Is Obama finished?

[pbrower2a]

"This would negate the positive effects of this."

I want to see non-military government spending reduced dramatically.  Fund our troops and wars and nothing but the bare minimum for anything else is essentially my motto. Palin would probably adopt that mindset as well.  I don't think she's losing too much sleep over the people who lack healthcare in this country.  Neither am I.

Someone without a conscience might be kept awake at night if a neighbor separated only by a thin wall is playing Hector Berlioz' Requiemon a very good stereo, or has a gout attack.

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The economy has certainly scared a lot of people. If Presidents ordinarily see their popularity decrease while the economy falters, then why would we not expect the opposite?

Record low? That's because America was so polarized in November 2008, and he hasn't magically put an end to the polarization between regions, Left and Right, and the like. He didn't have much to lose, and his opponents have created much fear in him.

Profits return, and inventories shrink, before peopole get their jobs back. 

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Explanation: as a rule, investors buy up underpriced securities after a panic before businesses start investing anew in plant and equipment -- which does the job creation in Big Business. Jobless claims are finally down.

[pbrower2a]

The military does leave people dead....terrorists and our enemies.

Not to mention the soldiers sacrificed as cannon fodder and the civilian "collateral damage".

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First, I don't like being called "Pbroker". Someone else called me that on another Forum, and that person was a real piece of work -- a Jew-baiting, Holocaust-denying slimeball who figured me out as part of ZOG (the so-called "Zionist Occupation Government"). I'm not even Jewish!

People voted for Obama as a repudiation of George W. Bush and policies that have led only to calamity. What did Dubya ever do for you? Lie to start a war for control of other countries' oilfields and then bungle it badly? Delegate power to the likes of Dick Cheney and Karl Rove that the President has no authority to assume even for himself?  Promote a corrupt speculative boom that went bust? Give resource-grabbers whatever they want?  Pander to traffickers in discreditable superstitions?

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How would you know? Hispanics are conservative on law and order, but other than that? They have no use for the anti-intellectualism so pervasive in the white Protestant Right.  They have been burned badly by the subprime lending scams that allowed many of them to buy houses that they could never afford -- houses that have often gone into repossession. Mexican-Americans tend to make huge sacrifices to get a single-family home, and this time they got burned badly. They are not going to forgive the GOP until it changes drastically. That's why Nevada went for Obama by about a 12% margin to the surprise of many.

The best way to economic stability is to eliminate corruption. The rest takes care of itself.  

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Mostly where Obama was very unpopular in 2008 -- the South and some parts of the Intermountain West. Nobody pretends that our economic system has yet undone the hardships that eight years of reactionary government created -- hardships imposed through ticking time-bombs that exploded in 2007 and 2008.

Much must change before we recover the sort of prosperity that we knew in the 1990s. We can't restore the corrupt bubble economy that we knew with Dubya as President. We Americans are going to have to create prosperity the old-fashioned way -- through long-term, low-yield investments that we can't run away from if they start to go sour.  Anything else creates at most the illusion of prosperity or prosperity only for a few at the expense of everyone else.  The stock market is well advanced from where it was in February, but it has yet to recover what it lost in the Panic of 2008.

Economic recoveries take time.  This one won't depend upon cronyism, tax cuts targeted at the super-rich, and quick-buck raids on resources. It will make things better for people who missed out on the illusory prosperity of the GWB era. Recoveries are much slower as a rule than panics. Such is the norm in American economic history.   

[pbrower2a]

Obama was put in to create jobs.  The other issues are a back drop. The jobs situation has to be below 8% to have any chance of him getting reelected. If not, the Ross Perot independents that voted for Obama last time around will be looking for an alternative.

Some places will get below 8% unemployment and not vote for Obama; some will not get below 8% unemployment yet vote for Obama. We need remember that eighteen states and DC haven't voted for any GOP nominee since at least 1988, and three states which have voted only once for a GOP nominee since 1988, which suggests that unless Obama has a corrupt or inept Presidency he will have practically 260 electoral votes after achieving little.  That leaves little wiggle room for the GOP. A second crash? A major scandal? Sure -- in such cases, Obama loses. It's hard to see how we can have another crash during a slow, steady recovery that depends upon work and investment instead of upon smoke and mirrors. Speculative booms almost invariably end in panics.

