Do you think Pres. Obama is adequately leading our nation and party?

[backtoblue]

Poll question: Do you think Pres. Obama is adequately leading our nation and party?

Is Obama living up to his promises in your opinion, or has he disappointed your expectations?

With all the clashing threads I am curious to see statistics. Elaborate if you wish to share your thoughts.

[blm]

1. I expected more progressiveness and LESS Clinton influence on policy and our party. I feel

Obama bought into the 'experience' argument amongst his inner circle, and brought in far too many Clintonites who had an abundance of 'experience' but, a good deal of that 'experience' was in capitulating to the GOP and BushInc's agenda.

Clintonites good at fighting? Nah. Good at rolling over for the right and kicking the left to the curb.

Too bad Obama bought into alot of that - I hope he becomes comfortable enough with his own building powerbase that he kicks the Bushloving capitulators to the curb.

[MarjorieG]

3. I still believe in his motives and aims, which is also building a big tent.

I think Clinton did what he had to do with the GOP Congress, and I know we're in agreement on a lot of Bush 1 cover-up. You may similarly want accountability by prosecution of Bush 2, but Obama is building a longer standing comfort with a Dem brand at a more advantageous time. He has tried numerous regulations and policies that were watered down by ConservaDems, but I feel he keeps trying.

Anyway, I'm more hopeful and understanding of the best of bad choices he's had to make.

[blm]

5. That hope is why I expect more progressive decisions from him once he has built a stronger

powerbase in DC that functions separately from the Clintons and their loyalists who have proven to be closer in tune with the Bush agenda than with the Democratic one, especially on foreign policy and military matters.

I do understand why someone would buy into the experience argument, though.

But, I don't buy the need to make center-right decisions because of the so-called 'big tent' theory. This nation's majority has been lined up AGAINST Bush and the GOP and their WRONGHEADED direction since 2006. THREE YEARS.

Going back towards the direction that people voted against is exactly the way one would SHRINK our party.

[MarjorieG]

13. Not clear to me that we all voted for the same thing, or close to it. He's making the Dems an okay

idea, while constantly refuting much of what the media perpetuates.

I really don't know what to do about the corporate influence that passes for policy rationale, still needing to make some improvement, carrying the ball forward. Difficult to cheer for the bank recovery and their comeuppance, all at the same time.

[blm]

15. BUSH made Dems an OK idea by 2004, moreso by fall of 06. A Dem NOMINEE was winning 08 no matter who

it was, and everyone, even the Republicans knew it.

Most of the country by 2006 was united AGAINST Bush and the right wing approach to policy. They wanted to move AWAY from that, and many wanted those policies reversed, and expected a Dem leader to be there to do it.

Of course, there's a chance I could be wrong and the people wanted Bush's policies kept but administered with a lighter hand.....but, I doubt it.

Bush's grab at Social Security, Katrina, Schiavo, record home foreclosures, bank failures, wall street bailouts, and unnecessary wars made the GOP as unattractive as possible to the majority of American voters.

I say all this as someone who does not REGRET voting for Obama, just one who understands that he bought into the 'experience' argument re the Clintonites who were always too close to the Bush agenda for my liking.

I still hope for the best out of his presidency and that he will eventually be comfortable in his own powerbase to make some definitive moves leftward.

[Douglas Carpenter]

8. Mr. Obama is doing slightly better than I expected. But then, I never imagined I was voting for

Dennis Kucinich or even George McGovern.

I knew that I was voting for a centrist Democrat, but an exceptionally intelligent and pragmatic one who has one of the broadest worldviews of anyone ever elected to the office.

I never imagined I was voting for a European style social democratic system or even voting for single-payer universal health care.

I never imagined I was voting for a reduction in military spending or a foreign policy that proclaimed, "Come home America."

I certainly never, ever imagined I was voting for public control over the corporations and the banks.

Those are all things I personally do believe in and would wish it were possible to vote for with a candidate who might actually be elected and might actually carry forth such policies.

Just as I have never found the job I really want or an ideal relationship or anything else in life that is what it really should be. In a similar way, I support those candidates who might actually assume power who are as progressive as current political realities allow. And if all else fails, I vote for those candidates who might actually win, who do not think like the crazies on Fox News. For in current political realities as they do actually currently exist in the current political culture in the real world, it is people who think like the crazies on Fox News who are the only real alternative who are actually capable of winning and actually capable of instituting their insanity into public policy.

