Hey, I got warned that I’d be bounced from KOS if I called Obama “Barry” again.

Is President Obama a con-artist or a true populist? Personally, I think he’s a slick marketing tool of our “hidden rulers.” We, the American people have been fooled again. He will have to be replaced in 2012. Howard Dean-start getting ready. If he is a true populist, he needs to demonstrate that by taking the following CONCRETE steps.

1)
Fire Summers, Geithner and Rhambo. Replace Bernanke. Put Elizabeth Warren in charge of new Consumer Protection Agency.
2)
Get out of Iraq immediately. Reverse dumb decision on Afghanistan escalation. (Remember Mr. President, you don’t like dumb wars).
3)
Expand health care coverage to 40 million people using reconciliation:
Expanding Medicaid to everyone below 215% of the FPL, and expanding SCHIP coverage to all uninsured children, should give roughly 30 million more Americans insurance for a cost of just under $800 billion.
The Medicaid expansion could be structured to also work as a de facto extreme catastrophic insurance policy for people over 215% FPL. This would effectively put an end to medical bankruptcy in this country.
Early Medicare buy-in could be added for people without insurance who are between 47-65.
Expanding Medicaid, Medicare, and SCHIP are all doable under reconciliation.
Tax the rich to pay for it all.
4)
Create monumental Infrastructure Bank for large job creation and investing in future productivity. Have the infrastructure professionals make all of the decisions and not pork-barrel politicians.
5)
The United States Senate is an inane, corrupt and dysfunctional institution that no longer serves the interests of the American people. Bypass it on energy. Use the full powers of the EPA to mandate change!

I didnt hear that spending freeze where it concerned TARP or TALF or the FEDS O% lending programs.How about the Defence Budget of 700 billion every year.
This is starting to make me very angry.These policies are looking right wing to me.
The only people who suffer are the same ones who have been suffering all along

Evan and Morin Joe are excsatic!

Yglesias: “I suspect this initiative was deliberately leaked to progressive bloggers in an effort to get denounced by the left and I don’t want to give them the satisfaction.”

Even now he finds a spin to keep him from being critical of Team Obama. Fortunately we already know the face of evil, Matt style, and it has nothing to do with protecting military spending or trashing the economy.

Have you asked for a list of acceptable replacements?

Wonder if the list will change if Hoovernomics 2.0 becomes official policy.

Good morning, pups. Well….OK morning, considering yesterday’s freeze announcement. Rachel was all over it, didn’t give that Jared guy an inch. I am so disgusted I could cry.

Following the 9/11 attacks, Bush and his war hawks hit us hard with a dose of shock serum. Now following the bursting of the credit bubble, it looks like Obama and his deficit hawks are doing their damnedest to make sure that we are hit with yet another dose of shock serum. And because war hawks and deficit hawks flock together like two birds of a feather (and like two bullets in a revolver) in that both of them are Wall Street elitists who are heavily invested in the defense industry, which makes its profits by keeping us bogged down in worthless wars around the world, these two flocks of hawks won’t demand that cuts be made to the defense budget. Instead, they’ll demand that cuts be made to Social Security and Medicare: the two biggest safety nets that ordinary Americans have to soften the blow from hawk-induced shock attacks.

Just something to keep me awake at night worrying to death that being hit with a second dose of shock serum will cause America to lose her middle class.:’(

From Peter Peterson’s lips to Obama’s Teleprompter.

And, by the way, veterans spending has shit to do with “security”.

Michael Moore, on democracynow, just called the current administration the “Bush Administration.” A fruedian slip par excellance.

So the American public now believes Obama is somewhere between Marx and Hoover. The divide between Republicans and Democrats is which end of the scale you think he’s at. That’s what I call letting folks definitely know your principles — errr, somewhere in there.

The fundamental error most political analysts are making is thinking that what has become a bimodal distribution of voter sentiment is a normal distribution. There is no center in American politics — well there is Bayh, Nelson, Lieberman and the other usual bought-out suspects. Less than 25 votes is as close to none in a country of 330 million as one can get.

Concur– sadly yes.

Seconded!

Thats never good:(

Well, that is not barry nice of them.

They are prolly just feeling a gratutitous joy in the flushness of the nation’s recent success in egalitarian accomplishment as broad and necessary justice flourishes throughout the Homeland.

An excess of success.

Don’t ruffle their feathers, it is the molting season, afterall.