Obama won't create jobs; he has yet to do so. He has established a more job-friendly environment. He's gone after corruption and overseas tax shelters that don't create jobs but instead drain capital. He can, like Ronald Reagan, ride a recovery.  

The Religious Right, the most reliable conduit for GOP voters, is drying up as a source of votes. Much of the fear of Obama "He's a secret Muslim; he will take your guns away" will prove hollow.

[pbrower2a]

I usually won't ever cite the NY Times/CBS News poll because it is a joke (see its 2009 NJ governor polling) but when it shows a result favorable to conservatives, that makes my argument even stronger.

http://www.nationalcenter.org/2003/08/majority-of-hispanics-pro-life.html

"According to a July 13-27 New York Times/CBS poll (as reported on LifeNews.com), 44 percent of Hispanics now say abortion should not be permitted, while 33 percent say it should be permitted with strict limits."

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You really need to get new glasses if you are going to use a poll from 2003 -- six years ago. That was when George W. Bush was in his first  term as President. The GOP was then going strong

I found a "404" message when I clicked on the link to "Lifenews.com", so I could not find out what the organization was. I can only imagine.

[pbrower2a]

It is too early, but Obama looks like he is running below the first term numbers of every president since Nixon.

That isn't a good sign.

The better news is that Reagan was the second lowest.

He faces a well-funded, strident, organized opposition that protests everything that he is and does. It's 1960s' street theater all over, except that it is "Obama=Hitler" and "Obama=Stalin" instead of

"Hey! Hey! LBJ! How many boys did you kill today!"

[pbrower2a]

Not even close to the 60's and Nixon probably benefited from it.

... and who would benefit from disgust at the teabag rhetoric and symbols?

[pbrower2a]

I don't know how many times I've posted this, but I'll say it again: Approvals more than two years out have no bearing on the likelihood a president gets re-elected. Will a math-inclined person please run the regression and post the graph? I'd really appreciate it.

I can't post the list of incumbent Senators and Governors, but I can post the article and the link:

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/search/label/incumbents

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This applies to Senate and gubernatorial elections, and not to the President directly, but the Presidential race consists of fifty statewide elections, one DC-wide election, and five races in Congressional seats. It's possible to lose a Senatorial or Gubernatorial race if one starts with a 50%+ approval rating (George Allen, 2006), but such is exceedingly rare. It takes an incredible "macaca" moment or outrages by staffers to lose from such a position.

I would expect the effect to be muted in several aspects in a Presidential race: if the President has a 70% approval rating in California in March 2012, then he's not likely to campaign heavily in California and pile on the percentage.  Likewise, if his approval rating is 35% in Oklahoma in March 2012 he's going to go for places more likely to give him a chance to win if it isn't a sure thing (Florida, Indiana, Missouri).  States elect the President; people don't.   

13 of the last 18 incumbent Presidents who ran for continuation of their Presidencies won election; five went down to defeat.

[pbrower2a]

Seemingly, if job creation in the US continues the current pace through the course of 2010, then more jobs will have been created than during the entire eight years of George W Bush's presidency

http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/politicalconnections.php

Unemployment needs to fall, of course, otherwise incomes remain flat and it's vital that the economy stays on track. Any double-dip and Obama will own it

It is no longer Dubya's economy. Of course President Obama gets the blame for any huge failures from here on; he also gets credit for any success. There will be no corrupt boom like that of the Double Zero decade, but any economic growth is more likely to be sustainable. Independent voters vote heavily on economic issues.   

[pbrower2a]

You don't have to convince me on New Liberal. I'm a liberal in the 19th century sense of the word which today would be a conservative libertarian. I'm Christian too and if you're bothered to take the time to read my religion and philosophy posts you'll see that I am far from the religious or radical right.

