Wow. I still can't F'ing believe Barack Obama is our president!

[PretzelWarrior]

Man oh man. To hear him quote the Koran and bring common ground between Islam and Christianity and to give them respect while discussing the need for change in the world conflicts relative to Islam is amazing...

The whole package including his look and name just blow me away. As well as he's managing the domestic issues, this seems what we all looked forward to him doing when we elected him.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. He wants to build bridges,

to find common ground. I don't agree with all his policies, but because of these two things I remain his supporter.

[ronnykmarshall]

2. I was watching the NBC report w/ Brian Williams ...

and was thinking the same thing. Seeing Barack at the desk in the Oval Office is fantastic.

[InvisibleTouch]

3. I still get a kick out of hearing the words "President Obama" on the news! n/t

[CTyankee]

4. I think one of the reasons I cannot be too hard on Obama is I realize what we lose

if we didn't have him in the Oval Office. He's truly our hope. That doesn't mean we are utterly uncritical of him, but it reminds us that our hopes are fragile and he is the best hope we have. We should always be mindful of that and not lose sight of it. When you look at the Republicans you see garbage. We don't need that ever again...

[Political Heretic]

24. No the best hope we have is in the power of the people.

Not uncritical faith in one leader.

He's not a savior. He's a centrist politician deeply tied to many special interest who happens to also be very smart and eloquent. He's done some good things, all within the parameters of what is an acceptable range of movement among elite consensus. And I'm glad for those "not-as-bad-as-McCain-would-be" things.

But the real hope we have is that ordinary people in this country will start waking up and realizing that Washington - all of it, on both sides of the isle - doesn't work for the interests of or justice for poor and working class America, that the system is inexorably stacked against ordinary Americans and that it needs to be remade.

[elizm]

40. And only he was able to bring together those ordinary people...

...in a movement that rocked the country, like no one else could have. Let's not lose sight of that.

[elizm]

41. And only he was able to bring together those ordinary people...

...in a movement that rocked the country, like no one else could have. Let's not lose sight of that.

[bdamomma]

5. it's so good to see someone who wants to mend fences instead of breaking or bombing

them down, all those PNAC/neo cons can go to hell.

[PretzelWarrior]

6. same with AIPAC

[bdamomma]

8. seems like Obama rattled some cages today on that front.

too bad.

[PretzelWarrior]

10. yeah. deal with it, AIPAC. you are an enemy to Mideast peace.

and President Obama doesn't need AIPAC to get reelected. So "F***" em.

[bdamomma]

12. and all that money that goes to Israel for bombs he could cut them off.

[PretzelWarrior]

15. well, he could certainly threaten cutbacks if they don't follow through with peace initiative.

I want a strong Israel as there are still too many surrounding nations who hate and wish Israel's destruction.

[bdamomma]

21. but in his speech today he pledged that the US and Israel are connected

so just because he is against those settlements he is getting backlash?

[PretzelWarrior]

23. if they wanna play hardball and accuse Obama of "interfering"

then he can just say, "Oh. okay. I wouldn't want to interfere. We are now taking our foreign aid to you out of our budget. That will kill two problems at once."

Good luck, Jewish hardliners.

[Political Heretic]

25. He's doing plenty of breaking and boming in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

[opihimoimoi]

7. He makes the previous * look like pissants...he sets the bar in the stratosphere

The best the GOP got is Huck, Palin, and Mitt

President Obama is the Peace Maker...bleesed is he that promotes Peace....

[bdamomma]

9. I hope Cheney's head is ready to explode.

[PretzelWarrior]

11. yeah. Cheney should get up and tell Cable News how wrong President Obama is.

please, Cheney. Tell us why you are for NOT finding common ground with others in the world. Stupid Wyoming asshole.

[bdamomma]

13. maybe his head has already exploded that is why he had his

daughter out there today.

[opihimoimoi]

16. Cheney is a GOP BULLY.....he is a trouble maker, a sniper, a whiner...

[Cha]

14. I have the same

"F'ing" feeling and after 8 years of being traumitized by the last president(sic) who can blame us?!

[PretzelWarrior]

17. he scores way higher than any president in my memory. First president I remembered was Nixon.

so I didn't know of a time of a Kennedy or Roosevelt.

[Cha]

19. I didn't start paying any

real attention until 2000 so you can imagine my contrasts.

[NYC_SKP]

18. Well, For Reals, I'm getting pretty fucking sick and tired of....

...recommending the string of positive threads about our president!

(not really, it's refreshing!)

