenue increases and ending the sequester. Again, I think it is bad policy and politics, but chained CPI is in exchange for other policies, which you may or may not think are of comparable importance.
The fact that you refuse to acknowledge that puts you in the camp refusing to deal with reality.
TG Chicago
@Hill Dweller:
I definitely can’t envision that happening without Dems and progressives pushing for it.
Do you see conservatives giving up on their ideals even though they’ll never be signed into law by Obama? Nope – they keep fighting. Why should we throw in the towel?
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@El Tiburon:
This makes sense. I take you at your word that you support the President while opposing him on some policy grounds; that is an honorable position, IMHO.
Where I think “firebaggers” and “Obots” differ greatly on tactical messaging, and often talk past each other because they hold different assumptions about how political capital are created, it with this:
From an Obot point of view, yes I think that to a first order approximation the bits I bolded above are true statements. Criticism of Democratic Presidents from the Left does empower the GOP.
The reason for this is that due to a combination of on the one hand a loud, obnoxious and heavily right-wing biased news media, and on the other hand low info voters not parsing with care what they hear from that news media, criticism from the left is deliberately and with malice mistranslated by the news media into: the President is weak, misguided and ineffective, in contrast to the Republicans and therefore the Republicans must be right and the President must be wrong.
This sleight of hand works because low info voters use the syllogism that strength = right, weakness = wrong, and assume that if a President is catching hell from his own party, he must be weak and therefore wrong, and furthermore that if he is wrong then it logically follows that his political enemies on the right must be correct.
Basically firebaggers and Obots have different concepts explaining how political capital is created and where mandates come from.
Theory A is: a leader advocates for correct policy. Correct policy creates enthusiasm from the base. Enthusiasm from the base translates into popularity amongst the general population, and that creates political capital and a mandate.
Theory B has it somewhat in reverse: cheerleading from the base inflates the popularity of a leader amongst the general population. That generates political capital and a mandate, and having more political captial gives the leader more freedom of action in advocating for better policy, than he/she would have if less popular.
Firebaggers lean more towards Theory A, while Obots lean more in the direction of Theory B, when it comes to arguments over messaging tactics.
Personally, I think elements of both theories are at work in our system. But I tend to give a little more weight to Theory B because: (1) Theory B has worked well for the GOP over the years (c.f. Reagan’s career) and Dems have been smashing their heads against a wall with little to show for it using Theory A for most of my lifetime, and (2) for Dems in particular we don’t have the news media working on our behalf the way they do for the GOP, so we need a louder cheering section than they do. That is why as an Obot I get frustrated when I hear criticisms of this President coming from the left that I suspect will be transmorgified from “Policy X is so much better than policy Y that Obama is a fool to support policy Y” to “Obambi is teh suxxors” by the time it gets filtered thru our news media and out to the low info voting population. The net result isn’t more support for policy X, it is more support for GOP policy H which is some hell-spawned nightmare that makes the differences between X and Y seem trivial in comparison.
El Tiburon
@David Koch:
No, you misunderstood my intent.
I wasn’t talking about seniors. I was talking about a paradigm shift in how we discuss Social Security.
My point being, if Obama were to use some of his political capital and bully pulpit the way he is using it for new gun control laws, he might be able to begin that shift.
No, nothing is going to be done short-term as long as Republicans control the house. But you know what, nothing will ever really be done regardless until we change the framing for Social Security.
Fact is it is going to be the ONLY source of income for millions and millions of Americans when they get too old to work. We need to accept this new reality and begin to deal with it by expanding it – not slashing it.
Ben Franklin
A little frosting on this cake. China taking the lead on International law.
“The drone idea was eventually abandoned even as Mr. Naw Kham outfoxed his pursuers in Myanmar’s mountainous jungles, said Mr. Liu, a precise man with a photograph of himself at a Mao heritage site on his office wall.
“The Chinese news media reported that Mr. Liu’s superiors had ordered that Mr. Naw Kham be captured alive. Mr. Liu, whose antinarcotics bureau runs a fleet of unarmed drones for surveillance in China’s border areas, insisted that the idea was shelved because of legal restraints.
“‘China using unmanned aircraft would have met with problems,’ he said. ‘My initial reaction was that this was not realistic because this relates to international and sovereignty issues.”
