Obama isn't a bad president. He's done a decent job. However he has to deal with one of the worst economic crises in American history, nutjobs who think he's a hitlerian communist and his fans who think he's Jesus. With the Obamania surrounding his election he was bound to be a disappointment.
Light a fire for a man and he'll be warm for a year. Set him on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life!
Magus`The fun has been DOUBLED!Registered Userregular
He got off to a rocky start, but he seems to have been improving quite a bit lately. If this continues into his second term, I'd say he could be a great president.
He got off to a rocky start, but he seems to have been improving quite a bit lately. If this continues into his second term, I'd say he could be a great president.
In my opinion he got off to a very strong start. Getting UHC passed was huge. It wouldn't have been my top priority but credit where credit is due. A lot of politician have been trying for UHC and have failed miserably. He got that win right out of the gate.
I'm positively eager to see what Obama is going to do in his second term. Once the whole "re-election" thing is done with, and if we can get Congress back into working order (that's a tough one, though), he's going to be able to roll with his desire to be remembered as a great president, and start doing things his way.
Most of the problems of his administration have actually been problems with Congress. Harry Reid has been a disaster of a Senate Majority Leader.
On the bus this morning, a couple of guys were talking about politics. One had recently met Paul Ryan, and said, "Future President, right there, man." I had to stifle a snort. Not likely, with his stance on Social Security. Then they talked about Breitbart dying, and how he was "our kind of guy" and that there were "mysterious circumstances" to his death.
Then they started talking about Obama's spending, and how inefficient his stimulus was compared to wealthy tax breaks. Then they started complaining about not enough infrastructure spending, and I wanted to mention how their side has fought tooth and claw against infrastructure spending, but... not really a worthwhile use of my time on the bus (which could be used for reading Gaunt's Ghosts books).
I'm positively eager to see what Obama is going to do in his second term. Once the whole "re-election" thing is done with, and if we can get Congress back into working order (that's a tough one, though), he's going to be able to roll with his desire to be remembered as a great president, and start doing things his way.
Most of the problems of his administration have actually been problems with Congress. Harry Reid has been a disaster of a Senate Majority Leader.
On the bus this morning, a couple of guys were talking about politics. One had recently met Paul Ryan, and said, "Future President, right there, man." I had to stifle a snort. Not likely, with his stance on Social Security. Then they talked about Breitbart dying, and how he was "our kind of guy" and that there were "mysterious circumstances" to his death.
Then they started talking about Obama's spending, and how inefficient his stimulus was compared to wealthy tax breaks. Then they started complaining about not enough infrastructure spending, and I wanted to mention how their side has fought tooth and claw against infrastructure spending, but... not really a worthwhile use of my time on the bus (which could be used for reading Gaunt's Ghosts books).
I find the image of people spouting what could be considered Republican policies while using mass transit deliiiightfully ironic, considering that around where I live, when the Repubs want to talk about services to cut to save money, they blather endlessly about 'subsidies for mass tranist' and 'the people using it should have to pay what it actually costs to use it instead of $1.50 and us subsidising the rest! I don't use the busses, why should my tax money go to them?!'
Obama isn't a bad president. He's done a decent job. However he has to deal with one of the worst economic crises in American history, nutjobs who say they think he's a hitlerian communist because they can't say they hate the color of his skin
That's more like it. And nobody thinks obama is jesus- This is just the far right trying to ridicule and diminish anything he does.
I find the image of people spouting what could be considered Republican policies while using mass transit deliiiightfully ironic, considering that around where I live, when the Repubs want to talk about services to cut to save money, they blather endlessly about 'subsidies for mass tranist' and 'the people using it should have to pay what it actually costs to use it instead of $1.50 and us subsidising the rest! I don't use the busses, why should my tax money go to them?!'
Tim Pawlenty,the last Republican governor of Minnesota, actually allowed a bus driver strike to go on for weeks, and eventually beat them, because he actually enjoyed not having busses clog up traffic. Eventually the drivers caved because T-Paw had no interest in public transit at all, barring the cost in the budget, and the strike meant he didn't have to pay them.
It's a good thing I was unemployed at the time, or else I wouldn't have been able to get to work.
Obama isn't a bad president. He's done a decent job. However he has to deal with one of the worst economic crises in American history, nutjobs who say they think he's a hitlerian communist because they can't say they hate the color of his skin
That's more like it. And nobody thinks obama is jesus- This is just the far right trying to ridicule and diminish anything he does.
Umm...have you read any of the previous 10 pages or so of this thread?
Obama isn't a bad president. He's done a decent job. However he has to deal with one of the worst economic crises in American history, nutjobs who say they think he's a hitlerian communist because they can't say they hate the color of his skin
That's more like it. And nobody thinks obama is jesus- This is just the far right trying to ridicule and diminish anything he does.