To borrow a phrase from another context,
the Obama administration is more aspirational than operational.

Mornin’, BT, pups

Sooooo, Obama has finally revealed that he channels Milton Friedman. The Pentagon’s dusting off its plans to invade Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and any other left leaning country in the Americas.

All the Lefty Blogs seem to all be reaching the same conclusion on this story the Left is uniting. I expect Rahm to strike real soon a united Left is scary.
Now if we can get the Poor and or the Tea Baggers, Ron Paulites etc with us Rahm will really have something to worry about.
Notice the press says Rahm has lost the Left to please the Center the Press never asks if the Center is actually pleased by everything Rahm has done for them.
Rahm wants to reach across the isle to the Republicans but despite pleading and begging that would put a horny teenager to shame Rahm has yet convince anyone in the GOP to walk with him.

Serious ?

I guess that obamarahma has made a strong move to become the worst US President ever. Buchanan was useless and helped to start the Civil War (I’m not sure that he really could have kept it from happening); Hoover had bad domestic economic policies that directly contributed to the depth of the Great Depression; bush II was a real disaster domestically and internationally, but he and his political outlook was not elected; obama was elected due to a campaign that PROMISED change (even though he and his sycophants want deny it) so his about face makes him a strong candidate for worst President ever.

When the military is the only thing hiring gotta do something with all those grunts. Can’t have them sitting on their asses.

Yep. Just helping those who have already sacrificed way too much for that term.

Naomi Klein is one smart cookie.

Can’t chip paint in the Army!

Honduras was the first step

Birds of a feather.
I’m with Molly. All I can say is Morning. This Freeze thingy doesn’t sound good. Like when a company that’s having trouble does a hiring freeze. You can’t increase business and then not have a set of employees to handle the new work. Can you?
It’s like passing a nasty health bill saying you’ll Fix it later. Reminds me of the couples whose marriages are not working at all and then who chose to have another baby, thinking that will save it.
But, I wax on….sorry.

I’m sure that SouthernDragon is dead serious!

Bill Young was in town yesterday and made an appearance in Largo. Sure sounded to me like he’s not planning on retiring any time soon. The best chance in years to oust Young and the administration switches parties.

Fighting a 3 or more front war on Terror is insane Londo on the TV show Babylon 5 said its something only the King of all idiots would do.
I’m wondering if the Elite class of an Empire express its Thantos or Death Instinct through stupidity and attention getting ploys that provoke and will continue until stopped.
I’m thinking of a spoiled brat looking to test its limits.

I’m all for fiscal responsibility and cutting government waste, but I’m worried about this move. So far no discussion of this plan in relation to jobs. Econ 101 teaches that government must spend to combat recession. The stimulus was a help although too small. Let’s hope that this is not repeat of Hoover decisions or FDR belt tightening mistakes of 1937.

If little job improvement on top of fhis failure to lead and push Democrats on the stimulus and healthcare,Obama will be a mediocre one term president.

homer http://www.altara.blogspot.com

Damn chippin’ hammers make a hell of a racket on that steel deck.

I like this blog because even though all hope for Democrats is over this blog is somewhat clever about it.

It’s like passing a nasty health bill saying you’ll Fix it later

If the freeze becomes real then there is no mechanism to fix the poor excuse for a health reform later on unless commensurate spending is decreased from somewhere else. Team Obama just put fixing it later into the circular file.

allan, that is brilliant.

Unfortunately, obama and the ruling elite trying to make us into a replica of Haiti. By breaking the social safety networks we will have nowhere to turn except to begging on the street, or, if we’re fortunate, some low level job of cleaning for the elites at whatever price they want to pay.

We will be taken over by China without them firing a shot.

I’m not doubting its just te stupid it still surprises me. Why can’t I be more jaded and accepting of all the stupid in the world?

Don’t forget the contractors, SD, we owe ‘em big time.

They need sumthin’ to do, as well.

Wonder if there is sumthin’, domestically, if the foreign “scenario” you mention doesn’t pan out?

Well, shucks, Americans do need to get out in the world more often.

DW

I imagine a lot of Special Forces types are training on our newly acquired bases in Columbia.

Relax people. This is kabuki. A faux pivot designed to appear centrist, just as Obama did in the campaign. He’s trying to recapture to support of independent voters that have been fleeing from his agenda all year.