What kind of weak, soft, overly legalistic government worries about trivial concerns like international law and “sovereignty issues” when it comes to drone-killing heinous murderers for whom capture is difficult? Why not just shoot Hellfire missiles wherever you think he might be hiding in weaker countries and kill him and anyone who happens to be near him? Or if you are able to find him, at least just riddle his skull with bullets, dump his corpse into the ocean, and then chant nationalistic slogans in the street and at your political conventions. Who would ever want to give a trial to such a heinous and savage foreign killer of your citizens, particularly if it means risking the lives of your soldiers to apprehend him?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/apr/05/china-drones-mekong-naw-kham
TG Chicago
@Omnes Omnibus:
This has been Obama’s approach to nearly every issue since he’s taken office.
IT HAS NOT WORKED.
*The “centrists” who allege to “care about that sort of thing” still complain that Obama will not compromise. This is what they’ve done every time.
*Taking your opponent’s idea as a starting point to negotiation is a lousy way to compromise anyway. This has turned out badly every time.
*The “centrists” will still scream “both sides do it” because that’s all they know. If they ever took one side, they would, by definition, cease to be “centrists”, which is far more important to them than providing good, workable solutions to problems. This is how it will work every time.
The first Obama term made all of these points abundantly clear. Why keep making the same mistakes all over again?
Omnes Omnibus
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: Well stated. I think there is also an element of temperamental difference with respect to compromise and willingness to accept half a loaf. One side seems more willing to accept incremental change as opposed to none; while the other side appears more confident that if one just holds out a little longer, one will get more. Ultimately, most of the Obot/firebagger fights are squabbles over tactics.
Omnes Omnibus
@TG Chicago: But we have made progress on a wide range of issues.
Also too, the people this kind of tactic is aimed at have the attention spans of golden retrievers and the memories of goldfish. As I said above, I have my doubts about the wisdom of putting SS on the table at all for any reason, but I also am not willing to say that my political judgment is better than that of the Obama team.
eemom
This is godawful policy being justified on the theory of “appearing reasonable” — “appearing,” to idiots who get their info (at best) from the Sunday talk shows, “reasonable,” as compared to an opposition that everybody knows is bugfuck crazy — which has an admittedly huge risk of backfiring politically.
I’m sorry, but there is NOTHING here to defend, Obot or no Obot. Once again, fuck this shit.
jl
@David Koch:
” For people who are against this, what are you gonna say when Elizabeth Warren votes for it? ”
I would say that Elizabeth Warren is wrong on the issue and explain why.
Hill Dweller
@TG Chicago:
Dems are not going to stick their necks out by pushing for a tax increase if there is no chance of it happening.
Dems routinely look like cowards because they’re held to a much higher standard than Republicans by the Village. Dems can be absolutely right on the merits, but the Village are far more likely to mindlessly parrot wingnut and/or corporate lies in hopes of proving they’re not “liberal”. Consequently, policy is fought largely on Republican ground.
It’s hard to overstate how disastrous the MSM has been for this country in the last 30+ years. We’re in a soft economy, with no short-term deficit problem, but the Village is still obsessed with austerity.
The progressive caucus budget was the most popular in polling, but it was ignored by the Village. They’ve also erased Obama’s jobs bill from memory.
Obama is trying hard to push gun control legislation, but the Village is obsessed with his missed jump shots, daughters’ vacation and calling Kamala Harris attractive.
We can and should push for progressive ideas, but the MSM and their corporate masters have no desire to see them advance.
eemom
@Omnes Omnibus:
You know that oft-repeated phrase about a stopped clock? Even a perfectly synched, methodically ticking clock fucks up once in a while.
Hell, I have one of those satellite-controlled ones in the kitchen and every fall and spring when the hour changes it has a nervous breakdown.
White Trash Liberal
@Ben Franklin:
I won’t touch that idiocy with a ten foot pole. The “even China is better on civil liberties than the US” meme Glenn is trying to create is repulsive and malignant.
Anna in PDX
@? Martin: Thanks, that was interesting and if all the stuff you mentioned in your final paragraph was something that could be done, I’d agree with the ideas to deal with SSDI. I don’t really agree with your framing that it’s in a crisis (I really hate this sort of framing in general about govt programs) but agree it could serve people better. It would also be nice in addition to having disability insurance for real disability cases, to make corporates pay for laying off people in their mid-50s. I think this is a horrible practice and there need to be serious disincentives for it.
It would also be nice to somehow make age discrimination less prevalent in employment.
To all those people saying seniors don’t support our policies so fuck’em, what the hell. Age groups are too wide to really practice identity politics against, and everyone is going to be in every one of them, eventually, except for those who die young, so punishing them would be incredibly stupid.