Umm...have you read any of the previous 10 pages or so of this thread?
Thinking Obama is Jesus and being disappointed because you don't have the slightest clue what the president can actually do, particularly with an actively resisting Congress, are two very different things.
An Inability to do any fact checking at all on statements?
Check.
I guess you missed 3 years of military involvement in Yemen. Which you'd know about if you bothered to... you know. Internet, Google. Connect the Dots.
Congress more or less runs the SEC, not the Executive. There's nothing he can do about how shitty the penalties are until Congress makes them something more painful (which will never happen.) I haven't seen any indication that he's restraining the SEC.
This is counter factual. Google the head of the SEC. You know the person that runs it?
Blatant, admited securities fraud happened in 2004-2008. Nothing has been done.
Maybe you missed it but the US president is in charge of law enforcement and has a great deal of power there.
I don't know what you want to call it.
There's a culture here where you relentlessly ridicule, outside of the stated rules of the forum.
Where being different is enough of a reason to be jailed.
And where you cant even be bothered to google fact check your own statements before posting them.
I think that's knee jerk circle the wagons tribalism, but clearly I am just extraordinarily dumb.
Seruko on
"How are you going to play Dota if your fingers and bitten off? You can't. That's how" -> Carnarvon
"You can be yodeling bear without spending a dime if you get lucky." -> reVerse
"In the grim darkness of the future, we will all be nurses catering to the whims of terrible old people." -> Hacksaw
"In fact, our whole society will be oriented around caring for one very decrepit, very old man on total life support." -> SKFM
I mean, the first time I met a non-white person was when this Vietnamese kid tried to break my legs but that was entirely fair because he was a centreback, not because he was a subhuman beast in some zoo ->yotes
I'm pretty sure you're getting infracted in part because you're so incredibly, aggressively, relentlessly abrasive.
Yeah, I'm not sure why someone would choose to stay in a place where they their basic personality and methods run contrary to the local rules and culture. If one were interested in debate, I suppose that would be something, but someone who presents cherrypicked factoids and presenting them as 100% solid gold proof while ridiculing anyone who comments on the inconsistancies really seems like someone who would prefer a different forum.
Well, I suppose that I'd do that stuff if I were getting paid. Nice work if you can get it.
I'm pretty sure you're getting infracted in part because you're so incredibly, aggressively, relentlessly abrasive.
Yeah, I'm not sure why someone would choose to stay in a place where they their basic personality and methods run contrary to the local rules and culture. If one were interested in debate, I suppose that would be something, but someone who presents cherrypicked factoids and presenting them as 100% solid gold proof while ridiculing anyone who comments on the inconsistancies really seems like someone who would prefer a different forum.
Well, I suppose that I'd do that stuff if I were getting paid. Nice work if you can get it.
Stay cool, man. If you're presented with factoids, brush them away with facts. Confront anger with calmness, and you will emerge the victor. Just sayin'.
Light a fire for a man and he'll be warm for a year. Set him on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life!
He got off to a rocky start, but he seems to have been improving quite a bit lately. If this continues into his second term, I'd say he could be a great president.
In my opinion he got off to a very strong start. Getting UHC passed was huge. It wouldn't have been my top priority but credit where credit is due. A lot of politician have been trying for UHC and have failed miserably. He got that win right out of the gate.
The health care legislation that was eventually passed was so neutered, so watered down, so full of compromises to Senate Republicans, blue dog Democrats, and handouts to private insurers, that it has actually set us back from true health care reforms--on par with what other nations provide their citizens--for at least several more decades.
There is an argument made that reforms are often incremental in nature, and not necessarily sweeping and all-inclusive all at once. But that comes as little comfort in a situation where Barack Obama's health care bill will give politicians for generations to come the political cover needed to avoid the controversial subject of health care by declaring it "good enough," "improving," or "a good start" until whichever decade comes around when voters start seriously caring about health care reform again. In a cruel bit of irony, we may not see the reforms that Democrats were first clamoring for in the legislation because of what we've ended up with in the legislation.
If we can impute any of that failure to Barack Obama, it was in his non-partisan idealism, thinking that he could sell House and (especially) Senate Republicans on reforms that would save the government money, and taxpayers money, while finally extending insurance coverage to millions of uninsured Americans.
We saw this so often with early term Obama, where he would have no idea that sane, fiscally sound legislation would always fail or always get dismantled by obstructionist congressional Republicans.
The 2012 version of Barack Obama is more wizened, he understands how the partisan game is played, and that these people are simply unwilling to listen to a Democratic president propose reforms that stretch a dollar so admirably that even Ronald Reagan would have blessed them. But the band-aid of a health care bill attributed to a President earlier in his term, who thought he was talking to a congress that actually cared about wasteful spending and about Americans dying from preventable illnesses, will always stand as a piece of compromise legislation that may end up doing more harm than good.
