Archive for the “Barack Obama” Category
Jan
07
2009
Nov
18
2008
Cancel Those OrdersPosted by terrance in Barack Obama, bush, current events, politics, religionAn Australian blogger has laid out an ambitious first-term agenda for the Obama administration.
Well, yeah. I’d go along with all of the above. However, beyond using the bully pulpit of the presidency to oppose discrimination and support equality, there’s little the president can do on any of the above until or unless Congress sends passes a hate crimes bill, ENDA, a repeal of DOMA. That doesn’t mean there can’t be some changes made right away, tho’. It’s been a week, and — well, I’m more convinced than ever that, no, we didn’t. Tags: current events, politics
Nov
07
2008
Wanna Work for Obama?Posted by terrance in Barack Obama, current events, gay rights, politicsWe’re going to have a new president, and one who’s light years more gay friendly than Dubya. OK. It doesn’t take much to be more gay-friendly than Dubya, but that’s beside the point. The point is, we’re going to have a friend in the White House. Wanna Work for him? The The Gay & Lesbian Leadership Institute is looking for people who do.
I thought about it, but I’m pretty sure working in the White House or for the administration is rather all-consuming. Especially given the mess that the current administration is leaving behind. (Like drunken frat boys who figured their gonna lose the security deposit anyway and said “Fuck it. Let throw one last kegger!”) That mess will take at least one term to clean up, and I expect Obama will be a two term president. I’d like to see a bit more of my kids before their in high school and going off to college. So, I’ll take a pass. But if you apply, and get a job, all I ask is that you get m a tour of the White House, and a couple of minutes to meet the President and/or First Lady.
So, Obama and Bush are scheduled to meet.
I would love to be a fly on the wall for that meeting. Bush is notoriously insecure around people who may be smarter than him — like the reporter who asked the French president a question in French (instead of “talkin’ American”, I guess), or the Irish reporter who dared probe beyond his trite homilies about “freedom” and “values”, but actually holding him accountable for a few things. This is a man who literally can not think of a single mistake he’s made, and doesn’t own anybody an explanation. I can only imagine how he’ll handle meeting Obama, who is as popular as Bush is unpopular, and then some. In 2004, Bush won 286 electoral votes, 50.7% of the popular vote, and carried 31 states. In 2000, he won 271 electoral votes, 47.9% of the popular vote, and carried 30 states. By Contrast, Obama won 364 electoral votes, 52.5% of the popular vote (in an election that saw record turnout, and possibly the highest rate in 100 years), and carried 28 states, but — notably — won several states that Bush carried in 2004, and was competitive in states that should have been Republican strongholds. Not only that, but Obama won an election that was largely a referendum on Bush, the Republican party, and their leadership. I wonder if Bush heard, in the White House, the cheers and honking horns as the city celebrated the impending end of his administration. For that matter I wonder if he’s gotten wind of the jubilant reactions all over the world. If he did, it would be easy to think that he wouldn’t care about it, but the anxiety just beneath the surface of his aloof exterior, if psychiatrist Justin Frank is right, wouldn’t be able to ignore it.
That his policies or political philosophy are being blamed for the current financial crisis, his war in Iraq about as unpopular as he is, and his foreign policy aims unachieved has got to get under his skin, given his fear of being wrong. (There’s that anxiety thing again.)
