"[T]wo months after a president has taken office in the middle of a global financial and economic crisis, as he grapples with two unending wars and a battered constitution, the whole idea of a definitive judgment is loopy. It’s also likely to be wrong."
Obama's immensely exuberant fan struggles as his idol deflates. Steady now. Obama was always only a man...
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Ya think?
...Obama was always only a man
Actually, a it's a good lesson on right-sizing the guy for both sides.
A battered constitution? The only people battering ans shredding the constitution are the Democrat Party and their core leadership.
The Democrat Creed:
A government of the party, by the party, and for the party. People? We don't need no stinking people!
Oh, won't Andrew "Testosterone Cream" Sullivan just shut his pie hole? What a pathetic, grade-school apologia.
"...unending wars...battered constitution...." Stifle it, moron.
I thought Battered Constitution was another of those Cincinnati delicacies.
I always ate the constitution without batter.
"[T]wo months after a president has taken office in the middle of a global financial and economic crisis, as he grapples with two unending wars and a battered constitution, the whole idea of a definitive judgment is loopy. It’s also likely to be wrong."
Well, a definitive judgment on Obama's presidency will have to wait 4 years or more. But we can at least reach a definitive judgment that his transition was the most gobsmackingly incompetent in the entire postwar period. Makes Clinton's transition look like a masterpiece of Swiss clockwork.
For the record:
site:althouse.blogspot.com "Obama Stumbles" -- 22 hits after 2 months in office
site:althouse.blogspot.com "Bush Stumbles" -- 0 hits after 8 years in office
Just for the record:
is it
foundering
or
floundering?
Cuz I keep reading headliens that sem to use both words interchangeably.
Obama won the election by feeding the left cheese curls.
But the nation can't live on bromides like Yes We Can.
We need something more substantive than children's mantras, even if the left can apparently live on those longer than most.
Jim, according to the dictionary I have in front of me, Obama's floundering, and on his way to foundering.
Balfegor -
When you say : a definitive judgment on Obama's presidency will have to wait 4 years or more you are considerably more charitable than many of my fellow historians of the American variety, who were willing to declare W the Worst President Evah anytime someone emailed to ask.
Andrew Sullivan doesn't live in reality. He lives with a bunch of phrases and ideas.
Iraq isn't a war anymore. 4 KIA a month is not a war, nor is it unending since it's largely ended. It will be fully ended in a year or two. If he actually looked at what is happening instead of internalizing catch phrases, he'd see that.
Ditto for Obama. He doesn't have a record of results yet. If the economy recovers by next year, everyone will think he's great. If we have double digit inflation and high unemployment, then he'll be a hapless idiot. What matters is what happens in the world, not what he said on a talk show.
Two unending wars and a battered constitution.
This is why I give 0 credence to British tautology on American politics. Sullivan, piss off.
I honestly do not understand why Althouse bothers, but she does bother, and I bother with her and respect what she finds interesting so here goes. Yes, there is a case for feeling, observing actually, that Obama is floundering. Floundering. Ha ha ha. That's a funny word. The man is way over his head and he cannot delegate fast enough or fully enough. He's in it now and there's nothing left but to play president, while those stuck on stupid and resolutely mean-spirited and dark of soul, say 100% of the bleak creatures at FireDogLake, persist in heap blame on the previous administration.
Here's a test. If you think your explanation of the current crisis is complete without once mentioning CRI, FM/FM, Frank, Waters, Dodd, Mudd, Syron, Raines, Howard, Mozilo, Greenspan, then you're too stupid, too partisan, too resolutely blinkered -- or possibly all three -- to talk to. Or to read.
Althouse, I adore you, but can we please let Sullivan go melt quietly into the darkness?
Hey if he sends Boris and Natasha a note could they call it fan mail from a flounderer?
In Cincinnati, it's called a "beer battered constitution".
Andy's been floundering for a month or so, since he saw he made the list of the top 25 liberal blogs. That hit him hard considering he has the soul of a conservative.
I guess it has to be me who mentions that a flounder ends up with both eyes on one side of the head.
See?
The more you know . . .
Geez people, he's only had 2 months to try and fix the destruction from 20 years of Reagan/Bush/Bush.
Blogger Peter V. Bella said...