You are going to want to retire one day. Will it please you that you stuck it to a senior back in the day, when you are struggling to live on social security because there are no more defined benefit pensions and our 401Kasinos all crashed? You sound like republicans with the “fuck em, they don’t vote for us”
El Tiburon
@jl:
Oh come on. This is certainly not the BJ way. Rant and rave. THAT is the BJ way.
Bobby Thomson
@cleek: I’m a fix it when batshit crazy lunatics aren’t running things guy, myself.
Ben Franklin
@White Trash Liberal:
I agree hunnert percent.
El Tiburon
@Hill Dweller:
This is really it, isn’t it?
If we really had a true, adversarial and functioning press corp in this country, then I don’t think we would be where we want to be.
I don’t really blame teabaggers. Idiots are gonna do what idiots are gonna do. But the MSM abused their power as informational gatekeepers to the public. I know I used to be one of those rubes falling hook line and sinker for the MSM.
David Koch
@jl: really, you wouldn’t call her dwight d Warren and a cowardly lion. Funny how she gets a pass.
Jasmine Bleach
@MomSense:
But how are Democrats supposed to win in 2014 when Obama (the lead Democrat) just endorsed chained-CPI and cutting Medicare? Holy geezus you folks have a weird idea of how to win elections. Sounds to me like Obama just ensured the Senate will switch to Republicans in 2014 and the House will more strongly go that way.
Instead, how about this? Loudly proclaim lifting the payroll tax cap, and SS will be secure until the 2070s if not beyond? All income will be treated under the same rules, and nobody (like those well-to-do) gets breaks?
Of course the current House will reject it, which is fine because SS really isn’t in jeopardy for the next decade, and then use their rejection of it as a campaign bludgeon against them in 2014 and take back the House! Then for the 2015 budget, lift the payroll tax cap, and be done with it. Safety net saved, benefits not cut, low and middle incomers not taxed more, everythings good.
Instead, now the Democrats are the ones shredding the safety net.
The Democrats need to play for the long term, actually supporting policies that most folks in the country support. They’d be unbeatable then.
Omnes Omnibus
@eemom: The problem is that I just don’t understand the both-sides-do-it, “reasonable centrist” mentality at all. I have no idea what would appeal to them or why.
Jasmine Bleach
@David Koch:
I’d be aghast because I support sound policies and don’t worship people like too many around here.
Having said that, I’d be surprised if Warren votes for it. Has she indicated she supports it?
Keith G
@El Tiburon: A freaking awesome comment. What has concerned me over the years is that some Obama supporters can sound like some Bush supporters. O.O. is not that category, but some here are.
David Koch
@Jasmine Bleach: why would you be surprised? She just voted for sequestration, she supported obama’s fiscal cliff deal that all the online people hated, she supported TARP, she supports drones (hell, even the liberal scott brown opposed drones), she supports bombing iran, she voted for the angel of death John Brennan, citibank’s jack lew, and republican chuck hagel. But she serves up empty lip service and so all the people who say they stand on principal give her a pass.
MomSense
@TG Chicago:
He has proposed this many times. Do you remember the fiscal cliff negotiations? Nancy Pelosi even said she favored chained CPI and then in January she spilled the beans by revealing that it was a bluff. She and the WH were calling the Republicans’ bluff.
MomSense
@Jasmine Bleach:
Pretty sure the Republicans ran on opposition to Obama’s cuts to Medicare in 2012. He had also proposed chained CPI several times before the 2012 election.
Mike Lamb
@dollared: So why doesn’t he role over to get it done?
Mike Lamb
@mclaren: You have a lot of people in this thread arguing that Obama has wanted to cut entitlements the entire time. If that’s correct, how is this a tacking hard to the right?
David Koch
It is sad reading all the arm-chair-types who never even ran for high school council lecturing a person on election tactics who is only the 3rd black person ever elected to the senate, who defeated the most famous woman in the world and her husband’s formidable political machine, and who broke the color barrier with two landslide victories.
how patronizing.
now, if you want to criticize on policy and economics, that’s fine. But how many electoral miracles does a skinny black guy with a funny name in a racist country have to accomplish before he’s credited with electoral skills?
eemom
@David Koch:
um, he’s not running for anything anymore.
