Talk Elections

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Objectively, no effing way. Subjectively, absolutely.

Yes from Ireland, although I'm definitely in the minority for that question.

Don't know financially (I don't think I'm worse off though), but I'm in a better state of mind.

Sure. I mean, I've met you guys, and that's definitely a good thing.

As a matter of fact, I am.

Yes, for reasons that have nothing to do with politics.

It's a different situation for everyone, and millions of Americans are still out of work- I know many of them.

But for me as a college student, it's different. Neither of my parents lost their jobs during the recession (my dad runs his own law practice and my mom is a special ed teacher) so I can't really go by that.

I can only go by my mindset. In January 2009, I was worried. We were losing hundreds of thousands of jobs every month and it seems like we were always hitting a new low, basically the bottom fell out. People were talking about 10-15-20 percent unemployment. I was afraid that our household income would dry up and I'd have to drop out of college, and my parents weren't really easing my fears, because they didn't know what was going to happen either.

For me, things are so much better. We still have high unemployment, but it appears that things are moving in the right direction. The unemployment rate has steadily fallen in the past few months, and we're now adding hundreds of thousands of jobs each month. I feel like the worst has long since passed us and things are looking better every day. And as someone who is about to graduate, this is welcome news.

This is just my perspective, polls show that most Americans still think our country is on the wrong track, but I think in the end we're better off than we were four years ago.

No but for obama we averted a depression and we are growing jobs otherwise.

Considering four years ago we were in the midst of an economic free-fall that threatened to turn into our Second Great Depression, yes, we are very much better off than we were four years ago by miles.  There is plenty of room for improvement, for sure, but I would rather be where we are now than where we were then.  

Politically speaking? No.
Psychologically speaking? Yes.

What do you mean, exactly?

Myself personally much better off. My 401K is about double what it was 4 years ago (well 3 1/2 years ago anyway). My House may be worth less but in my rural area the housing bubble never rose as high so it did not have as far to come down. I was able to refinance at record low interest rates. Inflation is virtually non existent. We ended one war and are drawing down forces in another. I don't have to worry about not having access to health care insurance if I were to lose my job. Things for me are far from perfect but they are much better than they were 4 years ago.

When I say politically speaking, I mean my confidence in the Government to do good is lower now than it was 4 years ago.

When I say psychologically speaking, I'm in a better state of mind now than I was 4 years ago.

This.
I definitely feel like overall things are better now than they were on the economic front as well is on the psychological front. Things aren't completely better, but at least the fear of an economic collapse and a lot of the more extreme rhetoric that we saw in 2010 has dwindled.

It's difficult to analyze.

When Barack Obama became President, I was enlisting in the U.S. Air Force with a career job in sight. My family was in better shape, economically and emotionally than it is now. My sister's were both single, my mother was recently re-married and working hard at her job. My father was newly retired.

Today, I find my Air Force dreams shattered after a short four months in due to a benign medical condition. (The saddest part is that I actually have more military experience than our two candidates for President)

My sisters are both married with children, but times are tough, especially economically. My father's retirement is now cut short as he has been forced to return to part-time work just to help make middle class ends meet.

It's difficult to say.

Good summary for me too.

What do you think?  :)

Worse. My mom had a much, much better job selling homes when Obama became president, now she's at an hourly wage job. That's not right. We've had to give up so much, gas prices have skyrocketed, etc.

Torie, you've alluded that you lost weight and got fit. If you don't mind me asking, how much did you lose?  (sorry for tangent)

I decided to change careers, got my Masters but haven't gotten back to my previous salary yet. I'm happier though.   None of this has anything to do with Obama.

65 pounds at the rate of 10 pounds a month. After that, I started ragging on BushOklahoma, and became rather insufferable about it. :)

Huh, I've also lost 65 so far and looking to drop more.  It is incongruous of me as a fat boy but I've also dropped in to lecture Bushie.  I guess there is no zealot like the recently converted:)

I also quit smoking a few months ago so it has been a productive administration. Maybe in the next one I'll finally achieve teetotal status but that may take a miracle of President Paul proportions. 

No - My family and I are barely hanging on by a thread economically.  My mom works in the mortgage business - she has ok months and terrible months.  She recently, along with her boyfriend, had to downsize from a house to a condo.  Her boyfriend develops homes.  There has been no pickup in his business and people are not building new homes.  My brother is working 6+ days a week.  I am living off of loans while working - there are months where there's a downturn in ones week to week finances and one of us has to sacrifice to support the other.  We've each had a turn at this.  My aunt is close to being homeless because of money spent to take care of my grandma before she passed.  Even minor events effect our financial situation and a major event could put us all out on the street.

I have hope though that the career path Ive chosen will lead to me being able to provide security and protection for my family and get us back on track.  It won't be because of the president though.  He...I have no words for how much pain he has deliberately caused along with Bush.  And that's that.