Stay cool, man. If you're presented with factoids, brush them away with facts. Confront anger with calmness, and you will emerge the victor. Just sayin'.
Oh, I'm as cool as the bottom side of a pillow. I haven't even engaged him, because there's no purpose; trying to go point-by-point with people like that just lets them cherry pick your argument further, prolonging the pointless debate.
President Obama's Administration plans to cancel funding for a long-standing and cost-effective health and wellness program for more than 100,000 Texas women. This move will cut off access to screenings for breast and cervical cancer, hypertension and diabetes, STD testing and family planning services for Texas women who otherwise could not afford them.
...
Because Texas refuses to fund abortion providers and their affiliates, the federal government has announced that it will cancel the Women's Health Program. To me, this reflects a twisted set of values, not to mention a continued disregard for the basic concept of states' rights.
Under federal law, Washington leaves it to state leaders to administer the Medicaid program and set criteria for who is, and is not, a qualified provider. Consistent with state and federal law, the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) developed a program that would ensure continued access to care by qualified providers across Texas and asked the Obama Administration for approval.
However, the Obama Administration apparently is unwilling to allow the exclusion of organizations like Planned Parenthood, as Texas law requires, even though that organization represents less than 2 percent of enrolled providers.
Is he just covering for his choice to not comply with federal regulations?
Stay cool, man. If you're presented with factoids, brush them away with facts. Confront anger with calmness, and you will emerge the victor. Just sayin'.
Oh, I'm as cool as the bottom side of a pillow. I haven't even engaged him, because there's no purpose; trying to go point-by-point with people like that just lets them cherry pick your argument further, prolonging the pointless debate.
President Obama's Administration plans to cancel funding for a long-standing and cost-effective health and wellness program for more than 100,000 Texas women. This move will cut off access to screenings for breast and cervical cancer, hypertension and diabetes, STD testing and family planning services for Texas women who otherwise could not afford them.
...
Because Texas refuses to fund abortion providers and their affiliates, the federal government has announced that it will cancel the Women's Health Program. To me, this reflects a twisted set of values, not to mention a continued disregard for the basic concept of states' rights.
Under federal law, Washington leaves it to state leaders to administer the Medicaid program and set criteria for who is, and is not, a qualified provider. Consistent with state and federal law, the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) developed a program that would ensure continued access to care by qualified providers across Texas and asked the Obama Administration for approval.
However, the Obama Administration apparently is unwilling to allow the exclusion of organizations like Planned Parenthood, as Texas law requires, even though that organization represents less than 2 percent of enrolled providers.
Is he just covering for his choice to not comply with federal regulations?
More or less.
Texas Medicaid provided pre-natal services at one level, but family planning at a lower income level. It was possible to qualify once you were pregnant, but if you weren't pregnant yet you didn't qualify.
Texas and the fed came up with the "Women's Health Services" plan.
Fed pays 90%, state pays 10%. Texas passed a law (goes into force March 14th) that said you can't spend state funds on an organization with an affiliate that provides abortion - in Texas Planned Parenthood is split to two orgs - one that does the family planning/women's health, and one that does the abortions. The Women's Health Services plan money goes to the one that DOESN'T provide abortions.
Supposedly the only org that meets that criteria of having an affiliate organization that provides abortion services, and will be blocked from recieving the money is Planned Parenthood. Perry is trying to argue that "yes, it's 90% federal money, but because we pay that 10%, we decide where it goes not the Fed." and the Fed is going "Like hell you do." Also lots of whargbling about the 'will of the Texas Legislature' and '10th amendment!' and such.
Is he just covering for his choice to not comply with federal regulations?
Yes. More specifically, the political gesture by Texas Executive Health and Human Services Commissioner Tom Suehs, who signed a provision into law last week that bans providers with "abortion affiliates" from being part of the WHP.
It's a big deal because (fiercely independent!) Texas gets something in the order of 9 federal dollars for every 1 dollar Texas puts into the Women's Health Program. So, a program that gets the vast majority of its funding from the federal government, where blocking qualified healthcare providers to score points with your constituents is a violation of federal law.
Not only that, but they were warned not to fucking do this a year ago, and are doing it anyway.
Stay cool, man. If you're presented with factoids, brush them away with facts. Confront anger with calmness, and you will emerge the victor. Just sayin'.
Oh, I'm as cool as the bottom side of a pillow. I haven't even engaged him, because there's no purpose; trying to go point-by-point with people like that just lets them cherry pick your argument further, prolonging the pointless debate.
President Obama's Administration plans to cancel funding for a long-standing and cost-effective health and wellness program for more than 100,000 Texas women. This move will cut off access to screenings for breast and cervical cancer, hypertension and diabetes, STD testing and family planning services for Texas women who otherwise could not afford them.