If you’re suggesting that this is somehow a “tactic” to get other Democrats elected this year and in 2014, I’m having a really hard time seeing how it does that.
dollared
@El Tiburon: This. This is how the wingnuts took over our country, by believing that they could undo the entire welfare state and undo the Civil War. And yes, we can restore social democracy in the US. But it takes belief in the possibility that we could win on the merits. If we don’t believe that, then it’s just one long, painful ride to looking like South Africa.
El Tiburon
It seems to pretty much be a consensus out in Liberaland that Obama’s budget is not only bad policy but bad politics.
Keith G
@David Koch: Oh for fuck sake. Perfection is only for mythological supreme beings. In case you missed the memo, this is a democracy and the little people are encouraged to give feedback to those who govern in their name.
Obama’s two elections were phenomenally brilliant but they weren’t miracles or perfectly executed. Get off your knees and worship something else.
David Koch
@eemom: he just held 4 fundraisers yesterday, so he’s running for something.
if you’re saying this is a bad electoral move then why did seniors vote for the people who wanted to end medicare as we know it 61-39
if you’re saying cutting cola is a bad electoral move then why did seniors overwhelming vote for Reagan in 84 when he raised the retirement age and taxed benefits for the first time.
show me were repeatedly voting against social security and medicare has hurt the republicans wth seniors.
I still hear/read people say we don’t want to lose the senior vote. Hello, we just lost the senior vote 5 months ago 61-39. It’s not reality to think of seniors a Democratic voting bloc.
jl
@David Koch:
I think ‘Dwight D.” Warren would not be funny, so would not use it. I would have to think of another name if I wanted to add a little sarcasm.
Nice how you moved the goal post there. Now I am giving Warren a pass if I don’t make fun of her in exactly the same way I do the prez.
You trivial self righteous nincompoop, I suppose flat contradicting Warren, should she cast such a vote, and explaining why she is wrong is ‘giving her a pass’.
Elie
@David Koch:
You have that right, Senhor — but nevermind. Each decision must be evaluated by our legions of smarter than Obama because” legions — not after anything but the immediate –“this must be bad because its bad to me right now and I know everything”
Frankly, I can’t wait until Obama is out of office and the next either white liberal or white conservative is in office. I am sure that they won’t be given the same treatment…
The long game is the long game. I there is no trust, of course, there is no way to believe anything but bad things…
Lets do a checkpoint 4 years from now on how bad Obama was and what you think THEN
David Koch
@El Tiburon:
Thank goodness actual voters don’t live in liberalland or John Edwards would have been the 2008 nominee and McCain would be president today.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/01/02/429058/-2008-straw-poll-Iowa-Eve-edition
Ben Franklin
@El Tiburon:
That is the deathstroke. LGM is the AFL and BJ the NFL of ‘liberal’ pov.
El Tiburon
@David Koch:
Straw-man argument aside, nobody is questioning his electoral skills.
It’s his policy and political skills that are in question. By his own admission and full-on consensus his negotiating skills are for shit. And that’s the thing about being the Prez – you don’t get to use your past accomplishments as a free pass.
David Koch
@jl: see, you just proved this more about personality then it is about policy.
it’s okay to call a guy who puts his life on the line every day a coward and a life long democrat a republican. While it’s wrong to mock former republican Elizabeth warren, who voted for Nixon and Reagan twice as a republican and wrong to call her a coward for voting for obummer’s budget, even though she’s in a safe seat in a deep blue state.
Morzer
@El Tiburon:
I am sad to see you abandoning your life’s work with such frivolous abandon.
David Koch
@El Tiburon:
no. you only get a free pass when you mouth empty words like elizabeth warren. as long as you do that you can vote any way you want without repercussions.
it’s hilarious being lectured by you on politics considering you voted for bush.
I don’t mind having a disagreement, but perhaps a former voter of the Texascutioner, who openly mocked Karla Fay Tucker’s death, would get off their high horse when talking to the proletariat.
Yutsano
Over/under on thread going 500+ comments?
Cassidy
@NR: Yeah…I’m thinking words like “objective” and “reality”, as well as “logic” and “reason” might be foreign concepts to you.
Bob In Portland
@satby: “Cover” is the operative word. Please read the comment at Booman Tribune.
Keith G
@Elie:
Four years might be too soon. Nonetheless, like many presidents his legacy will be mixed. There will be important pluses and significant minuses. A decade or so away there may be a better opportunity to see how the seeds he planted grew and maybe a chance to evaluate those things that got left on the table.
David Koch
btw.
For people who don’t like this what is your alternative to replacing the sequester and increasing spending?