Now, if the American people,(specifically the independent coalition that swung the election in Obama’s favor) have truly shifted left, as progressives here believe, they will see through this and reject it as well, will they not?

Right leaning independents will also see through this sudden embrace of ‘right-wing’ fiscal conservatism. It is little more than a juicy little bone for Bayh and other moderates in Red states to throw out to voters in November.

President Obama has lost his base and he has lost those center-right independents and he cannot get them both back because they have conflicting priorities and solutions to our nation’s problems.

He is now a lame duck president until November. The November elections will determine which faction of his coalition will carry this president forward ans shape the policy agenda for the rest of his one term.

Obama budget does allow for stomping on left governments in the America’s that do not allow our corporations to rape – er, do good business with – their mineral resources and lower paid workers.

However I do not believe a US armed forces invasion of any Central or South American Country (Islands are the Reagan exception and countries ruled by CIA associates is the Bush 41 exception) is the GOP way – er, Obama – way. There will be outsourcing by the Pentagon – or CIA – to a military industrial special services company (name to be chosen at contract signing). That way our military grunts can come out and earn 3 to 7 times military pay for the same work – the goal is to over pay for military security (read corporate expansion protection) so that nothing else can be in the budget.

Do not become jaded, my friend. I love your voice the way it is. We need more open hearts and minds. Not fewer.

Great sending a bunch young men into a stressful situation where coke is cheap and plentiful if we do get involved down there expect a crime wave back here after the war.

The IMF got its wrist slapped for trying to impose Shock Doctrine rules on the money it’s gonna loan Haiti. The contractors who take over Haiti wouldn’t like to have to pay the money back cuz it would take away from the profits of looting the country, what little is left to loot.

Ok thanks:)

A spending freeze on the heels of the SCOTUS debacle opening the floodgates to corporate spending on elections is, I guess, the change we were told would happen. Of course giving more of our government money to corporations instead of to the people does make sense if the corps. now have to spend more money on elections.

The problem is that ‘change’ has meant so many different things to so many voters. That is SO apparent when I come here. The progressive agenda is in conflict with the ‘change’ desired by a great many independents.

They don’t come much more jaded than moi.

BHO is quickly becoming my favorite Republican.

Now if I were a Chinese leader I’d be thinking about indenturing Japan in the near future now that they are rapidly headed to insolvency. Just keep pushing things in our economy until their best buds, the US, aren’t able to help them anymore. A few thousand year-old grudge match and slightly more recent actions during World War II to pay back. Maybe more like chess than checkers. (I have no idea if this is even remotely true.)

He was elected by the left and tacked right as soon as he took office. That resulted in, amongst other things, Scott Brown’s election and he comes to the conclusion that he needs to tack further right? In what universe was he too liberal? How traumatized must we have been by 8 years of Bush that we were fooled into thinking this one was intelligent?

I was wondering how that was going to work. Ouch.

But, not cynical.

Oh, wow. My sixteen year old just asked me Isn’t a freeze the opposite of a stimulus. What are they teaching these kids today? /s

Ehhh. I prefer orange boner

Are you implying that Obama and the elites in this country want to destroy the middle-class? If so, your line of thinking has now resulted in ‘total protonic reversal’!

I disagree, he was nominated by the left, elected by the center-right.

He doesn’t need our money now. No political donations needed from the citizenry so fuck them. Freeze their asses off and do the bidding of the well heeled MIC.

Life is good when you are a political whore.

SD is a Jadi Knight/Zen master, love, compassioin, understanding and rightful action … he is.

Fear not for him, demi, he understands … “be happy”.

He speaks to truth, not to despair or even to doubt.

;~DW

Come to think of it jaded isn’t the right term either. I’m far from dull or apathetic. *g* Guess I’ll just have to put “angry” in front of revolutionary.

You really have your finger on the pulse of the country.

The progressive agenda is in conflict with the ‘change’ desired by a great many independents.

Yeah, so many folks want to take the neo-con and neo-liberal policies of the last 30 plus years and turn further to the right while screwing the middle class that much more.

Very good economics question for a kid has she read Keynes? Are their any good econ books for kids?

That child needs to be sent to a re-education camp. Guantanamo still has some vacancies /s

You’re funny. *g*

*g*

I wish. *G*

She will be able to vote in 2012 and run for president in 2030.