...
Because Texas refuses to fund abortion providers and their affiliates, the federal government has announced that it will cancel the Women's Health Program. To me, this reflects a twisted set of values, not to mention a continued disregard for the basic concept of states' rights.
Under federal law, Washington leaves it to state leaders to administer the Medicaid program and set criteria for who is, and is not, a qualified provider. Consistent with state and federal law, the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) developed a program that would ensure continued access to care by qualified providers across Texas and asked the Obama Administration for approval.
However, the Obama Administration apparently is unwilling to allow the exclusion of organizations like Planned Parenthood, as Texas law requires, even though that organization represents less than 2 percent of enrolled providers.
Is he just covering for his choice to not comply with federal regulations?
More or less.
Texas Medicaid provided pre-natal services at one level, but family planning at a lower income level. It was possible to qualify once you were pregnant, but if you weren't pregnant yet you didn't qualify.
Texas and the fed came up with the "Women's Health Services" plan.
Fed pays 90%, state pays 10%. Texas passed a law (goes into force March 14th) that said you can't spend state funds on an organization with an affiliate that provides abortion - in Texas Planned Parenthood is split to two orgs - one that does the family planning/women's health, and one that does the abortions. The Women's Health Services plan money goes to the one that DOESN'T provide abortions.
Supposedly the only org that meets that criteria of having an affiliate organization that provides abortion services, and will be blocked from recieving the money is Planned Parenthood. Perry is trying to argue that "yes, it's 90% federal money, but because we pay that 10%, we decide where it goes not the Fed." and the Fed is going "Like hell you do." Also lots of whargbling about the 'will of the Texas Legislature' and '10th amendment!' and such.
I figured it was something like that, but I was having trouble getting past the $8 million abortionplex of it all.
Obama isn't a bad president. He's done a decent job. However he has to deal with one of the worst economic crises in American history, nutjobs who think he's a hitlerian communist and his fans who think he's Jesus. With the Obamania surrounding his election he was bound to be a disappointment.
The only people who call him Jesus are asshole Republicans trying to turn Democrats support for Obama to its extreme conclusion by lying about what Democrats really think. It's the old Rovian tactic by turning a strength into a weakness.
Obama isn't a bad president. He's done a decent job. However he has to deal with one of the worst economic crises in American history, nutjobs who think he's a hitlerian communist and his fans who think he's Jesus. With the Obamania surrounding his election he was bound to be a disappointment.
The only people who call him Jesus are asshole Republicans trying to turn Democrats support for Obama to its extreme conclusion by lying about what Democrats really think. It's the old Rovian tactic by turning a strength into a weakness.
Obama isn't a bad president. He's done a decent job. However he has to deal with one of the worst economic crises in American history, nutjobs who think he's a hitlerian communist and his fans who think he's Jesus. With the Obamania surrounding his election he was bound to be a disappointment.
The only people who call him Jesus are asshole Republicans trying to turn Democrats support for Obama to its extreme conclusion by lying about what Democrats really think. It's the old Rovian tactic by turning a strength into a weakness.
It's also projection, because if Republicans had a candidate as charismatic as Obama, they would be zealously devoted to him to vaguely religious levels. Witness Reagan.
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
Obama isn't a bad president. He's done a decent job. However he has to deal with one of the worst economic crises in American history, nutjobs who think he's a hitlerian communist and his fans who think he's Jesus. With the Obamania surrounding his election he was bound to be a disappointment.
The only people who call him Jesus are asshole Republicans trying to turn Democrats support for Obama to its extreme conclusion by lying about what Democrats really think. It's the old Rovian tactic by turning a strength into a weakness.
Yeah it's seriously not a thing.
Well, to be fair, I'ved used the term "Liberal Jesus" when debating people who had ridiculous expectations for Obama's presidency and are now disillusioned that we're not living in the New Socialist Paradise that no one was promised.
But it's not some massive thing like the Republicans who actually think he's Joedolf Stitler Johnsenedy JDRsevelt Carter.
While there's something to be said for the questionable constitutionality of drone strikes on American citizens outside the US (which if I recall correctly one of these guys was), the Executive has a ton of constitutional leeway in military situations, and that power has only expanded since WWII. For example, EVERY President since its passage in 1973 has said the War Powers Act is unconstitutional, and no one has really challenged any of them on it. Targeting non-citizen terrorists with drone strikes does not violate constitution, if for no other reason than non-citizens outside the US have no constitutional rights.
I think all things considered, Obama has been extremely moderate in terms of military action. In fact, I'd say it's where his careful, calculated actions and trust in his advisors and general tendency not to shoot from the hip has paid off. He could have dropped a whole mess of troops in Libya, and didn't. He could have continued to stick around in Iraq, and didn't. He could easily justify another five years in Afghanistan, and didn't. I think expecting him to end all US military actions and with the flip of a switch bring us back to isolationism is pretty goddamned crazy.