Right, the reduction in cola is not in the abstract, it’s only part of a package to increase taxes on the rich, while increasing current spending on infrastructure, and reversing and eliminating the sequester cuts.
You saw today’s job numbers, the sequester is starting to send the country into another recession.
If you’re really a liberal, then you have to think about the people still unemployed, struggling in poverty, and those who will be unemployed when the recession kicks in. It’s really easy for someone in a safe job to say, no deal on colas. But if you were hungry and losing your home, you wouldn’t care about an inflation index.
Now, a lot of onliners say, just use the progressive caucus budget in concert with the bully pulpit. C’mon. I have respect for the bully pulpit, but in reality it’s of limited use when republicans are in highly gerrymandered safe districts.
look at the gun debate. Obama has held dozens of events in the past three months, he gave a passionate speech in prime time on a sunday night carried on all four networks, and stirring speech during the SOTU. And even with 90% of people supporting background checks, they’re not going to vote for it, even though it’s a policy they once supported.
So how do you do it with just words alone? If they won’t respond to dead children and overwhelming public support for background checks, how do you get them to do something they really hate to their core, like raising taxes on rich and increasing spending?
Now you can say, these are worthy goals, and I care about today’s economic plight, but reducing my cola is too high of a price, I respect that.
But if you think a deal could be made, what would you offer? Can you think of anything? Simply saying use the magical bully pulpit is not a serious response.
dance around in your bones
@Yutsano:
Well, I’m already completely bored with it so I will never know. Prolly.
ricky
So tell me. After 380 + comments, exactly how much is Obama proposing in the effort to “SLASH” (as some have called it) Social Security by reducing the amount it will automatically increase IF the current legal formula calculating mandatory increases is altered.
And exactly how much has been slashed from Social Security
in the last ten years based on 2003 estimates of what the COLA would have yielded in benefits by this year?
Anybody know?
Yutsano
@dance around in your bones: Looking like under. I r disappoint.
raven
Hi girls and boys, this is the bear!
dance around in your bones
@Yutsano: Maybe it’ll hit 400. I don’t care.
(You notice I am still checking in, however. FAIL!)
@raven:Hi bear! High bear? Anyway, hola!
Gravenstone
I suspect if enough of us cheerlead for the magic 400, it’ll come to pass.
dance around in your bones
Hit ’em with an F! with an O! with a U! with an R!
Four hundred! Gooooooo BJ!
The Raven
I think there’s enough votes to pass this in the House, if Obama and the big-money donors push for it; the Republicans already broke ranks to pass the fiscal cliff deal.
Blocking this now depends on an alliance between the Tea Party Republicans and the Progressive Democrats; on a Firebagger coalition, in other words.
Is this the new party we all have been waiting for?
Redshirt
Fire Tea Baggers. Hot.
dance around in your bones
Just ten posts short of 400! Hit me with your best shot!
DeepSouthPopulist
I’m a teabagger on guns, race, culture and social issues, and a firebagger on everything else. A Tea-Fire-bagger coalition/party is not a bad idea. Too bad the tippy top’s divide and rule game is working.
eemom
@dance around in your bones:
Greenwald eats kittens kidnapped from bleg posts bankrolled by Anne Laurie cliquists. You heard it here.
DeepSouthPopulist
@DeepSouthPopulist:
Many of you are WAY too confident the GOP leaders won’t scrounge up the votes for tax increases in return for gutting of SS. Gutting SS is a GOP holy grail.
dance around in your bones
@eemom: Thank you for your incredible investigative journalism (and the Greenwald ref usually drives up the thread count, so point#2 in your favor)!
Are you sure he doesn’t skull-fuck them first?
Raven on the Hill
@Redshirt: Well it’s for-sure not the new progressive party I’d like to see, but there never was much chance of that emerging anyway.
Coalition forming is such a crapshoot. Just because the tea party R’s and the progressive D’s are both out of power, they’re sort-of cooperating. Whether that would last if there was a real shot at power, I have no idea.
393, er, 4!
ricky
@eemom: So you think Greenwald is up at this hour reading BJ and will refute this at least six times if further baited?
Central Planning
@Jasmine Bleach:
Do you claim the grocery store raises prices every week because sales are over?
Redshirt
@Raven on the Hill: A true Fire Tea Bagger would be an unholy terror. I guess a pure Puma comes closest, from Tennessee or so.
dance around in your bones
Come on, guys – we can do it! Hit 400 on this sucky thread and be done with it!