I've some left-libertarian convictions such as support for co-operatives and credit unions - that kind of thing. As for neoliberalism, the 'Crash of 2008' has rendered that as outdated as revolutionary socialism, the failed ideological God of the Left

What comes next?

I think the crash of 2008 was waiting to happen for over 30 years.

Only if you see it as the result of political tendencies that began about when Ronald Reagan became President. We got a culture of greed  but contempt for the intellect, and a rejection of fiscal and economic caution. That coincides with the transformation of Eisenhower-era conservatism into the "supply-side" economics of the Reagan era. Eisenhower-era conservatives disdained debt; Reagan-era conservatives found debt a powerful tool for keeping people working longer and harder for less -- but in fear of the Boss.

Such is a consequence of events that the generational theory of Neil Howe and William Strauss suggests as a consequence of a generational cycle.

[pbrower2a]

The thing people who claim about the effectiveness of the New Deal miss is that it was a political solution ot a political problem. 7% unemployment is an economic problem. 25% is a political one. It may be that austerity and free market economics will get you better growth 7 or 8 years down the line, but the unemployed won't wait that long. The Bruning government in Germany in 1930-32 followed Paulite economics to the hilt, doing a unilateral 33% salary cut for state employees and attempting to aggressively cut spending. The result was they all voted for Hitler who promised public works, and they loved him for it.

In 1931, Americans were being cut down in the streets of Washington by the US Army. five years later the President won reelection with 61% of the vote. The New Deal was an unprecedented success on its own terms. People just have no sense of proportion as to what those terms were.

We need to cut government salaries by 25% and use the rest to pay off the deficit. Cut the president's pay to $250,000. Congressmens' salaries down to $100,000. Implement a 20% cut in all programs other than defense and security. Cutting taxes will allow money to be used in the private sector to hire workers and spend rather than going towards taxes which results in even more people working and reduces unemployment.

Much of American business depends upon government activity -- medical practices that rely heavily upon Medicare and Medicaid patients, grocers (even Wal-Mart) who accept SNAP, truckers who use public roads, and of course contractors on public works.

If you are talking about the non-federal public sector, then think again of the consequences of underpaying cops (many of which will drift for all practical purposes to the payrolls of gangsters) and teachers. 

Without question, corruption must be weeded out of government -- but not solely for the purpose of cutting deficits. Government is still the only way in which to do certain things equitably and efficiently -- like the mail,  law enforcement, schools, and highways.

[pbrower2a]

I don't share the view that government is the only way to do certain things efficiently. I'm certainly not happy with schools, the post office, social security being bankrupt, or the way medicare is handled. Privitization I believe does things much more efficiently.

The Private Sector can do things better by some standards mostly because it can pick and choose customers. One way in which to choose customers is to price people out.

There is no private alternative to the Armed Forces or to diplomacy. The private solution to criminal justice is a lynch mob -- effective and inexpensive, but grossly unjust. Governments are responsible to people; corporations are responsible to shareholders or sugar-daddy providers of endowments.

Sure, elite private boarding schools are effective -- because the kids aren't handicapped to begin with, because they don't have their minds stunted in crowded slums and rural hovels, and because the boarding schools can eliminate television and video games. Federal Express and  UPS cater to high-value objects and communications; you would never send a greeting card by either, and you would probably never mass-mail your life history to prospective employers by either. If you think that Social Security is inadequate, then remember that you can supplement it with life insurance -- term or whole life -- and with an IRA. Both are low-yield , illiquid, and long-term if they are to offer any safety at all and don't devour your investment with fees.

Fire fighting? The firemen arrive at the scene of the fire not so much to protect a burning house (by which time it is ordinarily too late) but instead to protect the neighboring buildings. It's up to you to put in a sprinkler system.

Full privatization is best for those who have every advantage in the world, but for everyone else it is do without or pay an exorbitant price while pay becomes a sham.

[pbrower2a]

I don't share the view that government is the only way to do certain things efficiently. I'm certainly not happy with schools, the post office, social security being bankrupt, or the way medicare is handled. Privitization I believe does things much more efficiently.

