The craven capitulator was at it again last night. Obama gave up once more without a fight. Who cares about Boehner and the Republicans. Everyone knows that all Obama has to do is raise his voice and stomp his feet and they'll give him everything he wants, probably more, especially if he makes a stern face. But oh no, he caves before the fight even starts.
But this is not new. He has been at it for over two years.
He didn't close Guantanamo like he promised. It doesn't matter that Congress prohibited him from using funds too close it, he just gave up.
He waited two years to end DADT. What a weak kneed tool. It doesn't matter that he had to deal with the Great Recession and getting health care passed, that's no excuse for not doing it on day one.
Speaking of health care, what a weenie. There's no single payer and not even a public option. Who cares that the ACA without those things passed with no votes to spare and unanimous Republican objection. He just didn't try.
He didn't let all the Bush tax cuts expire. What a wimp. Who cares that as a result he was able to get DADT repeal, START II passed, and unemployment insurance extended. He's a softie. Yeah sure he thought a two year extension was better than what could happen when the Republicans took over the House. Baloney. What would make him think that? And I don't even want to hear about raising taxes in the middle of a recession. No one thinks that's a bad idea.
And now he averts a government shutdown. Why? If the baggers don't care about shutting down the government why should we. We should have waited a few days or weeks or even months and watch them squirm. And the deal he accepted, crimeny. No one has published all the details yet, but you can be sure he gave away the store. Why you ask? Because that's what he does. You can tell he doesn't negotiate because this fight has only been going on since last September and we've only had six temporary Continuing Resolutions. It's obvious he caved early.
Oh sure. Now you're going to tell me about his so called acheivements. Yes, there are even web sites that list hundreds of them. Who cares. Any President would have done those things, even McCain. Yes, yes, Rachel Maddow even made what she thought was a pretty impressive list,
"Even before today's historic Wall Street reform agreement, President Obama, of course, did what politicians have been trying to do for more than 60 years. He passed health reform, which, for the first time, establishes government responsibility for the health care of American citizens. Consider also the stimulus bill. It didn't just throw a lasso around our entire economy and yank and yank it back from the brink, it also pumped about $100 billion into the crumbling embarrassment of our national infrastructure and transportation system. It was the largest investment in infrastructure since Ike. For solving our country's energy problems, something Obama has compared to man walking on the moon, it contained about $60 billion in spending and tax incentives for renewable and clean energy, also a historic investment. It also included an unheralded but giant investment in science and tech, amping up the budgets at NASA, the National Science Foundation, and an experimental energy research agency that was created under President George W. Bush, but never funded until now.
"President Obama also expanded state kids' health insurance to cover another four million kids. He signed the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act amending the 1964 civil rights act for equal pay for equal work. He signed a nuclear arms deal with Russia that would reduce both countries' arsenals by a third. He created a new global nonproliferation initiative to keep nuclear materials out of the hands of terrorists. He set forth an international way forward on that radical left-wing proposition of Ronald Reagan, a world without nuclear weapons.
"Then there are the legislative and policy achievements that don't just build on previously-set precedents, but set new ones. The Hate Crimes Prevention Act, also known as the Matthew Shepard Act. It had languished in Congress for years. The Food and Drug Administration permitted for the first time to regulate tobacco. Better late than never, he dismantled the scandal-plagued Minerals Management Service, broke it into three parts so that the folks who collect money from oil leases aren't the same ones regulating the industry. And now, it will actually investigate the industry that it was busy schtupping and doing drugs with during the last administration. Obama fired two wartime commanding generals in little over a year.
"He overhauled the astonishing stupidity of the student loan system in which banks were being subsidized to give loans that were guaranteed by the government anyway, a license to print money. That was ended in the savings put toward actual aid to students. He canceled a weapons program that was bloated, unnecessary and totally irrelevant to either of our current wars, the F-22. Why even mention the cancellation of a single weapons system? Because that never happens. Weapons systems never get canceled. The F-22 did, which is itself a miracle."
"In each of these achievements and in the list of things he has yet to do -- Don't Ask, Don't Tell, closing Guantanamo -- in each of these things, there is room for liberal disappointment. I sing a bittersweet lullaby to the lost public option when I go to sleep at night.
"But presidential legacies are complex. Not even the Reagan administration's legacy is pure as the conservative-driven snow. But Taegan Goddard at CQ Politics was right today about nothing this big happening since FDR. The list of legislative accomplishments of this president in half a term even before energy reform which he's probably going to get to is, to quote the vice president, 'a big freaking deal.' Love this administration or hate it, this president is getting a lot done. The last time any president did this much in office, booze was illegal. If you believe in policy, if you believe in government that addresses problems, cheers to that."
Who cares? No, he's a craven, caving, wimpy, weasel and that's all there is to it. Next time I'm voting for LaRouche.