Probably the largest criticism that can be levied at Obama in terms of a terrible expansion of Executive power was when he signed the NDAA. But we've been down that road, and I'm not going to rehash it here. There's a pretty strong argument that vetoing it was a battle he could not win. But whether Obama uses it or not, it's here to stay.
The main reason the President will always say the War Powers Act is unconstitutional, and the main reason Congress will never... ever challenge the President on the War Powers act, is because both sides want to be able to take all of the credit for the good things that come from war and shift all of the blame onto the other side.
It's one of many things about people that irritate me.
An Inability to do any fact checking at all on statements?
Check.
I guess you missed 3 years of military involvement in Yemen. Which you'd know about if you bothered to... you know. Internet, Google. Connect the Dots.
Dude, if it's small-scale enough that I - a guy who follows international military movements and reads about tactics and strategy as a hobby - don't remember it, it doesn't qualify as a war. The only mention besides the drone strike I noted, for the record, in the first three pages of "US military yemen," were mentions of additional security personnel being deployed after the fucking US embassy was bombed and training and support personnel there at the Yemeni government's request. So, like, fuck off with this condescension.
Not really! Obama implemented a bunch of payroll tax cuts; Bush slashed capital gains taxes.
Failing at facts? Did you miss 250 Billion Dollars in tax cuts not associated with payroll tax cuts in the stimulus?
Which were necessary for it to pass Congress? And are a far, far, far smaller figure, both in percentages and absolute value, than the Bush tax cuts? And that those tax cuts also included stuff like expanded credits for college tuition payments?
Congress more or less runs the SEC, not the Executive. There's nothing he can do about how shitty the penalties are until Congress makes them something more painful (which will never happen.) I haven't seen any indication that he's restraining the SEC.
This is counter factual. Google the head of the SEC. You know the person that runs it?
Blatant, admited securities fraud happened in 2004-2008. Nothing has been done.
Not so; many banks have settled such cases. Additionally, there are a number of ongoing investigations. Given the sheer amount of fraud perpetrated and the number of documents they're sifting through I absolutely expect it to take years to sort out.
Maybe you missed it but the US president is in charge of law enforcement and has a great deal of power there.
Indirectly. The President, again, is not God-Emperor of the United States. He's directed people to look into the stuff that happened. They're looking. Several banks have settled, either with the feds or with state courts. Things do not happen overnight.
Great. Obama resisted using a pointless veto which would have been overturned by Congress anyways and would have led to him being attacked for vetoing money to the troops.
Instead he used the threat of the veto to gut the bill of some of its worst provisions while also insuring that he would have greater leeway in enforcing other troubling provisions. Then he used this leeway to effectively nullify the troubling riders to the budget.
He has basically avoiding a needless political hissy fit over the defense budget while outmaneuvering Congress and defusing a policy bomb set by Republicans. This is why this man is president and the armchair politicians on Reddit are not.
The way I see it the president had 3 main options:
1) Veto the original bill. This would have led to a political pissing match over the defense budget and Congress would have likely overturned the veto and we would be stuck with a much worse bill. At best Obama would be able to negotiate a better version of the bill (which is what he actually did by threatening to veto.)
2) After winning his concessions he could have still vetoed the bill. This would understandably upset Congress and lead to a political bitch-fit and Congress may be so upset that they refuse to negotiate anymore and simply pass the original bill. At best Obama would have his concessions and a bill passed over his veto and would have weathered a needless political fight while damaging any remaining trust between the legislature and the executive.
3) What he did in actuality was win his concessions through the veto threat and then signed the bill with a signing statement. He then used the leeway in the bill to nullify many of the remaining trouble spots with minimal political fighting.
Basically the political system is pretty messed up but I believe Obama made the right decisions to ultimately prevent the worst riders to the budget being implented without a pointless political furor.
I know that some will say that even a symbolic veto would have been nice and that Obama should have done that. However as I implied in my second edit, I believe that a symbolic veto, although pleasing to many, would have quite likely done damage to the interest of improving actual policy.
This is counter factual. Google the head of the SEC. You know the person that runs it?
Blatant, admited securities fraud happened in 2004-2008. Nothing has been done.
Not so; many banks have settled such cases. Additionally, there are a number of ongoing investigations. Given the sheer amount of fraud perpetrated and the number of documents they're sifting through I absolutely expect it to take years to sort out.
Oh hey, look, ProPublica just published a very convenient chart laying out how much the banks have settled/been fined for, broken down by bank and agency. Total judgements against, fines levied, and settlements paid amount to $26,058,950,000 (plus attendant legal expenses not included.) Four banks - Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, and Citigroup, have paid at least two billion dollars in fines/fees/judgements. (Bank of America alone has paid nearly half the above 26b figure.) Goldman has paid half a billion.
