


Brigadoon politics

Why Barack Obama struggles to mobilise the majority that won him the White House

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Readers' comments


A. Andros

You picked the wrong musical. Try "Carousel." That Rogers and Hammerstein classic is the better metaphor for the Obama presidency -- actors rode merry-go-round horses that gave the illusion of movement without actually going anywhere.

An Obama presidency never made sense except for a general enthusiasm to elect an unthreatening black man. (Bill Cosby wasn't interested so Obama got the nod.) Mr. Obama fills the description that Walter Lippmann tried to pin on FDR in 1932: "A nice man who, without any particular qualifications, would very much like to be president."

Obama was always Mr. Nobody from Nowhere. He is our colored Gatsby. His past is a mystery and his present prominence is unaccountable. Four years in the Senate qualifies one for -- well, for Years Five and Six in the Senate. He is pure fiction -- and he is not only the fiction, he is its narrator. His "Nobel Prize" is every bit as fictitious as being made a Kentucky Colonel. It is all just part of the act.

His presidency has lacked center because Mr. Obama lacks one too. He was never elected president because of what he promised to do but because of how he made Americans feel about themselves. And, how he made them feel was, in a word, "good." Americans who today trip over themselves to cheer homosexuality once tripped over themselves to prove their liberal bona fides by electing a "minority." Obama, in short, was the gay marriage issue of 2008. It is hardly his fault that the rest of us have moved on.

The real surprise is that he hasn't done such a bad job of being president. He is dignified and articulate. He has mastered the finger-jab. His foreign policy has been irenic and constructive. After much grunting and groaning, he deserves credit for giving America a start on a national healthcare program. Not a really good start but, nonetheless, a far better start than any of his predecessors. He seems to be backing into a de facto amnesty for illegal aliens and that is about the only practical policy. We Americans could have done worse. In fact, in 2000 and 2004 we DID do worse.

So, the glass is really half-full. We elected a symbol of our own "tolerance" in 2008. The election wasn't about him -- it was about us. The real surprise has been that the symbol actually has substance. Mr. Obama's musical is almost ready for the big time.

A. Andros in reply to grinnell

It wasn't "repellant" to 46% of the American people. You are confusing your own quirks with the electorate.

Mr. Obama's polls now show that HIS approval rating is below 50% -- are we thus entitled to call him "repellant?"

Politics is politics. Don't confuse it with religion (a common failing on the Left.)

Damn Dirty Ape in reply to A. Andros

Racist garbage. "Colored," really? what are you, stuck in 1960? His past is not at all mysterious, this is birther drivel.
The structure of the Federal government requires majorities in both houses or political opponents who are willing to compromise. Neither condition holds. It is simplistic to think that someone with a better personality or lighter skin color could change those fundamentals.

A. Andros in reply to Damn Dirty Ape

The leading Civil Rights organization in the USA is the National Association for the Advancement of COLORED People." If you wish to be politically correct, though, you refer to "People of COLOR." Now . . . "people of color" is grammatically identical to "colored people." It all depends on where one puts the adjective.

Your post is useful for reinforcing my point. The ever-so-eager and ever-so-earnest biens-pensants don't care much about the substance of an argument so long as it is made in politically correct language.

Do YOU ever talk of "white people?" Well . . . why not talk about "colored people?" Or, perhaps, you may wish to speak about "People of white" since that seems more politically correct.

Racist garbage? Have you seen the vote totals among the black population for Obama? Or, are you so trusting that you believe no white person would vote against Obama because he is black and no African-American would vote FOR him for the same reason?
Is race no longer present as a factor in American politics? How wonderful to learn!

Could someone with "a better personality" change things? Simplistic? It worked magnificently well for FDR, a man with a charismatic personality and a personality given to experimentation and daring. Otherwise -- we would have stuck with Hoover, right?

In short, your knee just jerked. Like a hen on a June bug, you pounced on the niceties of political correctness rather than consider the facts.

I am quite willing to be stuck in 1960 if the alternative is to have to bleat with your sheep n the present.


McGenius in reply to Damn Dirty Ape

When you can have factual errors in your autobiography and have characters in it as composites of people in your life, your life is mysterious. When you cannot get your own experiences straight, don't expect others to decipher your life.

Regarding dealing with a divided Congress, can you note any experience that he has had where he can constructively work with others who don't think like him? Considering his limited experience at much of anything, it is not possible. So no, it is not simplistic to think that someone else could not do a better job dealing with a diverse congress.

So, other than political correctness, explain why the word "colored" is any less racist than "Black" or "African American". For a man who is just as much White as he is Black, and who has ancestry as much from Europe as he has from Africa, how do the politically correct prefer him to be labeled? Glad you found a way to dismiss the rest of Andros' post.

mtnhiker in reply to A. Andros

"The real surprise is that he hasn't done such a bad job of being president"

I guess if you call attempting to make the American sontitution irrelevent a good thing - Then Obama has doon a good job.