He’s my Aspergher’s son. But, his otherness hardwiring mostly has to do with social skills. He is a critical thinker.

“The progressive agenda is in conflict with the ‘change’ desired by a great many independents.”

oh i am sad for you

Good point, but I suspect the ovrwhelming proportion will be spent on “new and improved” weapons systems – you know, the kind that will eventually be turned on the American public when they start getting restless.

This move is the equivalent of opening the door on an airplane while at cruising altitude. Whoever came up with this crazy idea did not think ahead very far: this is a two-fer for the republicans. First, it’s not a real spending freeze like the one Reagan pulled, which sent thousands of federal workers looking for jobs. So, the repubs can criticize the plan as being fake, incomplete, window-dressing, hypocritical, etc. Second, it legitimizes their message that the problem with government is that it spends too much money. Any new effort to spend money will be set against this “freeze” message.

Is THIS the message that was drawn from Massachusetts? Saving a few billion on domestic programs is going to make everyone feel better after trillions were used to bail out Wall St? Showing you can be tough on the domestic budget is going to ease the disappointment that you cannot be tough with the health insurance industry? I don’t think so. And I have said nothing of the progressive response to all of this. I for one am at the point of tuning this presidency out. The missteps and missed opportunities are becoming too painful to bear.

Son sorry I wrote daughter for some reason. Still very smart about the economy.

The good thing about that is the US military has yet to come to grips with how to fight an insurgency. Those crowd control devices are hard to deploy against a couple folks sneakin’ around in the alleys at night.

No worries. And, his ability to Think prolly disqualifies him from running for office.

A friend of mine told me yesterday that we should be grateful for small favors. Then he said, if our first minority president had been one of those dread Mexicans, there would have been rioting in the steets by now.

Obama doesn’t want to be a mediocre President. I guess he hasn’t seen the possibility that we will be an abject failure President. Not having any true core convictions he merely bobs up and down on the churning seas with no clear course.

In the past the military tried using a sledge hammer to swat a mosquito. They have learned. Now they use a 2 lb. maul to swat the mosquito.

Speaking of those who do not approve of the name Barry, it appears that their clock stopped sometime last night. The current Obama Mutual Assured Dystopia (MAD) plan to retrench unimportant discretionary spending does not appear to be worthy of a randomly created new topic. Somebody probably hit the snooze alarm or something.

America is exceptional, we will do both, proving our innate superiority in the world of nations, we are God’s chosen people do not forget.

It says so, right on every penny.

DW

He’s definitely over qualified for the Bush and Obama Econ team.:)

See that Indie is on the clock.

The doomsday scenario snark aside, Obama seems quite comfortable with the policies that almost caused a world-wide depression.

Dread, Dread? thats what they are saying about us now? :) Dread like the Dread Pirate Roberts? Does Glen Beck have pirate fantasies?

Yes, lol, we will do both. Who says Obama can’t multitask, anyway?

Interesting discussion this morning, folks, but have to go to work. Have a good day, everyone. Later.

Off to swim in the great capitalist cesspool. Boy, is it ever.

US KIA Irak: 4,374

US KIA Afghanistan: 972

Iraki and Afghan casualties: estimates vary to over 1.5M

US MBS 2010: 3,100 and rising

Be good to yourselves, and all other living things.

Namaste

Namaste, SD and pastfedup.

Have a pleasant day, Jedi-Dragon. Peace on ya.

Obama is nothing but a weak fish I amsorry i voted for him and the rest of his party. The can’t get anything done that dummy Bush got everything he wante dwithout 60 votes kick these bums out. and Bye buy obama in 2012

The sooner a progressive like Dean, Grayson, Elizabeth Warren, Hell, even Kucinich announces a 2012 Democratic primary challenge, the better. The flood of contributions to that candidate from the netroots and other disaffected Democrats will shock this White House, maybe into taking some positive, progressive actions.

People are sick of the spending, sick of the debt, sick of the bailouts, sick of the handouts, sick of the back room deals, sick of the taxpayer funded bribes, sick of the bureaucrats. They want unyielding, unapologetic fiscal conservatism.

This ‘spending freeze’, however, is no such thing.

Who benefits from the spending, the middle-class? Really? Who has benefited from the bailouts? The middle-class? How about those backroom deals and bribes…who did those help?

There is a free market consensus building and you are missing it.

Indie, dakine took you to the woodshed yesterday (on the BT morning thread) and you ran.