I keep hearing arguments like this, and there's not really any follow through to explain how or why that such is the case. Its disappointing really as I'm one of those odd folks susceptible to logical arguments. Mind taking it from the level of believing and trying out a little proving?

Yes when you look at the public schools that are government run, kids graduate not knowing how to read.

The kids involved are typically in Special Education. The government puts much effort into educating kids with 'special needs" of any kind -- "special needs" that may include impairment of hearing or sight or handicaps not related to low intelligence. Privately-run schools could never meet the needs of the retarded.

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FedEx and UPS will deliver mail, but at roughly ten to twenty times the rate that the USPS charges. I assure you that if I wanted a parcel with sensitive or high-value material in it I would send it by one of the premium services. But sending a check to a credit card issuer? The mail system so far has served me well.  Come to think of it, the check that I send to a credit-card company is sensitive... but I can't imagine anyone in the postal system ever filching the check. You would NEVER send a greeting card by Federal Express.

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Social Security operates at a lower cost than does a typical life insurance company. Medicare is far less expensive in its administration than is the private health-insurance cartel -- so much less that Medicare for all would be an economic boon to all but private insurers.  

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Sure, but healing from an auto accident caused by an incompetent driver also can take seemingly forever, too.  Without the DMV as a screener of drivers auto accident rates, property damage, and collision-related deaths and injuries would also skyrocket, and just think what that would do to insurance rates.  

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Really? Name a country that imitates our profits-first, cost-loading system for paying for it.

I don't deny that our medical care system is great for those who have unlimited funds or are lucky enough to have first-rate insurance or access to the charitable section. That said, our system prices people into the grave. Few peoples who have something else would tolerate that.

You can also claim that our economic system attracts the best physicians due to low taxes overall. In essence, physicians in America keep more of what they make than do those in any other country in the First World. Even with President Obama's effort to make health insurance less costly, America will be an attractive place for physicians because we have lower income taxes, lower sales taxes, and no VAT.

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Plato's theory of the four levels of knowledge cannot support partisan politics of any kind.

[pbrower2a]

 News cycle. President Obama was right about the Islamic Cultural Center near Ground Zero (the First Amendment allows no other interpretation because it has no exceptions for popular judgment of other people's religion) even if his statement in support of the Islamic Cultural Center is unpopular. Dwight Eisenhower was right about Brown v. Board of Education and the desegregation of Little Rock schools even if such helped him not in the least.

Once Americans see what the doctrinaire GOP has to offer they will see things differently. Because it has no means of bring back the Dubya-era boom in real estate and crooked behavior by lenders and related parties, it too has no clue on how to get prosperity for more than about 5% of the people -- and that by $crewing the rest of us badly.  

[pbrower2a]

News cycle. President Obama was right about the Islamic Cultural Center near Ground Zero (the First Amendment allows no other interpretation because it has no exceptions for popular judgment of other people's religion) even if his statement in support of the Islamic Cultural Center is unpopular. Dwight Eisenhower was right about Brown v. Board of Education and the desegregation of Little Rock schools even if such helped him not in the least.

Once Americans see what the doctrinaire GOP has to offer they will see things differently. Because it has no means of bring back the Dubya-era boom in real estate and crooked behavior by lenders and related parties, it too has no clue on how to get prosperity for more than about 5% of the people -- and that by $crewing the rest of us badly.  

Why don't you believe in polls? News cycle? It must be a very long news cycle, lasting almost 2 years, considering he's dropped ~25 points in the polls since he began his term.

When it is over an event of transitory importance it reflects the news cycle and nothing else. Do you remember how President Obama's approval ratings sank when the Gusher in the Gulf was going badly and that his approval ratings rebounded afterward? The news events had no connection to any Obama policy.

The very high polls came from when people had unbounded optimism that every incoming President has. No, you cannot safely extrapolate every sudden trend safely. That the high temperature for Chicago on January 26 is 25 F and 20F on January 27 does not imply that the high temperature will be 15F on January 28, or that Chicago will have an unusually chilly summer. Tell a stockbroker that you want to buy into the market on the margin because you just saw three straight days of gain and you will be laughed at.