[blm]

10. I wasn't expecting a full-on progressive. I was expecting one who was MORE progressive than Clinton

was and would be less LIKELY to rollover for the right than Clinton did. Instead we are getting only a slightly more progressive version of Clinton.

[backtoblue]

16. It's interesting how the new political faces seem to have big ties

to the clintons and bushes. It seems impossible for a third party to really have a shot at the presidency. (for the time being anyways).

[Echo In Light]

2. I didn't vote for him because I knew this is exactly what would happen

Corporate America only offers up "electable" candidates, which translates into that "elected" admin obediently serving the aims of their corporate pay masters, while tossing the people an illusory bone periodically to feed the illusion of us actually having a say in the matters of domestic and foreign policies ...which we do not have.

[backtoblue]

4. I feel the same

We are under a huge illusion of "power of the people". Our "choices" are limited, who are inherently the same anyways, and we don't even realize it. nt.

[Echo In Light]

6. Millions acknowledge it, but the in-denial types have still the largest %

....the change is coming, though, albeit slowly but surely.

Chomsky explained this stuff decades ago - it has to do with how the educated/professional classes are indoctrinated into a specific mindset. Doesn't really matter if it's Dem or Repub, as the crucial point of the indoctrination means people of either party are basically the same re obedience and adherence to long standing systems of hierarchical power. The social issues are merely enhanced to maintain divisiveness per Divide & Rule ruse.

[Douglas Carpenter]

12. even Chomsky says there are still significant differences and it does matter

Noam Chomsky in his own words:

" These may not look like huge differences, but they translate into quite bigeffects for the lives of people. Anyone who says "I don¹t care if Bush gets elected" is basically telling poor and working people in the country, "I don¹t care if your lives are destroyed. I don¹t care whether you are going to have a little money to help your disabled mother. I just don¹t care,because from my elevated point of view I don¹t see much difference between them." That¹s a way of saying, "Pay no attention to me, because I don¹t care about you." Apart from its being wrong, it¹s a recipe for disaster if you¹re hoping to ever develop a popular movement and a political alternative.

On domestic issues there could be a fairly significant difference­it¹s not
huge­but different in its outcomes. The group around Bush are real fanatics. They¹re quite open. They¹re not hiding it; you can¹t accuse them of that. They want to destroy the whole array of progressive achievements of the pastcentury. They¹ve already more or less gotten rid of progressive income tax.

They¹re trying to destroy the limited medical care system. The new
pharmaceutical bill is a step towards that. They¹re going after Social
Security. They probably will go after schools. They do not want a small
government, any more than Reagan did. They want a huge government, and
massively intrusive. They hate free markets. But they want it to work for
the rich. The Kerry people will do something not fantastically different,
but less so. They have a different constituency to appeal to, and they are much more likely to protect some limited form of benefits for the general population.

There are other differences. The popular constituency of the Bush people, a large part of it, is the extremist fundamentalist religious sector in the country, which is huge. There is nothing like it in any other industrial country. And they have to keep throwing them red meat to keep them in line. While they¹re shafting them in their economic and social policies, you¹vegot to make them think you¹re doing something for them. And throwing red meat to that constituency is very dangerous for the world, because it means violence and aggression, but also for the country, because it means harming civil liberties in a serious way. The Kerry people don¹t have that constituency. They would like to have it, but they¹re never going to appeal to it much. They have to appeal somehow to working people, women, minorities, and others, and that makes a difference."

From Noam Chomsky on the Difference Between Kerry & Bush

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0901-15.htm

[Echo In Light]

14. Naturally he encourages the "lesser of two evils," but likewise says vote 3rd party in non-swing sta

Bringing up Kerry/Bush, however, doesn't exactly speak to the early levels of cultural indoctrination that I referenced.

[LWolf]

9. + 1 nt

[madokie]

7. You bet

I know it can't change overnight and I also believe the changes are in the works, some things take a little while, most good things almost always does. so there ;-)

[backtoblue]

11. The devil's always in the details

If only he had let that little fly live...:P