Fox News continues to prove they hire only the smrtest individuals
“Ed, just from a political perspective, do you think that the President of the United States going into re-election wants gas prices to go higher? Is there anybody here who thinks that makes a lot of sense?” President Barack Obama asked at today’s press conference, after Fox News correspondent Ed Henry accused him of supporting higher gas prices. “Here’s the bottom line with respect to gas prices. I want gas prices lower because they hurt families.”
HacksawJ. Duggan Esq.Wrestler at LawRegistered Userregular
I'm still surprised the Obama administration let them into the white house press room. If I were a Democratic president, they wouldn't get through the front door.
I don't see what that gains you. It's not like being prevented from asking questions at the press conference will prevent them from distorting facts. At least this way you can spike a particularly stupid question back into their correspondent's face occasionally.
I'm still surprised the Obama administration let them into the white house press room. If I were a Democratic president, they wouldn't get through the front door.
BREAKING NEWS: President Hacksaw continues his(?) campaign against free speech.
That is what that would get you. Instead you can pull an Obama and shoot their stupid shit down.
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HacksawJ. Duggan Esq.Wrestler at LawRegistered Userregular
Or I could tell them to fuck off because they're not actually an objective news agency absent an extreme political bias.
This is counter factual. Google the head of the SEC. You know the person that runs it?
Blatant, admited securities fraud happened in 2004-2008. Nothing has been done.
Not so; many banks have settled such cases. Additionally, there are a number of ongoing investigations. Given the sheer amount of fraud perpetrated and the number of documents they're sifting through I absolutely expect it to take years to sort out.
Oh hey, look, ProPublica just published a very convenient chart laying out how much the banks have settled/been fined for, broken down by bank and agency. Total judgements against, fines levied, and settlements paid amount to $26,058,950,000 (plus attendant legal expenses not included.) Four banks - Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, and Citigroup, have paid at least two billion dollars in fines/fees/judgements. (Bank of America alone has paid nearly half the above 26b figure.) Goldman has paid half a billion.
These investigations and settlements are a total joke. The banks settle in order to avoid paying out the amounts of cash they actually could be liable for - pay $2 billion so you don't have to pay $200 billion. Less than a drop in the bucket of the magnitude of economic damage they are largely responsible for. Much of their cooperation with these settlements has also been in anticipation of them getting reamed for dirty foreclosure practices like robo-signing, and companies this large already have plenty of money ready for legal battles and settlements so they're not exactly cutting into their bonuses to pay this stuff out. The people most responsible for the practices the banks have settled over are probably the most insulated - and these settlements are usually resulting in some undeserved immunity on specific things that the bank no longer wants to be exposed to risk for having done.
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Barack Obama Waives Rule Allowing Indefinite Military Detention Of Americans
Boom. Roasted.
Next year, punch your congresscritter in the dick until it reads the NDAA.
Shitty Tumblr:lighthouse1138.tumblr.com
Steam Profile | Signature art by Alexandra 'Lexxy' Douglass
To be honest, not nuking the world is already a lot to ask for a president nowadays. I'm happy with anyone who does make the globe go up in smoke.
In my opinion he got off to a very strong start. Getting UHC passed was huge. It wouldn't have been my top priority but credit where credit is due. A lot of politician have been trying for UHC and have failed miserably. He got that win right out of the gate.
Most of the problems of his administration have actually been problems with Congress. Harry Reid has been a disaster of a Senate Majority Leader.
On the bus this morning, a couple of guys were talking about politics. One had recently met Paul Ryan, and said, "Future President, right there, man." I had to stifle a snort. Not likely, with his stance on Social Security. Then they talked about Breitbart dying, and how he was "our kind of guy" and that there were "mysterious circumstances" to his death.
Then they started talking about Obama's spending, and how inefficient his stimulus was compared to wealthy tax breaks. Then they started complaining about not enough infrastructure spending, and I wanted to mention how their side has fought tooth and claw against infrastructure spending, but... not really a worthwhile use of my time on the bus (which could be used for reading Gaunt's Ghosts books).
I find the image of people spouting what could be considered Republican policies while using mass transit deliiiightfully ironic, considering that around where I live, when the Repubs want to talk about services to cut to save money, they blather endlessly about 'subsidies for mass tranist' and 'the people using it should have to pay what it actually costs to use it instead of $1.50 and us subsidising the rest! I don't use the busses, why should my tax money go to them?!'
Tim Pawlenty,the last Republican governor of Minnesota, actually allowed a bus driver strike to go on for weeks, and eventually beat them, because he actually enjoyed not having busses clog up traffic. Eventually the drivers caved because T-Paw had no interest in public transit at all, barring the cost in the budget, and the strike meant he didn't have to pay them.
