Obama government will stop defending the DOMA

[RIP Robert H Bork]

I wonder if certain liberals here still think Obama is not liberal enough?

Lol. Obama is barely liberal. I don't understand how you could realistically define him as anything other than a charismatic centrist.

*FACEPALM*

You have a strange definition of centrism. Obama is perhaps the most liberal president we've ever had. I don't know how that could be considered centrist, not even from a far-leftist perspective.

lol.. I love it when the far right claims every centrist Democrat is "zomgz teh most liberalist ever in the whole wide world!@!"

The type of person I consider a liberal is former governor Floyd B. Olson (Farmer-Labor Party-MN)

Who said this, regarding the conservatives in the state legislature:

"I am making a last appeal to the Legislature. If the Senate does not make provision for the sufferers in the State and the Federal Government refuses to aid, I shall invoke the powers I hold and shall declare martial law. ... A lot of people who are now fighting [relief] measures because they happen to possess considerable wealth will be brought in by provost guard and be obliged to give up more than they would now. There is not going to be misery in this State if I can humanly prevent it. . . Unless the Federal and State governments act to insure against recurrence of the present situation, I hope the present system of government goes right down to hell."

I didn't know you approve of tyranny and intimidation.

Anyway, that's called Communism. That hardly makes Obama a "centrist".

lol... you obviously have no idea what communism is.  

How was Olson not a communist? Particularly reprehensible was his proposed system of government. He was clearly inspired by the tyranny of the Soviet Union.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Excuse me? You're the one who approves of tyranny, as we see through Olson's example.

[RI]

I wonder if certain liberals here still think Obama is not liberal enough?

Lol. Obama is barely liberal. I don't understand how you could realistically define him as anything other than a charismatic centrist.

If National Journal's most liberal Senator in 2007 is not a liberal, then who is a liberal, exactly?

Obviously using the GOP definition of the liberal, which is anything to left of them...

Nice try.  National Journal is not a partisan publication.

This effect has been explained before. Democratic nominees for president from the Senate tend to get rated as highly liberal by even objective sources while they are campaigning for the White House because they often take fewer votes due to spending less time in DC and they often only vote when their vote is needed by the party or for highly important legislation. As such, there is a heavy selection bias and the rating, while not biased in an intentionally partisan or ideological way, tends to skew reality toward the extremes; it makes sense that in 2007 or 2008 even while Obama was spending most of his time campaigning that his 'liberal score' would be high.

Scores from 2005 or 2006 should be more reflective of his natural leanings.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Obama (even if we accept the skewed and subjective definitions)

2005 82.5 16th
2006 86 10th
-------
2007 95.5 1st

[RI]

I wonder if certain liberals here still think Obama is not liberal enough?

Lol. Obama is barely liberal. I don't understand how you could realistically define him as anything other than a charismatic centrist.

*FACEPALM*

You have a strange definition of centrism. Obama is perhaps the most liberal president we've ever had. I don't know how that could be considered centrist, not even from a far-leftist perspective.

lol.. I love it when the far right claims every centrist Democrat is "zomgz teh most liberalist ever in the whole wide world!@!"

The type of person I consider a liberal is former governor Floyd B. Olson (Farmer-Labor Party-MN)

Who said this, regarding the conservatives in the state legislature:

"I am making a last appeal to the Legislature. If the Senate does not make provision for the sufferers in the State and the Federal Government refuses to aid, I shall invoke the powers I hold and shall declare martial law. ... A lot of people who are now fighting [relief] measures because they happen to possess considerable wealth will be brought in by provost guard and be obliged to give up more than they would now. There is not going to be misery in this State if I can humanly prevent it. . . Unless the Federal and State governments act to insure against recurrence of the present situation, I hope the present system of government goes right down to hell."

I didn't know you approve of tyranny and intimidation.

Anyway, that's called Communism. That hardly makes Obama a "centrist".

lol... you obviously have no idea what communism is.  

How was Olson not a communist? Particularly reprehensible was his proposed system of government. He was clearly inspired by the tyranny of the Soviet Union.

Please stop misusing the word communism. Declaring martial law, even for economic reasons is not communist; authoritarian perhaps, but not communist. There is a very specific intellectual lineage that defines Communism that is very different from what's being described.

[Marokai Backbeat]

Name one thing Obama has done that's anywhere near centrist. I certainly don't consider his position on the DOMA or gay marriage to be centrist.

