Obama as President

[jasonandrew]

I've been fairly impressed with Obama as president in his first six months or so.

This country has a mountain of issues and I know that some of his supporters are unhappy in the order in which he is tackling them.

I used to think that his greatest strength was being able to inspire hope.

Instead, I think his greatest asset is his slow methodology. After eight years of Bush and eight years of Clinton, I think that the American Public is unused to a President that is slow respond until there is a plan in place.

Bush never seemed to understand the difference between action and consequence. Or he didn’t care as many have suggested.

Clinton was an emotional president. He allowed himself to make mistakes by making rash decisions.

Obama is coldly logical and methodical. I think many that were energized by the message of hope is confusion passion and ideals with tone and methods.

From a distance, it looks like he runs policy at the White House like a national debate. The first tricks any skilled debater is to learn the data and then establish precedent.

Obama is quickly establishing a lot of precedents.

Perhaps the most overlooked and yet most important is the Open Government project. There is a Chief Information Officer now in the White House. His job is to ensure that the Public can access information.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/open/innovations/Data/

To quote the site:

Data.gov is a citizen-friendly platform that provides access to Federal datasets. With a searchable data catalog, Data.gov helps the public find, access, and download non-sensitive Government data and tools in a variety of formats.

What does this mean?

All of the information that used to be hidden from us is accessible. This is important because now we can check facts.

When a politician says something, we can look it up.

We’re no longer held hostage to reporters or specialists with special access with an agenda.
Want to know how many single mothers are below the poverty line? Look it up.

Want to know what products have peanut extract? Look it up.

Want a quick way to know how a Senator voted?

You get the idea.

The last eight years, Carl Rove used stories and generated mythology to win elections for Republicans.

The Democrats took it like that poor guy from Deliverance.

Obama is changing how politics will be played. He is changing the nature of the debate.

You want to work towards legalization of pot? You have crime, medical, and economic statistics available directly to you.

Just as the internet has started the rise of the Citizen Reporter via blogs, I believe this is the start of the Citizen Politician.

Comments

[sasjhwa.livejournal.com]

The following note does not kiss Obama's ass. When I express these views some people think I've just pissed on the Bible or something. If anyone doesn't want to hear a counter argument to Obama please pass this over.





Your description of Obama being slow and deliberate is something I just can't agree with. As soon as he got into office he started printing money and throwing at every problem in the economy without actually looking deeply at the problems. He threw billions at the banks without taking the time to make sure there were safeguards and checks in place to make sure it was actually spent in a way that would stimulate the economy or provide mortgage relief.

He threw money at the auto companies when they themselves said it wouldn't be enough to save them and without any requirement that cost cutting be done overseas to save American jobs. Money after money was thrown at GM only to now have them owned in majority by the US taxpayers and still going through bankruptcy. When governments own private companies which are run privately under the watchful eye of big brother that is called facism. We have a bankruptcy process for a reason and it should have been used. GM would have emerged from its financial crisis far sooner and with far less cost to my grandkids.

I know that Obama has good intentions. I know he wants to do the right thing. I want to have hope. I want to believe. Yes, I voted for him. But I know that very very soon we are going to be looking at the inflation of the 1970s very closely because we are going to be copying it. Before the Depression we printed tons of money with no backing and the dollar crashed. During and after World War 2 we did the same thing with the same result. The dollar lost value. In the 70s we did it again and the dollar lost even more value. Now the dollar has lost 95% of its value since the Federal Reserve began printing money willy nilly. And yet we keep printing more and more of it. Obama is continuing in the same pattern that his predecessors did. He is not learning from history and we are doomed to repeat it. Printing new money isn't the answer nor is opening new credit cards with the Chinese every time someone in a suit holds out their dish and proclaims, "Please sir, I want some more."

So for me the glow has worn off Obama. People say he hasn't had much time to do what he needs to but I'm not very impressed with what he has gotten done so far.

[highway-west.livejournal.com]

I do agree that the banking crisis was mishandled poorly. However, the majority of the aspects of the bungling were started under Bush. And yes, there was a lack of oversight.

Obama supported the Banking Stimulus Package, which did indeed add additional funds to the banks. One of the things the Obama Administration did was force audits of all of the big banks and started establishing new rules for what they needed to do in the future.

Did this hurt us or help overall? Hard to say at this point.

You have valid points about inflation. It is certainly a valid concern. However, I’ve seen a quick turnaround in the business area in Seattle just in terms of the job market. I think some of that can be traced back to the administration’s actions.

Government ownership of corporations is not fascism, it is socialism.

The United States has many socialistic programs that I’ve personally benefited growing up such as welfare and social security. Would GM have filed and then come out of the crisis solvent?

I doubt it.

Would we have been better off with GM just dying?

Hard to say just yet. If GM can be turned around in the next couple of years, then it is a good decision. If not, then it is a massive error.

I don’t think we can judge until we can see the success level of the decision yet. Right now everything is just theoretical.