It's a good thing I was unemployed at the time, or else I wouldn't have been able to get to work.
Umm...have you read any of the previous 10 pages or so of this thread?
Thinking Obama is Jesus and being disappointed because you don't have the slightest clue what the president can actually do, particularly with an actively resisting Congress, are two very different things.
Aggressive Peer judgment? Check.
An Inability to do any fact checking at all on statements?
Check.
I guess you missed 3 years of military involvement in Yemen. Which you'd know about if you bothered to... you know. Internet, Google. Connect the Dots.
Failing at facts? Did you miss 250 Billion Dollars in tax cuts not associated with payroll tax cuts in the stimulus?
This is counter factual. Google the head of the SEC. You know the person that runs it?
Blatant, admited securities fraud happened in 2004-2008. Nothing has been done.
Maybe you missed it but the US president is in charge of law enforcement and has a great deal of power there.
http://www.indyweek.com/indyweek/obamas-torture-scorecard/Content?oid=1300103
I don't know what you want to call it.
There's a culture here where you relentlessly ridicule, outside of the stated rules of the forum.
Where being different is enough of a reason to be jailed.
And where you cant even be bothered to google fact check your own statements before posting them.
I think that's knee jerk circle the wagons tribalism, but clearly I am just extraordinarily dumb.
"You can be yodeling bear without spending a dime if you get lucky." -> reVerse
"In the grim darkness of the future, we will all be nurses catering to the whims of terrible old people." -> Hacksaw
"In fact, our whole society will be oriented around caring for one very decrepit, very old man on total life support." -> SKFM
I mean, the first time I met a non-white person was when this Vietnamese kid tried to break my legs but that was entirely fair because he was a centreback, not because he was a subhuman beast in some zoo ->yotes
Yeah, I'm not sure why someone would choose to stay in a place where they their basic personality and methods run contrary to the local rules and culture. If one were interested in debate, I suppose that would be something, but someone who presents cherrypicked factoids and presenting them as 100% solid gold proof while ridiculing anyone who comments on the inconsistancies really seems like someone who would prefer a different forum.
Well, I suppose that I'd do that stuff if I were getting paid. Nice work if you can get it.
Stay cool, man. If you're presented with factoids, brush them away with facts. Confront anger with calmness, and you will emerge the victor. Just sayin'.
The health care legislation that was eventually passed was so neutered, so watered down, so full of compromises to Senate Republicans, blue dog Democrats, and handouts to private insurers, that it has actually set us back from true health care reforms--on par with what other nations provide their citizens--for at least several more decades.
There is an argument made that reforms are often incremental in nature, and not necessarily sweeping and all-inclusive all at once. But that comes as little comfort in a situation where Barack Obama's health care bill will give politicians for generations to come the political cover needed to avoid the controversial subject of health care by declaring it "good enough," "improving," or "a good start" until whichever decade comes around when voters start seriously caring about health care reform again. In a cruel bit of irony, we may not see the reforms that Democrats were first clamoring for in the legislation because of what we've ended up with in the legislation.
If we can impute any of that failure to Barack Obama, it was in his non-partisan idealism, thinking that he could sell House and (especially) Senate Republicans on reforms that would save the government money, and taxpayers money, while finally extending insurance coverage to millions of uninsured Americans.
We saw this so often with early term Obama, where he would have no idea that sane, fiscally sound legislation would always fail or always get dismantled by obstructionist congressional Republicans.
The 2012 version of Barack Obama is more wizened, he understands how the partisan game is played, and that these people are simply unwilling to listen to a Democratic president propose reforms that stretch a dollar so admirably that even Ronald Reagan would have blessed them. But the band-aid of a health care bill attributed to a President earlier in his term, who thought he was talking to a congress that actually cared about wasteful spending and about Americans dying from preventable illnesses, will always stand as a piece of compromise legislation that may end up doing more harm than good.
Oh, I'm as cool as the bottom side of a pillow. I haven't even engaged him, because there's no purpose; trying to go point-by-point with people like that just lets them cherry pick your argument further, prolonging the pointless debate.
On that note, I would like to ask, "What the hell is Rick Perry talking about?"
Is he just covering for his choice to not comply with federal regulations?
Oversimplification makes a lot of things possible.
Ron Paul is pretty close to George Washington!
More or less.
Texas Medicaid provided pre-natal services at one level, but family planning at a lower income level. It was possible to qualify once you were pregnant, but if you weren't pregnant yet you didn't qualify.
Texas and the fed came up with the "Women's Health Services" plan.
Fed pays 90%, state pays 10%. Texas passed a law (goes into force March 14th) that said you can't spend state funds on an organization with an affiliate that provides abortion - in Texas Planned Parenthood is split to two orgs - one that does the family planning/women's health, and one that does the abortions. The Women's Health Services plan money goes to the one that DOESN'T provide abortions.