"Deliberately caused"? ???

Not going there Badger...that leads to a board meltdown and then personal attacks on my intelligence, neither of which I am in the mood for tonight.

In some ways yes, in one large way, no, and neither have anything to do with who's President.

My father's still alive and cancer/aortic tear-free (well, mostly...).  So in a non-political sense, yes.

About the same.  Maybe a bit better, for multiple reasons.

I'm probably doing a little better in that I've spent the last four years getting a degree instead of coming out of high school. My parents and siblings are, however, in a much worse place financially than four years ago.

Personally? No, of course not.

Politically speaking, assuming this question is asked in context of the 2012 United States Presidential election, then the answer is yes, the US is objectively better off than it was four years ago given that at that time the country (and a lot of others) were on the brink of another Depression.

http://www.shadowstats.com/


(note :  this is not an anti-obama site. sh**t began with deubeulyou )

immensely

In terms of anything the government can change, no.  In terms of economy, no.

Answering as one of the few here who was "on my own" for the last four years:

My pay has decreased over the last 4 years from $50k full-time to $50k freelance, starting April 1. I spent much of the last 4 years unemployed, and much of the rest underemployed. That said, I have paid off all my credit cards, and got a nice lower mortgage rate thanks to TARP. So, the TL;DR is yes, significantly better off, though I credit Obama with virtually none of it.

Yes, a lot better.  Obama has almost nothing to do with it, except for creating a horsesh** health care reform law that has created a ridiculous amount of work for corporate health care attorneys like myself.

Yes, not that it has much to do with Obama.

Four years ago --

When I was discussing news with foreigners I was trying to separate my country as a nation from its leadership. The economy was at the start of the worst economic meltdown since the Great Depression, and few people then knew how bad it could be. The US had lost much of the credibility that it had when George H W Bush and Bill Clinton were President.  That is back.

My investments are finally doing well -- and I bought in in November 2009 -- and I figure that I could easily get some work if I didn't have a family situation in which I am an unpaid domestic servant/ nurse's aide who hopes that I can outlast my elderly parents and start to have a real life (you can probably tell that I am a poor fit for a hick town that is the only one in which those two sentimental geezers  could possibly live in and that I find insufferable). In my mid-50s, beggars can't be choosers when it comes to work. My life was a wreck before 2008, so that hasn't changed.

In 2008 we all had legitimate fear of a second Great Depression. That fear is no longer germane to my life. I consider that I could easily have ended up homeless and eventually in the morgue...

This question shouldn't be in the political board, should be in forum community or off-topic. Of course I am doing better, I moved out of a suburban sh**thole to go to college.

This is a classic political question, Ronald Reagan built his re-election campaign in 1984 around it, this is the perfect forum for it.

It's classic political rhetoric.  Just because it's used doesn't make it meaningful, and it has extremely limited utility in this election, which is basically a culture war with some collateral damage in the political center.

My quality of life has been pretty static throughout.  It's probably why I find myself supporting the incumbent so often.

Emotionally, the fall of '08 was a severely depressing time for me, so you can say that things have vastly improved under Obama in that regard. Not that he has anything to do with it. 

?

Well, you threw that grenade out there, but whatever. If you rally believe Obama--or Bush for that matter--"deliberately caused" the economic pain our country is slowly recovering from, well, yes, I can see why you might have concerns about others questioning your intelligence.

On the subject, looking at the question again, I have to say absolutely--and just within the last year. New dream job, new dream home, the wife passed the torch on the non-profit art center she founded and has her life back now. :) The improving economy is just the icing on the cake.

Blaming the lack of a social safety net and the cost of caring for the elderly on the national debt
A Thousand Word Response Essay by King

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Yes. I'm earning £4500 more, have moved out of the family home and the changes to the taxation system has meant I've been earning more and paying less each year. I don't drive, don't smoke and I walk to work. I've been going to the gym and put on about 60pounds. I've also grown into my face and look better than I did when I was 24. So it's been good.

Do I have a heightened opinion of our government/government in general now than I did four years ago? Absolutely not.

Am I in a better state of mind now than I was four years ago? Absolutely not.

So, no.

I'm happy for you that you are doing well and congrats on the art center.  I don't agree with you on an improving economy - at least in the metrics that matter to the poor and middle class: gas prices, food prices, inflation and jobs.  I do really believe both Bush and Obama plotted and planned to hurt people in favor of their business and ideological allies.  I just prefer not to discuss that because it leads to irrational questioning of intelligence.  All I put forward is a different theory of events that occur.  People refuse to accept the school of thought that we are led by a group of charlatans who seek unlimited power, privilege and control.  Just because someone else doesn't agree with what I believe, does not make me wrong or of limited intellectual capacity (and vice versa).  Forums are for discussion and debate - not personal attacks (unless they are attacks ascribed to those in the public arena).