I guess if you want to Hurt America's image and less America's influence in the world - then Obama has done a good job

I guess if you want to change the rules of engagement so our soldiers and our diplomats and in greater peril - then you could say that obama has done a good job.

I gues if you want a lot of Mexican citizens ant the Occasional American Citizen to die at the hands of guns that were bought in America through a government run program - then you could say that obama has done a good job

The list goes on and on and on and on.

grinnell in reply to A. Andros

You forget that a party only has to be repellent to enough people to push them into minority of the electoral college -- and that apparently has happened in at least four if not five of the past 6 elections for the GOP.

A. Andros in reply to mtnhiker

Ah . . . but, I believe he has helped "America's image." He did not attack a country on the other side of the world because of trumped up charges of weapons of mass destruction.

America's influence in the world? Fine words that butter no parsnips. I don't wish America to be influential - I want it to leave others alone and to be left alone.

Mexican citizens and guns? Now . . . don't we Yanks have plenty of our own guns without having to import them from Mexico?

Is Obama a great president? I doubt it. But, is he a disaster? I don't believe that for a moment. I would give him a strong "C" or, perhaps, even a B-.

And, I try to avoid grade inflation.


A. Andros in reply to grinnell

How quickly we forget. The GOP won five out of six presidential election between 1968 and 1988 and seven out of ten between 1968 and 2008. Those darn repellant Democrats -- will they ever learn?

A. Andros in reply to David_H87

"Politics is religion."

Yes . . . that is the faith of the Stalins, Pol Pots and Hitlers of this world. They, too, reduced all human relationships to politics. Which is to say, they reduced all human relationships to degrees of power.

I reserve part of my personality -- a large part of it -- for those things that are NOT politics. Faith is one of those things. Being a father, a husband and a friend are others. At other times I am someone who gets lost in Chopin, Beckett and William Faulkner. At still other times, I am simply someone who is hopeful that this particular bass lure will succeed where others failed or that a squeeze play at second will get my team out of trouble.

If you are one of those to whom everything is politics, then peace be with you. I cannot imagine living that way.

grinnell in reply to A. Andros

You just made my point for me. Yes, after the Democrats become too extremely left-wing they actually (at least some of them) realized that and they moved back towards the center with Bill Clinton. The Republicans have apparently not yet realized (at least apparently not enough outside Chris Christie) that they are too far to the right.

thepragmatist2 in reply to A. Andros

I don't always agree with you but I must say I always enjoy reading your posts. You are grounded, pragmatic, and articulate and always communicate your ideas very effectively. Kudos to you sir...

ashbird in reply to Damn Dirty Ape

He likes racist garbage and puts on a veneer of not being one.
When you get him mad, he'll launch bizarre personal attacks such as you write "insipid prose" and you have "a low IQ. How sad!"
When you tell him to stop replying to your posts because you have no interest in debating an end-stage bully and bigot, he'll say "you are just pulling a stunt; you will always 'crawl back'." A more vile personality I have not encountered. And he thinks he can applies his vileness to you because you are "colored".


—“Don’t ye ken, There’s a fair, Down on MacConnachy Square?”— is dodgy in what sense of the word? I don't get it, somebody please help a Yank out.


He's struggling because it WASN'T a majority. If a few hundred thousand whites in Ohio had voted differently, Romney would be president. Obama must realize that he won a coin toss, not a broad political mandate.

Raza Libre in reply to grinnell

I think it is a bit of a mistake to call Americans "fiscally conservative" though. Sure, when polled we SAY that we are fiscally conservative...but if you look at what people actually believe it is far from that. Most Americans want lower taxes and more government spending (Reaganism, basically)--but that is far from conservative.

Even the most "conservative" electoral block, the Tea Party, is not actually fiscally conservative. The Tea Party demand lower government spending allright--but not THEIR government spending. They want to cut deficits by lowering Taxes and without cutting Social Security-- while simultaneously spending more on national defense (aka, not fixing the biggest drivers of the deficit). That is more an uninformed hallucination than a cohesive set of "conservative" fiscal policies.


Obama is a good campaigner, not necessarily a good governor. In fact, he had zero governing experience before arriving at the White House.

Most Americans are for background checks? Sure, but that is very different than being for a BAD background check bill.

Most Americans are for immigration reform, but that means very different things to different people.

Most Americans are for health care reform, does it mean they have to like Obamacare? Of course not.