Frankly, it certainly is centrist. He neither supports or wants to ban gay marriage, he supports civil unions. That's a clearly centrist position.

But other things? There's a bunch. His healthcare plan was basically the Republican proposal from the 1990's, it borrowed a ton of originally Republican ideas and is far to the right of anything Kennedy, Nixon, Truman, FDR, TR, LBJ, and even to the right of Clinton's old proposal in the 1990's.

His tax cut deal with the Republicans was a complete cave. You think an extension of all Bush tax cuts is something the super-farthest-left President ever agrees to do? Even the tax hikes he wants would merely increase it to Clinton levels.

Financial regulations were extraordinarily basic. In the State of the Union, Obama proposed cutting the corporate tax rate. Last year Obama proposed taking a Republican tax idea on business reinvestment and blowing it up to a 100% deduction instead.

After the Tuscon shooting, Obama did absolutely nothing about gun control. Under Obama, gun rights have probably expanded more than any President in decades. And hell, right now, Obama is in the process of caving to Republican spending cuts, proposing his on spending freezes, and wanting to spend even more in the defense budget.

You could think of a million different things he's done or said that by no means says he's far to the left by any measure.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

You don't know that much about Australia, then.

[RIP Robert H Bork]

I wonder if certain liberals here still think Obama is not liberal enough?

Lol. Obama is barely liberal. I don't understand how you could realistically define him as anything other than a charismatic centrist.

*FACEPALM*

You have a strange definition of centrism. Obama is perhaps the most liberal president we've ever had. I don't know how that could be considered centrist, not even from a far-leftist perspective.

No, US Conservatives have a strange definition of centreism. Largely because they've spent the last 30 years shifting the centre of American politics to the right, and insisting on the Democrats meeting them in the middle...

Name one thing Obama has done that's anywhere near centrist. I certainly don't consider his position on the DOMA or gay marriage to be centrist. But I can understand why you consider even full-blown gay marriage to be "centrist"; after all, you're in Australia, which is probably much further left than the US.

Which illustrates my point.

The US definition of centreist is completely skewed away from the conventional wisdom of what the centre is.

Australia is hardly some leftist paradise... we're socially liberal in the fact that a minority are actively socially left of centre and another minority don't give a s**t... Gay marriage/civil unions have high support in Australia not because of it being a left-wing haven, but because a lot of people don't care enough to complain, and the Australian ideal of 'fairness' "well it doesn't seem fair that they don't have the same rights I do" kicks in.

Well, I don't consider that to be centrist, nor do I consider Obama to be a centrist, in gay marriage or anywhere else.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Because your view is the centreist view?

[RIP Robert H Bork]

Because your view is the centreist view?

No. I don't claim to be a centrist (I've never claimed to be anything but conservative), but I also don't consider Obama to be one, and I maintain that position.

[cinyc]

This effect has been explained before. Democratic nominees for president from the Senate tend to get rated as highly liberal by even objective sources while they are campaigning for the White House because they often take fewer votes due to spending less time in DC and they often only vote when their vote is needed by the party or for highly important legislation. As such, there is a heavy selection bias and the rating, while not biased in an intentionally partisan or ideological way, tends to skew reality toward the extremes; it makes sense that in 2007 or 2008 even while Obama was spending most of his time campaigning that his 'liberal score' would be high.

Scores from 2005 or 2006 should be more reflective of his natural leanings.

Care to guess who had the most liberal Senate voting record of all Democratic nominees in 2006, per National Journal?  Hint.

[tpfkaw]

Please don't fancy yourself by pretending you're a "genuine liberal"... try "genuine bald faced liar" in that case.

That's almost as clever as the time I was called "poopyface."

You must be logged in to read this quote.

"Classical" liberalism, simply put, is the desire for a smaller government that respects individual rights.  No classical liberal argues for a larger government or decreased rights.  Beyond that, the continuum can exist among anyone who satisfies those criteria.  That includes all manner of people, whether they accept or reject the idea of the monopoly of force.  It's really freakish how a "true liberal" nowadays is an outright fascist.  The square has been circled, war is peace, freedom is slavery.