A battered constitution? The only people battering ans shredding the constitution are the Democrat Party and their core leadership.
Hey - don't forget McCain-Feingold!
Alex -
u forgot Clinton/Clinton
Alex -
"Geez people he's only had 2 months..".
You should defer these kinds of statements to Michael. That's his role here.
Geez people, he's only had 2 months to try and fix the destruction from 20 years of Reagan/Bush/Bush.
I'll take another 20 years of that kind of destruction, please.
I sure don't think we can take another year of Obama's "fixes."
O/T
On a personal note.
It has come to my attention that I was namejacked here-most likely by the usual suspect.
That person Michael/LuckyOldson used my handle to cast dispersions on Host with the Most and Joe.
That's just the two that I know of-
For some reason it bothers me-and I would like to apologize to those two commenters-
Host with the Most and Joe because there isn't a damn thing I have ever disagreed with when they comment.
They are bang on-commenters and there is no way in hell I'd start ad hominem with either of them.
Or really anyone else for that matter so if there are other commenters who feel that I have done that to them please consider that it was that poor soul Michael/Luckyoldson.
Thanks in advance.
Wasn't Flounder that guy in Animal House?
A battered constitution???
Who gets to lick the beaters?
Battered flounder.
Hey he might not be floundering but it seems if he gets anything right it's a fluke.
There's a porgies and bess joke in here somewhere but I don't have the time to look for it.
I'd say the President is a sole brother but Mort would call that racist.
I guess the 58 million people who voted for McCain were right.
Well, speaking as a reluctant McCain voter, I wouldn't go that far. Maybe "less wrong" is a better way to put it.
To cheer myself up this past November 5th, I kept reminding myself that while the bad news was that Obama won, the good news was that McCain lost.
Let's look on the bright side. He's not Clinton so at least we don't have to make any blowfish jokes.
Andrew "The Great Knee Pad Caper" Sullivan quips again about his little black love interests seeming confusion about all things political, financial, constitutional while seemingly trying to excuse it as bad novice luck. How sweet. Can we all just give him one big AWWWWW?
President Obama may be floundering but I’m going to keep on hoping for the best . . . just for the halibut.
Kroft sat on a chair, Obama sat on a perch.
Has Obama jumped the shark?
Probably not, since he doesn't water ski as well as... well you know the rest.
He sat on a perch? Ouch.
They're no sharks, but they do have spiky dorsal fins.
The whole thing smelts.
Barra cuda been better advised but herring is human, forgiveness divine.
Speaking of flounder, are they good in fish tacos?
Just asking?
Message to Ann Althouse and other Bush apologists...It took Bush and the Republicans eight years to completely mess up both our foreign and domestic affairs. For Christ sakes give President Obama at least a year to undo that damage! (BTW, did you see today that the street overwhelming approved of the plan that the Obama administration unveiled today?)
"L. E. Lee said...
Message to Ann Althouse and other Bush apologists...It took Bush and the Republicans eight years to completely mess up both our foreign and domestic affairs. For Christ sakes give President Obama at least a year to undo that damage!"
If that is true, why have his first acts been to piss of friends in Canada, Mexico and Britain, and to look foolish and weak to Russia. If you accept the argument that Bush's foreign policy was bust, then it appears Obama wants to do as much damage in 8 months as Bush did in 8 years.
Two things regarding Geihtner's plan:
1) Given that this was his 3rd plan (his first two having helped kill the markets in the first place) I'm not sure you can really count it as a success as he was pretty much attempting to undo his own actions.
2) Give it at least a week to see how the markets react. Need I remind you that we had a 900 point rally last fall.
Dear Holdfast,
Take a deep breath and calm down. President Obama is hugely popular in Canda, Mexico and Great Britan. You have to realize that only for the most rabid of right wingers would the idea rise that an alliance would be broken because the British PM was given DVDs that were the wrong format. No one else takes you seriously when you rant over small things.
Hey, the stimulus funds are now being poured into the economy, billions of stimulus dollars are being spent by state and local governments to pay people to do jobs in their communities that needed to be done, and this week workers are going to start getting stimulus dollars in their paychecks.
And don't look now but:
Walgreens today became just the latest American company to announce that profits are exceeding expectations.