Redshirt
@dance around in your bones: Here you go. :)
rda909
@The Raven: Yes! Please all these new 3rd Party Heroes need to go form their own site post haste and leave us Obots alone to worship peacefully at the altar of Obummer.
Once they get all the Rand Paul bootlickers onboard, they can probably get the Hillary contingent to join too, since her record while Senator was so uber-progessive. It’s a win-win-win for all of us! Bye now!
Irish Steel
@eemom: You’ve blown this case wide open!
rda909
@Redshirt: I believe the word you’re looking for is, “Hawt.”
dance around in your bones
Ok, FYWP told me my edit was SPAM!SPAM,SPAM I tell you!
“You fucked up, you trusted WP!”
Redshirt
@rda909: Hotxxorr
lol chikinburd
Jesus Christ, people.
rda909
@El Tiburon: Quick. Name a President who has presided over more “progressive” change in any of our lifetimes. (hint: you can’t)
Oh, and you know it’s a fact that he’s faced the most obstructionist Congress ever, correct? By far. Even from 2008-2010, it was Democrats in the Senate blocking everything until anything he tried to do was watered down, with no Republicans at all, except when President Obama got passed the largest single Stimulus in American history, and he a got a couple Republicans to vote for it within his first few months in office. FDR and LBJ had HUGE majorities compared to President Obama.
rda909
@Redshirt: Oooo…kinky.
Redshirt
@rda909: Know the future. Watch “Matrix Revolutions”.
ricky
We need a real Tax and Better Barterer Democrat.
rda909
@Keith G: Yes, we’re mindless Obots! Now please go form your own site and build that mass movement that’s going to take down us sell-out liberals, who worship his High Holiness Baracktu Obamatu. Go now before it’s too late. The time is neigh, since all those “hard-worker” Libertarians seem to have a lot of time on their hands considering they fill up every comment section of every site and newspaper site, and YouTube video within seconds of its posting, with their pre-programmed talking points. Catch these geniuses while you can, brave soldier in the War of Ideas, and free us from the chains of the Bilderbergers, of which Obummer clearly is part of. Fly now…go away…be freeDUM!
Bruce S
@Morzer:
A pretty good rule, but like all good rules it has the exception – in this case, marriage equality.
Bruce S
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Which is why Martin Luther King should never have pushed Kennedy and Johnson to do the right thing on civil rights and the labor movement should have taken their cues from FDR and not been so miliant. The reality is that social movements pushing for better policy have empowered Democratic Presidents to do the right thing. The argument for “criticism of Democratic President’s from the Left does empower the GOP” might be drawn from the nightmare of Johnson’s escalation of the Vietnam war as “criticism from the Left” mounted and eventually undid his presidency. But that is because Johnson was committed to doing the wrong thing. He “disempowered” himself. The antiwar movement was right and he was wrong. Your binary analysis above is completely ahistorical and half-assed, to say the least. It’s shockingly wrong-headed and stunningly superficial.
I’ve personally heard Obama himself say as much as what I’m putting forward when he started running – that he needed his supporters to eventually act as outsiders and organizers around issues and push him to do the right thing if he actually attained the office. He knew what the pressures inside the White House would inevitably be and that he could need robust social movements forcing his hand if he were to succeed in effecting significant change. Unfortunately, most of what we’ve gotten on our side is chatter – with the exception of marriage equality activists and hopefully an increasingly robust push from environmental activists, while the Crazies actually went out and organized around their issues, boxing in Obama. We shouldn’t worry about Obama – he can take care of himself. We should push aggressively for sound policy. Anything less is folly.
Bruce S
@David Koch:
“But if you think a deal could be made, what would you offer? Can you think of anything?”
A lot of the defense of this bargaining strategy – putting this retrograde COLA reduction on the table as a first move – appears to be premised on the notion that Obama doesn’t believe a deal can be made and this is optics. So I’m not convinced the ball is in the court of the policy critics in terms of “how do you actually make a deal.” Personally, I’d rather not have a deal given how big a bite the GOP wants to take out of the federal government and I certainly don’t want to open any negotiations with this very bad proposal. Since there’s no real evidence Obama believes a deal can be had or that he is more serious about actually making one anymore than I am, the issue becomes why put this out there when it’s extremely unpopular – EVEN AMONG SELF-IDENTIFIED REPUBLICANS. I don’t get it. It’s main appeal is to Beltway f*cktards – the kind of folks who sit around blowing BS on Morning Joe. Horrible, politically incestuous people who are totally oblivious to the real world, despite their access to column inches and cable news microphones.