The last two Presidents to have practically no legislative agenda -- George H. W. Bush and Jimmy Carter -- kept higher poll numbers longer than Obama and still lost bids for re-election. Any President with any legislative agenda will step on some toes. You can be sure that Teddy Roosevelt was extremely unpopular among manufacturers of patent medicines that the Pure Food and Drug Act (1906) made unmarketable.  

As I said in 2009, President Obama will run on his record and win or run from his record and lose. He obviously can't run from his record anymore, so he loses only if something unusual happens for an incumbent President:

1. A derogatory scandal erupts with him at the center.

2. We have another economic meltdown much like that of September 2008.

3. A massive change of ideology -- let us say a revival of the Religious Right -- occurs. Such would take far more than a week.

4. An international debacle occurs.  

[pbrower2a]

I'm still rather optimistic.

A. It's still 2010, we've got two more years. Let's chill.

B. The Republicans are going to have to pick one hell of a candidate to run in 2012, someone that isn't Palin, Huckabee, Romney, Jindal, or Gingrich. Someone fresh and new and isn't so much of a Hardcore right-wing nutjob, and Ive yet to really see someone.

C. Obama ran a great campaign in 2008 and will probably do so again in 2012 with the same people he surrounded himself in 2008. Also, going back to Republicans picking a good candidate, they cant run their platform on scare tactics and shameless attacks about Obama's personal life, which doesn't seem possible with the way they are acting currently. It needs to be about current events, the economy, and what people are really looking for for answers.

A. Well you better hope the unemployment rate drops at least 2% (if not more) within the next 2 years.

Combat operations over in Iraq, the President will have to address economic issues. If Republicans balk, then he can use them as foils by running against Congress.

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Flip-flop, flip-flop. Your opinion matters not in the least -- no more than mine.

Romney has the best chance to win if President Obama is a disaster. But is Obama a disaster? 

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1. Barack Obama ran as an unabashed liberal.

2. He made promises of legislative activity and has gotten his legislative agenda passed -- one of the strongest indicators of an effective president. The last president so effective at that was Ronald Reagan. He made promises and achieved them.

3. He remains an optimist. Good pattern.

4. He has gotten American combat units out of Iraq. The mission really is accomplished -- this time. To be sure, I can't quite understand what good we were doing in Iraq after we overthrew Saddam Hussein. But that is over. President Obama has undone the second-most egregious blunder of his predecessor.

5. Now he has more legitimacy with which to deal with the economy.

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Americans will be satisfied with genuine progress. Watch the deficits shrink. The exit from Iraq will sink in, and Americans will get more confidence.

Underinvestment? Corporate America is now playing a gambit by hoarding cash instead of hiring and investing. The privileged classes would hire and invest again if they got their way (for them, going beyond Dubya-era tax cuts, maybe even exemption of the rich from taxes?), just as the hack philosopher Ayn Rand suggested. The GOP is trying to slow the economy so that Americans will turn to economic abusers of recent years  as "saviors".

So when the Dubya-era tax cuts expire in 2011 when the Democrats still hold majorities in both Houses in Congress, the gambit fails. Then it is back to normal.

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That's exactly how the GOP prospects looked... in 1982.

[pbrower2a]

Obama ran a great campaign as a challenger, maybe the best, when he could aspire to be all things to all voters.

But so far he seems to be floundering in an attempt to run a re-election campaign, where he must actually stand for something and defend a less than impressive record

He has a long list of legislative achievements -- in his first two years. He put a swift end to the most dangerous economic economic meltdown in nearly 80 years. The only constituency of 2008 that he lost was the financial sector who would have voted for the Islamic Brotherhood or the KKK if such would have saved their skins and, having had their needs met, now concern themselves with taxes on their income. Such people are small components of the electorate, and they are heavily concentrated in states that President Obama has no chance of losing.

He is consistent. He is not losing his core constituencies.