Anyone who cares can check it.

You are obviously a paid shill for the oligopolies who want FEUDALISM. We need public institutions that are robust enough to regulate oligopolies.

I think so too. If things continue according to Naomi Klein’s views, there will be deep social security and medicare cuts.

Indie, the small government line is a distraction, so that oligopolies can socialize losses on the backs of the taxpayers, while they privatize profits.

Do you support privatizing water? Taxpayers own water filtration and sewage facilities in most of the United States. It has been their tax dollars over the decades that have built those facilities. You libertarians want to SELL the public’s ownership of these facilities, so oligopolies can privatize the profits from selling water.

Do you want to defund the Patent Office? That’s another way to help oligopolies, because it hurts innovation and people who create value.

Link?

Who on the left nominated Barry?

I was here at FDL and almost no one wanted Barry or HRC.

Hee – I was saying “dread Mexicans” much like my late pal and mentor, the great trial lawyer Warren Eddsel Burnett, come to Texas via West Virginia, used to bitch about hunters going after the “dread deer.” Besides which, I am half Basque, and half Tepehuan-Raramuri, rooted in these orignial nations people from south of the border. And I can tell you from personal experience that we are among the dreaded of the earth. Wait till immigration reform hits the fan.

I am not happy with beating Bush or around bushes.It’s all systemic; i.e., everything runs as ‘fathers’ of the confederation prescribed.
The only difference is that we now have also ‘mothers and fathers’ to guide america.
These are also known as “servants”; because they sacrifice their lives to the service of the country so that all other fathers and mothers can live not serving anyone or can watch tv, go for a walk, do self-serving work and other things.

They also don’t have to mind public business because they have sworn servants who mind the store.
So be patient. The cheques and balances which the ‘fathers’ [what hap'd to mothers?]instituted and which made america great will work out perfectly; or history books wld say that! Not to worry, let the servants work things out! tnx for ur patience for reading the above trivia of mine!

The people also want better education, energy independence, a health care public option, less pollution, Social Security COLA’s, a continuation of Medicare Advantage, credit card fees and lower taxes.

They are not “fiscal conservatives” – they are people who want a variety of things that they’re not willing to pay for. They are people who don’t know the difference between investment and profligacy. They are people who believe the budget of the government works just like their household budget, not realizing that their family budget also contains deficits and debt – like a house and a car and their children’s college educations, et al, the payments for which can be kept up unless they lose their job or a major illness has to be paid for.

This country does not have a political “center.” This country has individuals who all want “freedom” until it results in their not being able to take care of themselves and their families; then they want blood. And at that point they will follow any politician or organization that promises to extract it for them.

One of the things that was most interesting to me here was a mention in the second video of increased student spending… can you guide me to site where I can follow this issue? I hope it will include provisions for math and sciences for the grade schoo and high school set. (better arts education for small towns like where grew up in Southern Utah. I’d also like to see those with usleless bachelors degrees (like myself– but who are now older and wiser) to be able to secure federal aid (loans or grants) to go back and remediate at the undergrad level in a science and/or math and technology/computers related subject areas.

I disagree. He was nominated by the left, elected by the center and center left. Quit projecting! ;-)

I’ve been checking issues that the American voting public largely favors for over 40 years now, and even many who identify themselves as ‘conservative’ favor such lefty ideas as Social Security, Medicare, reasonable help for the poor and disadvantaged (food stamps, assistance for poor families with children, energy assistance) and no bloated military budget. A center-right nation is a meme floated by right wing think tanks, but polling and long term voting patterns do not support that.

People, Hoover wasn’t really all that bad as President. He was the one who started many of the infrastructure programs that FDR was to claim and rebrand as “New Deal.” (Remember why it’s called Hoover Dam?)

He described himself as a Progressive and Reformer! Yet he was a Republican! Many of his programs are ones we pine for in these forums day after day. He actually worked to reduce the disparity between the rich and poor (which he saw as the reason for the Great Depression) and to pay for his social assistance programs by taxing the HELL out of the top earners (including corporations).

A lot of the Progressive programs that he wanted to pass as part of his agenda were blocked by a conservative Congress. (Sound familiar?) But he did manage to get quite a few through. Yet these programs needed TIME to work, and that was the one thing he did not have, as a 1-Termer.

We would be LUCKY if Obama were as good as Hoover.