Hello
I use to think that it'll take at least one term to clean George Bush' mess, but now i suspect that the damage may just be irreversible. That it's beyond tangible things, that it's just too deep...
(More after the jump).
...So Barack Obama goes from minus 700,000 jobs a month to plus 162,000 a month in a year, effectively preventing a second great depression; He passes health care reform that will provide health insurance to tens of millions; A revolutionary student loans reform; Investing in the middle class more than any president since LBJ; Cut taxes to 95% of all Americans; Saving the financial system and bring the Dow from 6000 to 11000; Saving the entire Auto Industry; Passes a whole bunch of laws protecting ordinary citizens, including the Lilly Ledbetter Act and the Hate Crimes Bill; Investing in clean and renewable energy more than all the previous administrations combined; Ends the ban on Stem Cell Research; Stabilizing America's stance in the world and is about to sign arms control agreement with Russia - all this in 14 months and after receiving the country at the worst shape since FDR days.
And yet:
The new CBS poll have him at 44%. It's like the better the job he's doing, the lower his poll numbers goes.
I always suspected that Barack Obama's biggest problem is simply being decades ahead of the country he leads - But i never thought the gap was that big. He's a 21th century president trying to pull a country stuck in the 20th.
It's like the previous 8 years put this country is a Coma. People are just Brain Dead. So much stupidity, from top to bottom - Politicians, media, even educated people. Wingnuts are in total control of public opinion, journalists flat out lie, and people are not even trying to look for the truth or have their own opinion.
See that vid of Obama's discussion with workers in North Carolina today - A woman equipped with GOP talking points asked him about health care. He gave her an epic 15 minutes answer, explained everything point by point in a way that really have to convince any reasonable listener - And afterword she said that she didn't change her mind.
I guess George Bush really was the most fitting president for our time.
Anyway, here's President Obama's remarks and mini town-hall with workers of Celgard, an advanced battery technology manufacturer, in Charlotte, North Carolina. As always, it's highly informing.
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Here's a great NYT story - that actually brought me to tears - about a Community Health Center in Portland, Maine, that was built during the past year from the Recovery Act money. You really should read it all.
This president is actually saving lives, but hey, who cares.
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...Soon he was out on Park Avenue, where a line was forming outside a brick bandbox called the Portland Expo. The reason: President Obama was to speak there in the afternoon about new health care legislation that, among other things, will provide a huge increase in money — $11 billion — to community health centers like this one.
Across the country, more than 1,200 of these centers are providing treatment to low-income patients who would otherwise linger in expensive emergency rooms. The law is intended to reduce the burden on Medicaid and help the centers serve 20 million more people...
....A year ago, there was no Portland Community Health Center, though for years the city had been seeking federal money for a center that would provide care regardless of income or insurance. One that would reach the many new immigrants and refugees — from Rwanda, Iraq, Congo — who are finding their way to this southern Maine hub; save money; offer help.
Then, last year, the city received $1.3 million in stimulus money to open a community health center. It created a board, hired a staff, and found some vacant but tired space in a building on Park Avenue. On Nov. 2, the doors opened....
....The staff includes three nurse practitioners, a registered nurse, a social worker, two medical assistants, and a pediatrician and a doctor who come once a week. An eligibility specialist is also on hand to help clients navigate a health care universe nearly confusing enough to require hospitalization.
Patients without insurance pay on a sliding fee scale that is made possible by Medicaid reimbursement. For example, if they earn $10,830 or less a year, which is the usual case here, they pay $3 a visit.
So far, this community health center has seen 750 patients who, employees say, would otherwise have gone to the emergency room or gone without treatment. Half have no insurance. Many are Mainers, but just as many are recently arrived immigrants who often bear the mental scars of war. Interpreters are part of the everyday life here...
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Since we already established that this president is the enemy of the environment, it's not a surprise that this NYT Editorial could not find a place on the FP:
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The new automobile fuel economy standards formally adopted by the Obama administration on Thursday will yield a trifecta of benefits: reduced dependence on foreign oil, fewer greenhouse gas emissions, and consumer savings at the pump.
This was truly a moment to celebrate. But it was tempered by the fact that some in Congress are trying to undo the laws that made the new standards possible.
The standards will require automakers to build passenger cars, sport-utility vehicles and minivans that average 35.5 miles per gallon by 2016 — a 30 percent increase over today’s cars, and the biggest single jump in fuel economy since the original standards were adopted in the 1970s. Cars will cost more, but the government estimates that consumers will save an average of $3,000 in fuel over the life of a new vehicle.
The standards will also impose the first-ever limits on automobile greenhouse gas emissions, and are expected to reduce fleetwide emissions by 21 percent by 2030 compared with what the output would have been without the standards. Because emissions from passenger vehicles represent about one-fifth of America’s greenhouse gases, this is a step forward for the planet...
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Next Thursday, in Prague, the US and Russia will sign new START agreement
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Obama will leave Wednesday night and arrive in Prague on Thursday morning. Soon after landing, he’ll have a bilateral meeting with President Dmitry Medvedev of Russia, which will be followed by a ceremonial lunch among the United States, Russia and the Czech Republic.
The START deal will be signed in the afternoon, and Obama and Medvedev will give a press conference afterward.
On Thursday evening, Obama will have dinner with 11 leaders of countries in central and eastern Europe, as well as NATO allies.
On Friday morning, Obama will meet with the Czech Republic’s president, Václav Klaus, and prime minister, Jan Fischer, before returning home. He’ll land in Washington on Friday night.
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And few photos from this event in NC, all taken by Getty:
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