*Recommended* :thumbsup:

[dancingme]

20. I heard the weekly radio address while driving on Sat

I was listening to local news radio to get the weather. When I heard the announcer say "And now the President's weekly address to the nation" I automatically touched the dial to change the station because I can't stand Bush's voice, and then I remembered. That was so nice. :)

[Political Heretic]

22. Stary-eyed, celebrity worship is really not where we need to be as citizens.

Make no mistake, Obama's positioning in regards to Israel is bold and awesome. But its this sort of fan-club attitude in some that scares me.

[PretzelWarrior]

26. blah blah blah. I already started a firestorm MONTHS back taking your position

where I was essentially against Jackeens and her "teen beat" photos and the constant justifications of Obamafans. I am not taking an uncritical look at Obama. It just so happens that on a day like today after I just listened to the entirety of his speech, I am super stoked we even had a candidate like him to vote for.

Can you imagine what the last 5 months would have been like with McSame and Failin?

[Political Heretic]

28. Yes, pretty much the same, except with less soaring rhetoric.

We haven't seen much of that rhetoric turned into tangible action that looks like any sort of dramatic departure from politics as usual... yet.

Perhaps its "too soon" as some suggest. Maybe Obama is "playing chess" and secretly moving all the pieces in the place to deliver radical change within this broken down political system of corporation controlled "insider baseball."

But it hasn't happened yet.

[PretzelWarrior]

29. how about you tell me your "success and completion" criteria for Obama?

what, in your mind, is a set of accomplishments you'd be happy with if Predident Obama manages them? FOr his first year. For his first 2 years and for his first term?

You really should play more chess. Opening game moves don't seem to have a lot to do with each other to the casual observer. You may even lose a pawn early, but if you've got an eye on strategy and end game you will be quite successful.

Believe it or not, there is a grand plan coming together on multiple fronts including war or ending war, health care, economic growth, etc.

[Jennicut]

27. It is just thankfulness that we have an intelligent President finally after 8 long years

of a moron that espoused hatred toward Muslims. We are excited about it. :)

[Political Heretic]

30. That actually scares me.

The "thankfulness we have an intelligent President" seems to cause some to completely ignore the compromising, the capitulating, the backtracking, the triangulating, on any number of issues where Obama has yet to bring "change" to Washington in anything other than pretty words - but has certainly compromised and reinforced the political status quo like the best politicians of the past.

How quickly he changed from the bold outsider he ran as when he started his campaign to completely entrenched in the politics as usual establishment on an overwhelming majority of issues from Wall Street to Health Care.

[PretzelWarrior]

31. your cynicism is impressive. Maybe you should go hang out at the cafe

or art house, smoke some cigarettes and rail against the establishment and those "sell outs" like John Lennon.

[Political Heretic]

32. I'm actually a public policy advocate as my profession...

32, with a masters degree. You can mock and trivialize my arguments all you want, but the bottom line is that I don't believe our role as citizens is to be cheerleaders for our government. Our role is to forcefully push our moderate centrist leaders to convince them (usually against their will) that deeper, more radical change is needed for majority of this country that is poor or working middle class.

I'm not cycical. I strongly believe in the power of people awakened and committed to social and economic justice advocacy. I am optimistic and idealistic about that. But real change has always meant standing up against this institutionally benefit corporate owned political system that is completely focused on carrying out the agenda of the elite and placating and pacifying the people with half-baked policy compromises and "crumbs from the table of the masters" here and there...

The people were always and will always be the force for change and the hope for all our futures - not any one political leader.

[PretzelWarrior]

33. uhhh........WE ARE IN AGREEMENT. And so is Obama, by the way.

the big difference between him and other recent presidents is he KNOWS it has to come from the neighborhoods, the families...the grass roots. That is why he makes his appeals directly to the people both here and abroad. We have to be first INSPIRED to see a change and then MOTIVATED to seek that change ourselves.

We must work hard ourselves. Some career Democratic politicians are going to have to pay the price of not listening to us people on health care, etc. But ultimately, there is nothing wrong with taking a moment to recognize an area where a president has not disappointed you and in fact inspired you. Which is what I am doing.

[Political Heretic]

34. Understood.

I'm sorry that I functioned like a bucket of water. I shouldn't have posted in this thread.

[Jennicut]

37. Nah, you just want to keep the heat on Obama and he wants that too

On Gitmo and torture the public is split. He needs us to keep pushing him and wants us too as he has said that in the past.

By the way, its in our generation's nature to be cynical. I am 33, getting a degree to teach early childhood education. Gen X is the most cynical generation out there right now. We got pushed around by the baby boomers AND we have Gen Y telling telling us they are better then us at technology, etc. After all, what other generation would have helped launch a music scene from dreary rainy Seattle where everyone wore flannel shirts and jeans? LOL. I am just kidding really about us being cynical (well sort of) and mean nothing against the baby boomers and Gen Y. I have overcome a lot of the cynicism over the years. Having kids does that...if watching endless episodes of Spongebob cannot make you more happy what can?