NR
@Cassidy: You’re the one who thinks you can read Obama’s mind. I’m just going by what he publicly says. It’s easy to see which of us is dealing with reality. (Hint: It ain’t you.)
El Tiburon
@David Koch:
Of course you will say this same exact thing to John Cole, you know the guy who owns the fucking blog you currently pollute, every time he talks politics, won’t you?
ricky
The cost of Social Security is rising. Obama, by proposing to limit it’s rate of increase, is slashing it, say some.
The cost of health care is rising. Obama, by proposing to limit its rate of increase, is socializing medicine or is out to kill the elderly, say some.
Why can’t we solve this the old fashioned liberal way from the 20th century. How about a wage/price freeze to hold down the need for COLA’s and pay people not to grow so many old folks.
El Tiburon
@rda909:
Q
Zachary Taylor? No, Franklin Pierce. I give up. Who is it?
Yes, Obama has been in office during some great progressive changes. Did he leading them or simply do the politically expedient thing to do? He did not jump out in front of gay rights so much but fell in line.
But what has he really put his butt on the line for? The history on Obamcare is still being written but I don’t think it will be too kind.
And his list of policies that are abhorrent to liberals is well established. Has he marched with strikers or promised to increase social security benefits or gone after bankers or torturers? What does he stand for, really?
After Bush this country was ready for a fundamental shift and Obama failed miserably. Is it all his fault? Of course not. But what a wasted moment in time.
Rex Everything
@Bruce S: Every word of this is right on.
ricky
@El Tiburon:
Yes, as a liberal I abhor by the Obama policy of not marching with strikers. Said so the day it was revealed by a wikileak of thought exchanges between Rahm and Holder.
We all know an increase in Social Security was the simmering
issue that caused young and minority folk to flock to the polls in 2008, and the Obama policy of not proposing one has me livid to this day.
And don’t get me started with not going after bankers and torturers. This is one area where we all know we imagined he campaigned on this and that the country was ready to reestablish civil liberties for suspected foreign terrorists
and do a three sixty and waterboard the sadists who terrorized poor people by giving them home loans.
tofubo
@ present it’s 6.2% up to 113,000
change it to 5.0% up to 125,000 (everyone making under 125,000 will either not see the amount they pay go up and most will see a reduction in what they pay)
then, continue the 5% on income over 250,000
it lowers the tax paid for most people and makes it almost a flat tax (less regressive at least, the grover should like it)
rda909
@El Tiburon: Of course he didn’t lead on anything. He’s BLACKITY BLACK BLACK. Duh.
I realized people such as you are detrimental to any political movement by the end of PRESIDENT Obama’s first year, when the first thing he did was the Lily Ledbetter Act which had been languishing for over a decade, and then the largest, single Stimulus in the history of America, and then managing the auto bailout going so far to remove GM’s CEO, which he took a lot of flak for at the time and proven to be very beneficial, stopped the bleeding of job losses which were around 800K LOST PER MONTH, and with the most obstructionist opposition party ever, and on and on…
…and you and your friends have been simply responding every step of the way with, “Not good enough!” Thankfully, Senator Elizabeth Warren agrees with me, and not people such as you.
Go ahead, prove me wrong, and get your big political movement started to stop us Obots from selling all y’all out! Now git…time’s a-wastin’.
rda909
@ricky: Don’t you have some online petition to click on, you activist, you?
ricky
@rda909: Don’t go thinking just because I am unafraid to call myself a liberal that I am not progressive enough to have feelings capable of being
verbally bruised by your contempt for my digital manning of the barricades.
El Tiburon
@rda909:
Why would you bring this into this debate? Are you saying that if Barack Obama were Bernard McWhitey I would say he has been a great leader? Your assumptions about me are very offensive and say more about you, I think, than me. I guess when you have no argument to make yell RACIST and you win.
As far as Lily Ledbetter and so on down the line, I’ve stated emphatically that Obama has done a lot of good. Let me say it again for you: Obama has done a lot of good for this country. Of that there can be no dispute or argument. Especially not from me.
But, the simple and clear fact, at least from my perspective, is that Lily Ledbetter, et al would have been enacted by President Edwards or President H. R. Clinton or any Democratic President elected in 2008. Name one thing that Obama has done that another Democrat would not have done.
Pass ACA? Perhaps. But all of the progressive policies passed, again IMHO, were a fait accomplis.