I see positive steps being taken. Maybe my standards are so low because of Bush, but as long as I see work towards the positive, I’ll keep supporting him.

[sasjhwa.livejournal.com]

Saying that Bush is to blame because he started a program that Obama continued doesn't take the onus off Obama. He was swept into power on a message of change. He could have changed course and gone in a different direction but chose to follow Bush's policies.

I really hope that we emerge from this in some decent shape as a country. I just fear that too much damage has been done.

You are right about socialism. I used the wrong word. I had it right in my head but these dang hands betrayed me. I think they are working for the establishment! I swear the left one knows things it shouldn't! :D

I also benefited from welfare growing up. The problem is that the government can't afford all of its socialist programs. The problem with Democrats as a general rule is that they like to create new social programs to help everyone, but then they cut taxes. Then they print money to pay for them. It frightens me to know end that the country has for decades not been able to come up with a solution for our socialized retirement program which is going broke, nor for how to make medicare/aid solvent, but is now eagerly trying to establish universal health care at the government (ie taxpayer) expense. The cradle to grave programs burden the taxpayer and put even more power in the hands of the federal government. It also raises inflation yet again as money has to be printed or borrowed to cover the ever increasing cost of those programs. How much of our lives do they need to control after all?

Unfortunately the Republicans have been no better. They are so similar as parties in so many ways it is really sad. I'm really hoping there is a revolution in the Republican party toward a more conservative fiscal approach to the country, or that a new party arises that can feed off its corpse and bring terror to Washington. Dracula for President? LOL

[highway-west.livejournal.com]

What should he have done?

[sasjhwa.livejournal.com]

There is a lot of debate about what he should have done. I know it is a lot easier to say what doesn't work than what does. I have been learning a lot about Austrian economics (and yes, I am still learning) which has the philosophy that the economy is the strongest in a Democracy when the free market has less government control. The government should enforce contracts but otherwise should keep its hands off the economy.

Let bankruptcies happen. Chapter 11 is designed to save companies, not destroy them. The pain is great in the short term but they are done. Propping up companies that couldn't keep themselves in business works in the short term but in the long term the underlying problem remains and the government will be stuck with its finger in the dike for years. It is a band aid on a severed artery, rather than proper surgery.

The current system leads to government control of private enterprise which scares me in a very Orwellian way. I do not trust the government. The founding fathers didn't trust the government which is why they wrote in so many ways to limit its power.

Unfortunately the power of the Presidency has grown ever more powerful over the last number of administrations and a great deal under Bush. It is very far out of balance from how the Constitution says it should be. That is an entirely different issue though.

[highway-west.livejournal.com]

There is a lot of debate about what he should have done. I know it is a lot easier to say what doesn't work than what does. I have been learning a lot about Austrian economics (and yes, I am still learning) which has the philosophy that the economy is the strongest in a Democracy when the free market has less government control. The government should enforce contracts but otherwise should keep its hands off the economy.>>

Austrian Economics was cutting edge in the 19th and 20th centuries. In practice, it doesn’t work for the complex banking system we have. Greenspan, former
Chairman of the Federal Reserve and Austrian Economics advocate, admitted that his policies over not strongly regulating the banking system caused problems. I spent two years working at a bank writing banking procedures. I can tell you how screwed up some of the practices are and how out of date the laws are. The Patriot Act really screwed the banking system by adding arcane laws.

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There is a lot of debate about what he should have done. I know it is a lot easier to say what doesn't work than what does. I have been learning a lot about Austrian economics (and yes, I am still learning) which has the philosophy that the economy is the strongest in a Democracy when the free market has less government control. The government should enforce contracts but otherwise should keep its hands off the economy.>>

Austrian Economics was cutting edge in the 19th and 20th centuries. In practice, it doesn’t work for the complex banking system we have. Greenspan, former
Chairman of the Federal Reserve and Austrian Economics advocate, admitted that his policies over not strongly regulating the banking system caused problems. I spent two years working at a bank writing banking procedures. I can tell you how screwed up some of the practices are and how out of date the laws are. The Patriot Act really screwed the banking system by adding arcane laws.

<<Let bankruptcies happen. Chapter 11 is designed to save companies, not destroy them. The pain is great in the short term but they are done. Propping up companies that couldn't keep themselves in business works in the short term but in the long term the underlying problem remains and the government will be stuck with its finger in the dike for years. It is a band aid on a severed artery, rather than proper surgery. >>

Bankruptcies no longer work as they used to due to some new laws passed by Bush and the Republican congress. Unless done properly, a GM bankruptcy would have lead to the death of that company and the assets sold off. Would that have helped the country? Would it have benefited the country to let it fail? There are theories, but at the moment, I suspect a lot of it is guesswork.

<<The current system leads to government control of private enterprise which scares me in a very Orwellian way. I do not trust the government. The founding fathers didn't trust the government which is why they wrote in so many ways to limit its power. >>

Again, you are using fear terms. Government control of private enterprise is socialism.

The tactics our government has been using since 911 has certainly been Orwellian.