I hope I can avoid getting into an argument with you here, because I really don't want that, but the bulk of your argument is one I've heard before and which sparks in me thoughts of bovine excrement, though you're much fairer and more reasonable than most people who make it. Which in turn means I hope you won't accuse me of expecting "rainbows and unicorns," which is the response I usually get (weirdly, always using those exact words) to my points, even though nothing I say could be fairly so interpreted.
But I just don't accept the line that "Obama couldn't have done any more, because Congress." What he could have done is he could have TRIED. He promised Hope and Change, but he ran a discount on the Hope, so the Change dribbled out the pocket too. With the health care bill, which even started out, as others have noted, closer to the Gingrich alternative to Hillarycare than anything else, instead of selling it on the bully pulpit, Obama kept stripping out provisions in an attempt to woo the so-called "moderate" Republicans. But they refused to be wooed, so that didn't accomplish anything on what wound up being passed on, IIRC, purely Democratic votes.
With such a damp squib, no wonder the people lost enthusiasm, and that meant low turnout, and that is why the Democrats lost Congress in 2010. No other reason. The 2009-10 Congress was, though not filibuster-proof, movable. The ones since then have not been. But it wasn't cosmic fate that did that, it was disappointment in what happened in 2009-10. So Obama is, in that sense, responsible for the existence of the Republican Congresses.
I don't expect that a better Obama would have been able to do much more, but I think he could have made incremental improvements, in two or three ways. 1) A president savvier in the ways of Congress could make more and better deals. (This is still the Democratic Congress I'm talking about.) No, he can't steamroll over them - even FDR couldn't do that - but there are ways to grease their intransigence. 2) The bully pulpit: whip up the enthusiasm of the people. This has the beneficial effects of a) putting pressure on Congress, b) encouraging progressive voter participation, c) moving the Overton window.
And yes, Obama's policies and procedures are effectively those of a moderate Republican. So, for that matter, in practice were Bill Clinton's. You question this, asking what Republican of recent times could they possibly be like. Answer, none! There are no moderate Republicans any more! We (I say "we" because I was originally that even longer-gone species, a liberal Republican) have all become Democrats! Which is why the Democratic Party today is full of moderate Republican policies. Please remember that McCain, one of your suggestions, is on many issues further right that Reagan (who at least had the sense not to chant things like "Bomb-bomb-Iraq"), and that Reagan came on to the presidential stage as the clearly-different right-wing alternative to Gerald Ford, and that Gerald Ford was, in his day, a conservative Republican. Not a moderate. Things have shifted that far.
As for Hillary, I expect her to become President, and I expect she'll be no worse than Bill or Obama. And any Democrat, even one far worse, would be infinitely better than any of the troglodytes who call themselves Republicans these days. So, unlike many Bernie supporters, I'd be content with her. What bothers me about Hillary is not the specter of Bill. Bill is Bill, and Hillary is not responsible for that, and over the years she's clearly separated herself from that. What I worry about is her neocon instincts, and what digs at me is the history of Hillarycare. Not the proposal itself, which was good, but the way she failed to sell it to Congress (again, a Democratic Congress, and - again - the only Democratic Congress that administration ever had). That failure denied us a health care program for FIFTEEN FRICKIN' YEARS. I'd like to see her acknowledge that she screwed that one up, and to show that she's learned better how to work with Congress - exactly the thing that Obama didn't know either.
In the end, I'm supporting Bernie because he's proposing the things I really want, and Hillary isn't. That's really the whole story.
no subject
But I just don't accept the line that "Obama couldn't have done any more, because Congress." What he could have done is he could have TRIED. He promised Hope and Change, but he ran a discount on the Hope, so the Change dribbled out the pocket too. With the health care bill, which even started out, as others have noted, closer to the Gingrich alternative to Hillarycare than anything else, instead of selling it on the bully pulpit, Obama kept stripping out provisions in an attempt to woo the so-called "moderate" Republicans. But they refused to be wooed, so that didn't accomplish anything on what wound up being passed on, IIRC, purely Democratic votes.
With such a damp squib, no wonder the people lost enthusiasm, and that meant low turnout, and that is why the Democrats lost Congress in 2010. No other reason. The 2009-10 Congress was, though not filibuster-proof, movable. The ones since then have not been. But it wasn't cosmic fate that did that, it was disappointment in what happened in 2009-10. So Obama is, in that sense, responsible for the existence of the Republican Congresses.
I don't expect that a better Obama would have been able to do much more, but I think he could have made incremental improvements, in two or three ways. 1) A president savvier in the ways of Congress could make more and better deals. (This is still the Democratic Congress I'm talking about.) No, he can't steamroll over them - even FDR couldn't do that - but there are ways to grease their intransigence. 2) The bully pulpit: whip up the enthusiasm of the people. This has the beneficial effects of a) putting pressure on Congress, b) encouraging progressive voter participation, c) moving the Overton window.
And yes, Obama's policies and procedures are effectively those of a moderate Republican. So, for that matter, in practice were Bill Clinton's. You question this, asking what Republican of recent times could they possibly be like. Answer, none! There are no moderate Republicans any more! We (I say "we" because I was originally that even longer-gone species, a liberal Republican) have all become Democrats! Which is why the Democratic Party today is full of moderate Republican policies. Please remember that McCain, one of your suggestions, is on many issues further right that Reagan (who at least had the sense not to chant things like "Bomb-bomb-Iraq"), and that Reagan came on to the presidential stage as the clearly-different right-wing alternative to Gerald Ford, and that Gerald Ford was, in his day, a conservative Republican. Not a moderate. Things have shifted that far.
As for Hillary, I expect her to become President, and I expect she'll be no worse than Bill or Obama. And any Democrat, even one far worse, would be infinitely better than any of the troglodytes who call themselves Republicans these days. So, unlike many Bernie supporters, I'd be content with her. What bothers me about Hillary is not the specter of Bill. Bill is Bill, and Hillary is not responsible for that, and over the years she's clearly separated herself from that. What I worry about is her neocon instincts, and what digs at me is the history of Hillarycare. Not the proposal itself, which was good, but the way she failed to sell it to Congress (again, a Democratic Congress, and - again - the only Democratic Congress that administration ever had). That failure denied us a health care program for FIFTEEN FRICKIN' YEARS. I'd like to see her acknowledge that she screwed that one up, and to show that she's learned better how to work with Congress - exactly the thing that Obama didn't know either.
In the end, I'm supporting Bernie because he's proposing the things I really want, and Hillary isn't. That's really the whole story.