[asteroid2003QQ47]

38. Your posting in this thread is not totally unappreciated. Thank you!

If you replaced the water in your bucket with Brawndo the Thirst Mutilator and posted 'PHOTOS,'
you'd be a hero with the herd.

[asteroid2003QQ47]

39. "The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism...

by those who have not got it."
--George Bernard Shaw
----------------------

Burn the Witch, PW, burn the witch!

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

35. What we need more is compulsive instant gratification ankle biting.

And melodrama. Lots and lots of ego-stroking melodrama.

[zulchzulu]

36. Leaders can be admired... and Obama is certainly a leader

Don't confuse the notion of "celebrity worship" with Obama's appeal. We've arguably had screwed up Presidents for a generation or more and it's sometimes just too much to take to realize we could have someone as appealing as Obama... not just in this country, but around the Globe.

[cali]

42. Do posts calling him a war criminal or corporate puppet "scare" you too?

[Political Heretic]

43. No. And you seem to be under some mistaken impression that I must have the same reaction to both.

While I don't share the opinion of someone like Ted Rall who is a gasbag, I'm not "scared" of people who are being any shade of critical of our leaders.

To me, it is better than people who make it their mission to target concerned and frustrated citizens and protect the fixation of their idolization and worship from criticism.

The difference between you and the rest of us, I think is that you're so thrilled to have not-bush and buy in to this vision of a political and corporate structure that just puts a little extra oil in the joints of the same basic machine - you have the idea that the basic social structure we have live under for the last thirty years is basically more or less fine when a (D) is in office, and all a (D) needs to do is just pick up the mess that an (R) makes and return everything back to so-called "normal."

That's a privileged point of view that comes from being in a privileged class.

But what the rest of us know is that our political and economic system is fundamentally broken and that George W. Bush didn't "break" it - it was already broken. Barack Obama appears for the most part, to be choosing a path of simply trying to fix and restore that same broken system. "Change" for him meant change from the last 8 years, not fundamental change from the system that creates some of the worst social injustice of any other industrialized nation in the world.....

....and I have numbers on that for you. America ranks DEAD LAST in most of the indicators that I would argue we have a civic and moral obligation to care about:

We are Losing America Right Before our Blind Eyes
http://practical-vision.blogspot.com/2009/03/we-are-losing-america-right-before-our.html


You can roll your eyes and mock and ridicule me all you fucking want. I say what I say, and I do what I am doing with my life because I believe the American system of corporate governance betrays the constitution and causes unnecessary exploitation and suffering for too many people at home and abroad.


EDIT - I chose some words poorly. When I said "the difference between you and the rest of us" I mean between you and those of us that feel more critical and believe that much more fundamental change is needed than anything Obama (or any other candidate for office) was ever promising. I did not mean to imply that you are in a minority in your opinion - I'm sure you are probably in the majority.

[MadMaddie]

44. So you think we should not have any hope?

It takes a leader (one that we may not agree with all of the time) to instill hope in his fellow countrymen and women.

Churchill instilled hope in the Brits during WWII.

Roosevelt instilled hope in Americans during WWII.

Patton instilled hope in the soldiers and Europeans during WWII.

MLK instilled hope in African Americans in the 50's and 60's.

If people have hope then they have the motivation to stay and fight the good fight.

Let's put this in perspective: What kind of Hope would McCain and Palin have instilled in US citizens and in the world at this point in the game?

How do you think McCain/Palin would have handled the Auto Industry?
What about the Financial Industry.
Would they have started the path to WWIII? Would they knee jerk and bomb N. Korea or Iran?
They would have nominated another extreme right Supreme Court Justice and moved us toward "The Handmaids Tale"
Gays in America might eventually be reporting to re-education camps. (I am not joking)
Our military would be destroyed even further
Any minority in this country would be subject to Right Wing attacks of all kinds.
States that have passed Gay Marriage may not have been able to have done it with McCain/Palin.

wait...it gets worse because I don't think McCain would complete the first term of the stressful job due to his health.....and we would be looking at President Palin.

So it's not some starry eyed, love fest for Obama all the time. The reality is if President Obama would not have won we Americans would be living in a new "Dark Ages"!

He is not the end all to every problem that exists, it's up to you and me and others to start running for local positions and changing policies at the bottom and work them upward while he is working them down.

[LeftishBrit]

45. From a world perspective, I'm just HUGELY relieved to see an intelligent president...

and one seriously working for peace.