Then there’s Obama himself; a man not from the kind of privileged background that Bush enjoyed, who nonetheless attended Harvard Law School (his father also went to Harvard), and went on to become president of the Harvard Law review. And he’s more beloved than Bush was even at the height of his popularity, mainly because the country and the world is counting on him to lead the way out of the disasters of Bush’s rule. Though a young man, Obama’s success story probably reminds Bush of his failure to live up to Poppy Bush’s legend. Justin A. Frank, M.D.: … I think what he does is he turns everybody who disagrees with him into his father. It doesn’t matter whether it’s actually the concrete representation of his father, like Baker, or the voters who vote against staying in Iraq. We have become his father. We are the people he is now defying. He will turn everybody, any authority, anybody who disagrees with him, into a father figure who he’d have to defy. BuzzFlash: And why? What’s his basic psychological beef with his father? Justin A. Frank, M.D.: It would be nice to be able to reduce it to one thing. But there is one thing that is very clear, which is that his father was, as Bush was growing up, a superhero. He was an all-American baseball star. George W. Bush was “a jockstrap carrier,” or a cheerleader. His father was a war hero, and George W. Bush was a coward who avoided everything that involved responsibility. His father was a family man devoted to his family, and George W. Bush was a hard-drinking kid who was afraid of being responsible. His father was all the things that Bush was not. He was a big, powerful man in Bush’s eyes — that’s the first thing. When Bush arrived at Andover, for instance, the prep school that he went to, his father’s pictures were all over the wall as having been a hero there twenty-five years earlier. The pictures are still up. So it was very hard to live up to him. The best way to deal with that is to either carve your own path, or to constantly undermine your father. One of the things that he did was, though, he became very loyal to his father, and in 1988, helped manage his campaign for President against Dukakis. Plus he bested McCain and the Republicans at Bush’s bailout meeting. Of course, chances are that Bush will behave himself. And even if he doesn’t Obama, with his legendary cool demeanor, will no doubt handle it well. Still, I’d love to be a fly on the wall for that one.
Nov
07
2008
Never Failing, Always FailedPosted by terrance in Barack Obama, current events, elections, iraq, politics, race, war on terrorSometimes the most pointed — or preposterous — comes from unexpected sources. This time, it’s The Onion providing the former and the Wall Street Journal serving up the latter. The best satire comes wrapped around a grain of discomforting truth. Daniel De Groot unwrapped one in a headline from The Onion that should give Democrats something to think about. Read his post for more on that. The jaw-dropper, though, comes from the Wall Street Journal, (hat-tip to Steve Benen at Political Animal) where they’ve apparently learned well (or not so well) something Rick pointed out earler: Conservatism never fails; it is only failed. It’s been a long, long time coming Sam Cooke, “A Change is Gonna Come” At 11:01 p.m. last night, after the polls closed in California, I just had to call someone. I’d spent the night at the National Public Radio headquarters with a bunch of other bloggers, live-blogging the election results. I called home and spoke briefly to my husband, then found myself walking aimlessly down a hallway. I stopped in a reception area, looked at the night sky from the second story window, and though how strange it was that the world — my world had changed so dramatically — yet the sky looked just the same. And I thought about the people who didn’t live to see what happened that night, and the people who never thought they would — but did.
Nov
05
2008
ChangePosted by terrance in Barack Obama, current events, economics, music, politics, religion, video
Nov
05
2008
History, AgainPosted by terrance in Barack Obama, current events, elections, politics, race
Nov
04
2008
Off Blog the Election at NPRPosted by terrance in Barack Obama, current events, elections, politicsAnd so the night begins. I’m off to NPR, where I’ll be joining a bunch of other political bloggers to cover the election results into the night. With any luck it won’t be a long night. The popular vote graphic on their site is encouraging. I’ll put it this way. If Virgina, Florida and Pennsylvania report for Obama before the Metro stops running, I’m going home. Same if Ohio, Florida, and Virginia report for Obama; or if Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida report for Obama; or some combination of the three. In the meantime, we wait. I and write two different posts for tomorrow, and wait to see which one I publish. OK. Not that we didn’t already know this, but they have none.
And then there’s the question of class… Tags: current events, elections, politics
Nov
04
2008
Liveblogging Election 2008Posted by terrance in Barack Obama, current events, economics, npr bloggers, politics
Nov
04
2008
Meeting ObamaPosted by terrance in Barack Obama, current events, elections, politics, raceI just dare you to watch this and not feel something. He didn’t say it in so many words, but I’m willing to bet that Charles Alexander has thought to himself at some point, “I never thought I’d live to see the day…” To understand the reason for his emotions about this election, you have to understand the context. Tags: current events, elections, politics |