[Marokai Backbeat]

This effect has been explained before. Democratic nominees for president from the Senate tend to get rated as highly liberal by even objective sources while they are campaigning for the White House because they often take fewer votes due to spending less time in DC and they often only vote when their vote is needed by the party or for highly important legislation. As such, there is a heavy selection bias and the rating, while not biased in an intentionally partisan or ideological way, tends to skew reality toward the extremes; it makes sense that in 2007 or 2008 even while Obama was spending most of his time campaigning that his 'liberal score' would be high.

Scores from 2005 or 2006 should be more reflective of his natural leanings.

Care to guess who had the most liberal Senate voting record of all Democratic nominees in 2006, per National Journal?  Hint.

Why do you people always obsessively focus on the stupid ratings lists instead of actually pointing out the list of the evil liberal things they've said and done instead?

You can talk talk talk about Obama's crazy-liberal record but it's not reflected in almost anything he's actually done.

[RI]

This effect has been explained before. Democratic nominees for president from the Senate tend to get rated as highly liberal by even objective sources while they are campaigning for the White House because they often take fewer votes due to spending less time in DC and they often only vote when their vote is needed by the party or for highly important legislation. As such, there is a heavy selection bias and the rating, while not biased in an intentionally partisan or ideological way, tends to skew reality toward the extremes; it makes sense that in 2007 or 2008 even while Obama was spending most of his time campaigning that his 'liberal score' would be high.

Scores from 2005 or 2006 should be more reflective of his natural leanings.

Care to guess who had the most liberal Senate voting record of all Democratic nominees in 2006, per National Journal?  Hint.

Perhaps, but only barely more liberal than Dodd, plus that was only of Senate members running for President. I'm sure Kucinich, for example, would have been more liberal if rated. Also, as Polnut pointed out, he was 10th most liberal in the Senate that year overall, so while, yes, you've made the point that he is definitely on the left side of the spectrum, he's far from the raging leftist loon that he's often portrayed to be or implied to be by quoting 2007 numbers.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Because your view is the centreist view?

No. I don't claim to be a centrist, but I also don't consider Obama to be one, and I maintain that position.

That's a pretty reasonable position to hold. I think you're wrong-ish, but eh...

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

This effect has been explained before. Democratic nominees for president from the Senate tend to get rated as highly liberal by even objective sources while they are campaigning for the White House because they often take fewer votes due to spending less time in DC and they often only vote when their vote is needed by the party or for highly important legislation. As such, there is a heavy selection bias and the rating, while not biased in an intentionally partisan or ideological way, tends to skew reality toward the extremes; it makes sense that in 2007 or 2008 even while Obama was spending most of his time campaigning that his 'liberal score' would be high.

Scores from 2005 or 2006 should be more reflective of his natural leanings.

Care to guess who had the most liberal Senate voting record of all Democratic nominees in 2006, per National Journal?  Hint.

Why do you people always obsessively focus on the stupid ratings lists instead of actually pointing out the list of the evil liberal things they've said and done instead?

You can talk talk talk about Obama's crazy-liberal record but it's not reflected in almost anything he's actually done.

changing the goal-posts - now most liberal candidate in 2006...

When was 10th most liberal... or 15th in 2005...

[Verily]

Please don't fancy yourself by pretending you're a "genuine liberal"... try "genuine bald faced liar" in that case.

That's almost as clever as the time I was called "poopyface."

You must be logged in to read this quote.

"Classical" liberalism, simply put, is the desire for a smaller government that respects individual rights.  No classical liberal argues for a larger government or decreased rights.  Beyond that, the continuum can exist among anyone who satisfies those criteria.  That includes all manner of people, whether they accept or reject the idea of the monopoly of force.  It's really freakish how a "true liberal" nowadays is an outright fascist.  The square has been circled, war is peace, freedom is slavery.

Simply untrue.

Classical liberalism was the founding ideology of the modern state. It resisted the concentration of power in unelected (or otherwise illegitimate, since it was fine with unelected courts) officials, like monarchs and military leaders, but that is a far cry from resisting the power of the state.

Quite the opposite--the classical liberals were very much in favor of state intervention to improve infrastructure for trade or to educate and provide for the health of the general public, which they viewed as a civic government duties that had not been met by the previous governments. True, they were in some sense minimalist in these endeavors. (Sometimes, not always--the push for universal education, while its significance is largely forgotten today, was quite a radical and dramatic expansion of government authority.) But they certainly and undoubtedly dramatically expanded the scope and goals of the state in the 18th and 19th centuries with new programs designed to serve the public instead of the leadership.