Supposedly the only org that meets that criteria of having an affiliate organization that provides abortion services, and will be blocked from recieving the money is Planned Parenthood. Perry is trying to argue that "yes, it's 90% federal money, but because we pay that 10%, we decide where it goes not the Fed." and the Fed is going "Like hell you do." Also lots of whargbling about the 'will of the Texas Legislature' and '10th amendment!' and such.
Yes. More specifically, the political gesture by Texas Executive Health and Human Services Commissioner Tom Suehs, who signed a provision into law last week that bans providers with "abortion affiliates" from being part of the WHP.
It's a big deal because (fiercely independent!) Texas gets something in the order of 9 federal dollars for every 1 dollar Texas puts into the Women's Health Program. So, a program that gets the vast majority of its funding from the federal government, where blocking qualified healthcare providers to score points with your constituents is a violation of federal law.
Not only that, but they were warned not to fucking do this a year ago, and are doing it anyway.
Texas! :rotate:
I figured it was something like that, but I was having trouble getting past the $8 million abortionplex of it all.
The only people who call him Jesus are asshole Republicans trying to turn Democrats support for Obama to its extreme conclusion by lying about what Democrats really think. It's the old Rovian tactic by turning a strength into a weakness.
Yeah it's seriously not a thing.
It's also projection, because if Republicans had a candidate as charismatic as Obama, they would be zealously devoted to him to vaguely religious levels. Witness Reagan.
Well, to be fair, I'ved used the term "Liberal Jesus" when debating people who had ridiculous expectations for Obama's presidency and are now disillusioned that we're not living in the New Socialist Paradise that no one was promised.
But it's not some massive thing like the Republicans who actually think he's Joedolf Stitler Johnsenedy JDRsevelt Carter.
The main reason the President will always say the War Powers Act is unconstitutional, and the main reason Congress will never... ever challenge the President on the War Powers act, is because both sides want to be able to take all of the credit for the good things that come from war and shift all of the blame onto the other side.
It's one of many things about people that irritate me.
twitch.tv/Taramoor
@TaramoorPlays
Taramoor on Youtube
Well, you are. Sorry.
Dude, if it's small-scale enough that I - a guy who follows international military movements and reads about tactics and strategy as a hobby - don't remember it, it doesn't qualify as a war. The only mention besides the drone strike I noted, for the record, in the first three pages of "US military yemen," were mentions of additional security personnel being deployed after the fucking US embassy was bombed and training and support personnel there at the Yemeni government's request. So, like, fuck off with this condescension.
Which were necessary for it to pass Congress? And are a far, far, far smaller figure, both in percentages and absolute value, than the Bush tax cuts? And that those tax cuts also included stuff like expanded credits for college tuition payments?
Not so; many banks have settled such cases. Additionally, there are a number of ongoing investigations. Given the sheer amount of fraud perpetrated and the number of documents they're sifting through I absolutely expect it to take years to sort out.
Indirectly. The President, again, is not God-Emperor of the United States. He's directed people to look into the stuff that happened. They're looking. Several banks have settled, either with the feds or with state courts. Things do not happen overnight.
Which has remarkably little to do with what I said!
The relevant executive orders, by the way, are here, here, and here. They were signed two days after his inauguration.
And yes, you are extraordinarily dumb.
Edit: Fixed tags.
Substitute "Reddit" with "Penny Arcade" at will
PSN/Steam/NNID: SyphonBlue | BNet: SyphonBlue#1126
Oh hey, look, ProPublica just published a very convenient chart laying out how much the banks have settled/been fined for, broken down by bank and agency. Total judgements against, fines levied, and settlements paid amount to $26,058,950,000 (plus attendant legal expenses not included.) Four banks - Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, and Citigroup, have paid at least two billion dollars in fines/fees/judgements. (Bank of America alone has paid nearly half the above 26b figure.) Goldman has paid half a billion.
PSN/Steam/NNID: SyphonBlue | BNet: SyphonBlue#1126
BREAKING NEWS: President Hacksaw continues his(?) campaign against free speech.
That is what that would get you. Instead you can pull an Obama and shoot their stupid shit down.
These investigations and settlements are a total joke. The banks settle in order to avoid paying out the amounts of cash they actually could be liable for - pay $2 billion so you don't have to pay $200 billion. Less than a drop in the bucket of the magnitude of economic damage they are largely responsible for. Much of their cooperation with these settlements has also been in anticipation of them getting reamed for dirty foreclosure practices like robo-signing, and companies this large already have plenty of money ready for legal battles and settlements so they're not exactly cutting into their bonuses to pay this stuff out. The people most responsible for the practices the banks have settled over are probably the most insulated - and these settlements are usually resulting in some undeserved immunity on specific things that the bank no longer wants to be exposed to risk for having done.