Obama's inability to govern effectively was exposed during the sequester. What the heck, he is the president and has a lot of authority and a lot of money at his disposal. How is he not able to wisely use the vast amount of resource still available to him after the sequester? If you just need somebody to raise taxes, I can do that just as well.

hmy_ in reply to Tontonco

But is it truly his fault, or do the Republicans deserve the blame for using such slimy tactics?

Never before has the US Congress used the filibuster as many times as today, and from 2010 to 2012, Congress employed it more than every other session in history combined.

It seems to me that the GOP has silently changed the rules of governance from their historical norms, and combined with the internet, 24/7 talk radio, and Fox News, they have found themselves holding the president in complete contempt.

So the minority party no longer has to respect the fundamental rule of democracy that majority votes should win, and they hate the sitting president to the point that numerous Republican lawmakers routinely call him a Communist, Socialist, Nazi, Muslim, criminal, anti-Christ, etc. Of course nothing is going to get done, at least until the GOP is marginalized to the point that they can no longer even filibuster.

It seems that this will be the case by 2020, if not 2016, assuming they continue on.

grinnell in reply to Tontonco

Why was the background check bill bad?

What do you mean by immigration reform being different things to different people? What's your point?

Not sure what your point is about Obamacare either.

Believe it or not, congress spends the money, at least last time I checked.

Tontonco in reply to hmy_

You have wrong expectations on how our government should function.

The US is not a democracy, but a republic. There is no fundamental rule that the majority should win. Passing laws is supposed to be difficult. The rule of majority can easily become another form of tyranny, which the founding fathers tried to keep in check.

Republicans have the majority in congress, and they have the majority of the states as well, although this is not directly reflected in the Senate.

May be you could argue that Republicans are blocking good legislation that they would normally approve but are not approving to damage Obama. But I haven't seen any clear evidence for that. A lot of people in this country dislike Obamacare, what is Obama doing about that? (Only 34% of the population likes Obamacare, what happens to the majority rule here, reading polls, etc?)

New Conservative in reply to Tontonco


The funny thing is that you brought up the clear example in your own sentence saying you couldn't find any examples.

Obamacare was created by the Heritage Foundation in the early 90's and then became Romneycare in Massachussetts. If a Republican president had proposed it, (as a Republican governor did) it would have sailed through no problem.

However, it blocked because it would damage Obama.

francisbjohn in reply to grinnell

The background check bill would have been impossible to enforce it would have required a check on ALL transactions including private ones. That is simply impossible to enforce and it wouldn't have made a dent in gun crime anyway, charging a criminal with "obtaining a firearm without a background check" is pointless if they've already carried out a massacre! On the other hand a zealous prosecutor could use it go after otherwise law-abiding citizens simply for messing up some pointless bureaucratic procedure. I suspect that's all the bill was intended to do ie; make gun ownership more of a hassle thus slowly reducing the number of Americans willing to own a gun.

grinnell in reply to francisbjohn

I may be wrong but I do not believe that the intention of the bill was simply to make gun ownership for the average person more of a hassle thus reducing the number of American willing to own a gun. After nearly 30 little kids and innocent adults are massacred in a school I believe some people want to do something. In my opinion, there are already so many guns floating around that getting a handle on them is next to impossible. And I actually own some of them.

francisbjohn in reply to grinnell

You are wrong, its simple: the faction of Democrats that is against private gun ownership is too cowardly to ever come out and admit it. They don't want to give their political opponents a clear target, so they're strategy is to just chip away at gun rights by making it more of a hassle to be a gun owner, thus slowly reducing the number of gun owners until it represents a minority small enough for them to just flatly strip of their rights. It won't ever work, but it is causing alot of headache and irritating alot of people in its attempt.

teacup775 in reply to francisbjohn

If the dems have been chipping away at gun rights leading to a drop in guns, their strategy is an abject failure. How many guns exist in the states? Enough for 300 per capita or some other incredible number.

francisbjohn in reply to teacup775

300 per capita would be 90 billion, your number is wrong.

I did say in my reply to grinnell that their strategy was a failure, and likely always would be. Now it is true that the number of gun owners as a percentage of the total population has declined somewhat, hard to say what the cause of that is, its probably just as likely due to the declining crime rate over the last 30 years as anything political.