Legalizing gay marriage is going to happen regardless. We all know this. Is it happening faster under Obama than it would have under a President Clinton? I don’t know – but it’s going to happen.
So, I ask again, what has this President done that can be considered really going for it? The aforementioned ACA perhaps. We will see about that.
Gun control? He does seem to be leading on that and props to him for not giving up the fight. And not to belittle those who died, but it is now a fight that can be fought a little easier, right?
Where is he on unions? On Social Security? On drone warfare and killing US citizens? On indefinite detention? On income inequality and the poor and Big Banks?
Is he going to lead on these issues that are a tougher nut to crack?
Well, so far not really.
El Tiburon
@rda909:
That’s right. When he negotiates with Social Security, Lily Ledbetter Act does not give him cover.
When he claims the right to kill US citizens on his word, saving GM does not give him cover.
When there seems to be no justice for the Banksters who are robbing us blind, him evolving on gay marriage does not give him cover.
So, yes, I will continue to voice my displeasure with my President when he continues to pursue so many policies detrimental to this country and its people.
I’m not a fanboi. I don’t have an Obama poster or bumper sticker. I don’t hope to meet him and have a beer with him and get to shake his hand and be in awe of Him.
I want my President to fight for what is right and just. What is your problem with that?
rda909
@El Tiburon: Hilarious. You claim there’s no inherent racism behind the incessant ranting about President Obama on so many “liberal” sites and by “liberal” pundits that started on Day One in office, then 2 paragraphs later, prove my point exquisitely.
John Edwards had one of the most, if not THE most, DLC-approved voting records while in the Senate, and Hillary wasn’t far behind, not to mention the fact she helped start the DLC and was an executive of the DLC for years. President Obama had an entire life history and career showing he’s always been far to the left of these two, and even publicly called out the DLC for putting his name in their marketing and wanted nothing to do with them. He has a radically different approach to governing and campaigning than those two, and has lived a life free of scandal. So no, you cannot assume all these historic changes were going to happen regardless of which “Democrat” is in there, and certainly not getting re-elected in 2012.
So perfect then…you dismissively toss aside President Obama’s incredible record of accomplishment, historic really, as if it’s all no big deal. Any Democrat would’ve done all that and would’ve been able to handle the unparalleled Republican hate and obstruction (odd how you Obama-whiners never respond to that part) just as President Obama has done, correct? His life history growing up as he did means nothing then. I want my President not just to “fight,” but more importantly I want him to get stuff done. So many of the things he’s done that “liberals” complain about have saved millions and millions of poverty level people and children, yet that almost never gets mentioned, because it doesn’t affect people like you and the white-privileged Left, so it’s easier to whine in blogs, on TV or in The Nation (I cancelled my subscription which I had for years because of this same issue) as President Obama delivers help to those who need it most even when Republicans are holding those people hostage. Yes, that’s what I want.
I live and work in a very diverse area with good mix of all kinds of ethnicities, and every single person I know and work with gets this really well and predicted it exactly. They knew white-privileged people would hold him to an impossible standard and nothing will ever be good enough. It’s been amazing to see how accurately they predicted what has happened. Considering in my life and what I’ve seen online, about 98% of people with Obama Derangement Syndrome are white people. Often quite wealthy too, or at least suburban dwellers. His support is through the roof with non-whites. That’s why I bring that up.
I was bored of this conversation 3 years ago, and people such as you have been saying the exact same things every single day, in every single blog since then, so I know where this is going and won’t be responding further, so perhaps a better use of your time would be here:
http://www.thepeoplesview.net/2013/04/for-ideologue-left-social-security.html
Rex Everything
Digby’s words from yesterday are kinda massively apropos here:
“Meanwhile prepare for a barrage of savvy, world weary commentary from your fellow liberals telling you that this is no big thing and that Democrats will not suffer even a tiny bit if they vote for a common sense proposal like this one. You will be shushed and told to calm down and take a chill pill. In other words, you will be gaslighted by fellow liberals who are embarrassed that you aren’t being coolly accepting of something that is completely unacceptable. This is how this works. Tell them to STFU and move out of the way.”
dollared
@da909: Bull.Shit. And what, my criticism of Bill Clinton for selling out unions and welfare recipients was based on what, my bias against fat people?
Obama is center right. He is not a liberal, and he is not willing to fight for liberal memes and principles. It’s just that simple.
To suggest that criticism of Obama for cutting Social Security is racially based proves what conservatives have been saying for 200 years – that some lefties will cry “racism” forever, for no reason.