[tpfkaw]

You and I seem to be using different definitions of the term "classical liberal" - you are referring to the Federalist-Whig-Republican tradition in the US while I am referring to the "Democrat" tradition; Your group is what I would call "republican nationalists" or "Hobbesian republicans" who believed that government ought to be run "for the benefit of the people," while those whom I would describe as "classical liberals" (and who would have described themselves as such at the time) considered government to be an evil in itself.

[RI]

You and I seem to be using different definitions of the term "classical liberal" - you are referring to the Federalist-Whig-Republican tradition in the US while I am referring to the "Democrat" tradition; Your group is what I would call "republican nationalists" or "Hobbesian republicans" who believed that government ought to be run "for the benefit of the people," while those whom I would describe as "classical liberals" (and who would have described themselves as such at the time) considered government to be an evil in itself.

Even Locke didn't consider the government to be an 'evil'.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Exactly... classical liberals believed in 'limited government' - but the it's the NEO-classicals who are angling more towards your idea of smallest level of government possible...

But yes, I would love to see ANY quote from a recognised early liberal thinker who considers government to be an evil?

[cinyc]

This effect has been explained before. Democratic nominees for president from the Senate tend to get rated as highly liberal by even objective sources while they are campaigning for the White House because they often take fewer votes due to spending less time in DC and they often only vote when their vote is needed by the party or for highly important legislation. As such, there is a heavy selection bias and the rating, while not biased in an intentionally partisan or ideological way, tends to skew reality toward the extremes; it makes sense that in 2007 or 2008 even while Obama was spending most of his time campaigning that his 'liberal score' would be high.

Scores from 2005 or 2006 should be more reflective of his natural leanings.

Care to guess who had the most liberal Senate voting record of all Democratic nominees in 2006, per National Journal?  Hint.

Why do you people always obsessively focus on the stupid ratings lists instead of actually pointing out the list of the evil liberal things they've said and done instead?

You can talk talk talk about Obama's crazy-liberal record but it's not reflected in almost anything he's actually done.

changing the goal-posts - now most liberal candidate in 2006...

When was 10th most liberal... or 15th in 2005...

The 10th most liberal Senator is still more liberal than 90 of his colleagues.  How is that is not liberal enough for you or others who are denying that Obama is a liberal is beyond my comprehension.

The guy is a liberal.  He enacted socialized medicine despite overwhelming opposition, wants to hike taxes on the so-called rich, is pro-abortion and despite attempts to hide it, wants gay marriage.  He comes down on the liberal side of every contested issue today.  That he doesn't have the power to enact what he wishes is a different story.

[Lief 🗽]

He passed Bob Dole's healthcare bill. I guess Bob Dole is also a hardcore socialist too now?

[Bacon King]

You and I seem to be using different definitions of the term "classical liberal" - you are referring to the Federalist-Whig-Republican tradition in the US while I am referring to the "Democrat" tradition; Your group is what I would call "republican nationalists" or "Hobbesian republicans" who believed that government ought to be run "for the benefit of the people," while those whom I would describe as "classical liberals" (and who would have described themselves as such at the time) considered government to be an evil in itself.

Sorry to be blunt, I don't think you know what you're talking about.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

This effect has been explained before. Democratic nominees for president from the Senate tend to get rated as highly liberal by even objective sources while they are campaigning for the White House because they often take fewer votes due to spending less time in DC and they often only vote when their vote is needed by the party or for highly important legislation. As such, there is a heavy selection bias and the rating, while not biased in an intentionally partisan or ideological way, tends to skew reality toward the extremes; it makes sense that in 2007 or 2008 even while Obama was spending most of his time campaigning that his 'liberal score' would be high.

Scores from 2005 or 2006 should be more reflective of his natural leanings.

Care to guess who had the most liberal Senate voting record of all Democratic nominees in 2006, per National Journal?  Hint.

Why do you people always obsessively focus on the stupid ratings lists instead of actually pointing out the list of the evil liberal things they've said and done instead?

You can talk talk talk about Obama's crazy-liberal record but it's not reflected in almost anything he's actually done.

changing the goal-posts - now most liberal candidate in 2006...

When was 10th most liberal... or 15th in 2005...