February retail sales picked up at the end of the month and were not as bad as expected.
After federal aid went to the banks and the stimulus bill passed mortgage applications increased and now we find that new housing starts jumped 22% in February. March may be even better.
Although prices have dropped by 15% since last year, we find out today that existing home sales have suddenly spiked upward 5%.
New jobless claims, after accelerating downward for months, have now stabilized over the past month at about 650,000. Still bad, but no longer getting worse.
Ford, the only U.S. automaker which did not receive bailout funds, announced this morning that it will even buy back some of its own debt.
There is still plenty of bad news out there, but my question is this:
Having invested so heavily in the failure of the Obama stimulus plan, what will the Obama-haters do if it works?
Seeing "Andrew Sullivan" and "flounder" in the same sentence is kind of . . . . disturbing.
That's the thing. It might work, or the US economy might recover on its own despite any screw ups by the government. We don't live in a totalitarian state. Most of what happens has nothing to do with the government. I think the economy will recover no matter what the government does. It's just a matter of how long it takes.
There's school of thought that CEOs are just the playthings of fate. If things go well, they look great. If things go badly, they are goats. Much of the time, like right now, they have little control of what happens. If consumer demand for cars collapses, how is that the fault of CEOs? Car sales dropping by 50% or more in one year has nothing to do with decisions made in the board room.
Presidents, while more powerful, have the same problem. Sometimes fate gives you a bad hand. Sometimes you get a hand so good you can't lose. I'd argue that Bill Clinton inherited an era of peace and prosperity, and had the sense not to screw it up.
I'm sort of expecting the natural rebound of the economy to be squelched by the stimulus, the carbon tax, etc.
Should be interesting.
Since the economy is recovering does that mean Obama is going to ask Congress to repeal the long term spending aspects of the stimulus package? (That would actually be a brilliant political move, so the answer is no.)
Obama is stunned by the power he has to spend trillions of borrowed dollars and no good excuses to suck up the dough fast enough.The Dot Com bubble, and then the Housing bubble, and now the Socialized medicine bubble, to be followed by the Cap and Trade bubble. He better figure out where he wants to go next.
Unfortunately for the Obama apologists, the Chinese have figured out that Obama is a candy ass, and have picked just the right time to propose that the world dump the dollar as the world's reserve currency.
Once they figured out that Obama wanted to borrow the Chinese taxpayer's hard-earned yuan to pay for his spending programs, they decided to roll out the big "fuck you".
Prosperity begins at home, I guess.
LE Lee,
Bush did not legislate the bills that caused the domestic economic crisis. That was done during the first Clinton Administration under a Democrat legislature that beieved that everyone had the right to own a home, even if they did not qualify for a mortgage.
Like most economic policies, good or bad, it took years before the effects were felt. Put the blame where it belongs. On the Democrat Party; the same party that is going to destroy all incentive to prosperity, self determination, self reliance, individual responsibility, and individual initiative.
We are a country of individuals, not some primitive village.
If it were not for the fact that the commentariat is virtually in the bag for Obama I would expect a cover story somewhere on "Obama's Failed Presidency."
there is also a case for feeling that Althouse has not yet realized her biggest mistake by voting The Won...
or, at least cannot admit it ... yet :)
let's hear you, Ann
3...2...1 gong
" L. E. Lee said...
Message to Ann Althouse and other Bush apologists...It took Bush and the Republicans eight years to completely mess up both our foreign and domestic affairs. For Christ sakes give President Obama at least a year to undo that damage! (BTW, did you see today that the street overwhelming approved of the plan that the Obama administration unveiled today?)"
Dude your entitled to your opinions but not your fake contrived facts. Try a little course in civics before you rant off with stupid nonsense.
The only good thing the Obumer and the new communist party will have resulted in creating four years from now is a republican congress with real republicans running the show and a real republican president. The dismemberment of the parasite will then begin.
Trooper York said.." there's a porgy and bess joke in here somewhere..."
only if you knew about catfish row and Jake which I assume you don't.
Is anyone supposed to care wha leel Andy sez? Or does? Geez louise ... what a drama king (snarf).
If Obie doesn't put on the big kid pants, then yeah ... we are fooked. And it won't take a year.
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