The 10th most liberal Senator is still more liberal than 90 of his colleagues.  How is that is not liberal enough for you or others who are denying that Obama is a liberal is beyond my comprehension.

The guy is a liberal.  He enacted socialized medicine despite overwhelming opposition, wants to hike taxes on the so-called rich, is pro-abortion and despite attempts to hide it, wants gay marriage.  He comes down on the liberal side of every contested issue today.  That he doesn't have the power to enact what he wishes is a different story.

I think he is a liberal, but is governing as a moderate.

He put in place Bob Dole's healthcare plan from 1994 (which is miles to the right of Nixon's health plan from 1974), he wants to increase taxes on the richest 1% and scale back unsustainable tax cuts... big deal (which the majority of the country supported), is pro-choice (as is the larger plurality of America) and supports full legal recognition of gay unions (in which the most recent poll had 52% supporting full legal equivalence - another which had 49% believing that gays and lesbians had the constitutional right to be married and 52% believing they should)...

So while conservatives who have had the social agenda by the neck for the last 30 years, are freaking out by how times have shifted past them ... this is not a radical leftist agenda... despite what you might believe.

[Ban my account ffs!]

I wonder if certain liberals here still think Obama is not liberal enough?

Lol. Obama is barely liberal. I don't understand how you could realistically define him as anything other than a charismatic centrist.

*FACEPALM*

You have a strange definition of centrism. Obama is perhaps the most liberal president we've ever had. I don't know how that could be considered centrist, not even from a far-leftist perspective.

lol.. I love it when the far right claims every centrist Democrat is "zomgz teh most liberalist ever in the whole wide world!@!"

The type of person I consider a liberal is former governor Floyd B. Olson (Farmer-Labor Party-MN)

Who said this, regarding the conservatives in the state legislature:

"I am making a last appeal to the Legislature. If the Senate does not make provision for the sufferers in the State and the Federal Government refuses to aid, I shall invoke the powers I hold and shall declare martial law. ... A lot of people who are now fighting [relief] measures because they happen to possess considerable wealth will be brought in by provost guard and be obliged to give up more than they would now. There is not going to be misery in this State if I can humanly prevent it. . . Unless the Federal and State governments act to insure against recurrence of the present situation, I hope the present system of government goes right down to hell."

I didn't know you approve of tyranny and intimidation.

Anyway, that's called Communism. That hardly makes Obama a "centrist".

lol... you obviously have no idea what communism is.  

How was Olson not a communist? Particularly reprehensible was his proposed system of government. He was clearly inspired by the tyranny of the Soviet Union.

Please stop misusing the word communism. Declaring martial law, even for economic reasons is not communist; authoritarian perhaps, but not communist. There is a very specific intellectual lineage that defines Communism that is very different from what's being described.

Thanks for clearing that up.

And no... I don't think governors should declare martial law in order to scare legislators into enacting liberal tax policies and welfare expansion... but I respect Floyd Olson for his passion.  He was not by any means anti-democracy... and at the worst, he beat the conservatives (the legislature was non-partisan until 1972) at their own game.  This was a time when campaign posters touted how liberal candidates were and how their opponents weren't "real liberals".

I'll give you that Floyd Olson was a democratic socialist.  The Farmer-Labor party was basically a socialist party... and while it originally had sympathy for the revolution in Russia, that soured under Stalin during the 1930s.  But he was no communist.  There is a big difference.

[tpfkaw]

You and I seem to be using different definitions of the term "classical liberal" - you are referring to the Federalist-Whig-Republican tradition in the US while I am referring to the "Democrat" tradition; Your group is what I would call "republican nationalists" or "Hobbesian republicans" who believed that government ought to be run "for the benefit of the people," while those whom I would describe as "classical liberals" (and who would have described themselves as such at the time) considered government to be an evil in itself.

Even Locke didn't consider the government to be an 'evil'.

Locke is overrated.  Anyways, he was a far-right militia hate group leader:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Exactly... classical liberals believed in 'limited government' - but the it's the NEO-classicals who are angling more towards your idea of smallest level of government possible...

But yes, I would love to see ANY quote from a recognised early liberal thinker who considers government to be an evil?

You're an idiot:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

He passed Bob Dole's healthcare bill. I guess Bob Dole is also a hardcore socialist too now?

Yep.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

...and you seem to lack basic manners.