You may find it interesting to know that I once thought as you do about guns. I changed my mind after actually seeing the so called "gun culture" up close. I encourage you to do the same, just find someone you trust who owns a gun and ask them to teach you, even if you don't hunt target shooting is still loads of fun. :)

grinnell in reply to francisbjohn

Francis -- I don't doubt that there is a faction of Democrats (or people in general) who are against private gun ownership or that they might be cowardly. I don't know if the intention of this particular bill was to chip away at gun ownership rights. What I do know is that I have a sibling who is mentally ill and he can buy guns on the internet and have them delivered to him at home. Liquor stores in my town close at 8 PM Monday through Thursday but I can stop by my local sporting goods store and purchase a gun at 9 PM. In my opinion the latter is more suspect. The GOP wants a waiting period to get an abortion but no restrictions whatsoever on guns? I have hunted and trapped since I was a kid but the ease with which one can get a gun is rather scary.

francisbjohn in reply to grinnell

Clearly you have never tried to buy a gun, there is alot of paperwork a waiting period and a background check. There are already plenty of restrictions and believe it or not the GOP and me personally are not against ALL restrictions as you say. What I'm against are stupid restrictions that can't work, remember; every law limits our freedom in some way, so if we get no increase in safety from a law then why make it? Take the expanded background check provisions, how could that possibly be enforced on private party sales?

grinnell in reply to francisbjohn

Really? I have gun cabinet full of them I have had since I was a kid or confiscated from my brother that he has bought online. As far as waiting periods, I could walk into a store and buy a shotgun in all of about 10 minutes. Handguns or some other weapons, yes, there are more restrictions. I agree that some are stupid restrictions. As I stated in a previous post, there are so many guns around that I don't even know if any law whatsoever would have any effect at all. I sold a handgun to a friend last year that my brother had bought online. Obviously no background check and as far as I know the gun was never registered to my brother in the first place since he bought it online.

francisbjohn in reply to grinnell

"I have gun cabinet full of them..."
I have no reason to take what you say at face value, so don't bother trying to prove it, I don't.

"I could walk into a store and buy a shotgun in all of about 10 minutes."
A shotgun is not as dangerous as other weapons and furthermore is one of the types of weapons that people on the left say they DON'T want to ban, so what is that statement suppose to prove?

Well don't you think you should know before you unnecessarily limit peoples freedom? Making a law doesn't fix anything if its a bad law that can't be enforced. These laws add up, a more complex legal system is not a fairer system.

How in your mind do you think this could reasonably be stopped in any set of circumstances? The only way I can see to mandate universal background checks is through registering all guns and then punishing anyone who came to possess one without a background checks. Problem is that criminals could still get them and any punishment would inevitably be after a crime is committed. If we can only effectively enforce this law AFTER a crime then it could not have prevented tragedies like Newtown...


Did Lexington even consider that perhaps millions of voters re-elected Obama because it promised to bring 4 more years of ineffectual leadership, and gridlock in congress? Every time those clowns actually start working and passing laws they give the shaft to ~80% of the population. Hell, our country would be in much better shape if these chuckleheads in Washington never got a damn thing done for the next hundred years.

Curate's Egg in reply to David_H87

Where do you get this ludicrous idea that organized anarchy is more effective than effective governance? Where's your support for that?

People like you are the hipsters of political discourse: politics is too mainstream, so I will hate them all. Not really an adult response to the state of things, is it?

Curate's Egg

A simple truth: a disunited majority is weaker than a united minority. And the Republicans are very, very united - they just re-elected Mark Sanford, for God's sake.


Perhaps the Obama team can come up with yet another video, (it was the video that caused the uprisings in the Middle East prior to Sept 11, 2012 which resulted in the Benghazi disaster---YEAH RIGHT!!!), and convince more Americans to become proud of their country for the first time in their lives, a la Michelle, when she uttered her remarkedly stupid words re her husband's ascendancy to the presidency...I'm sure the Dem's friends in Hollywood can create a production glorifying the Obama years, and charge the costs against the American taxpayer under some yet still unread portion of the voluminous Affordable Care Act/Obamacare debacle...

Alias_ in reply to grinnell

Nah, I don't think, so...I majored in Journalism, so I believe my posting is up to far as your politics, well, you and Pelosi, and all the rest of your ilk can go spend someone else's money, and run up our debt a few more trillion, and then join Mr Obama, Jay Carney, Susan Rice, and Hilary that all went well in Benghazi...

grinnell in reply to Alias_

And we wondered why newspapers are going belly up left and right -- journalists like you who make little sense and use ellipses wantonly. I majored in computer science and engineering and not only can I solve problems and have a job, I can write better than you.

Alias_ in reply to grinnell

Let me put it succinctly, you farsical buffoon...You're a joke, as are your comments and your politics...I will not waste any more of my time with you, nor your infantile and dishonest posts...

grinnell in reply to Alias_

See, you really should have studied some technical field. Perhaps you would have learned how to think rather than call people names. To be honest, I thought that in journalism school they taught how to formulate arguments backed by evidence of some sort. Perhaps you slept through that part?


Obama has made the mistake of believing in himself, an older more cynical politican would have been more effective.

MrRFox in reply to Tom_23

Yes, a guy who knows how to take a punch and land one too - Obama's never been in such a fight in his life, yet he thought (past tense) he could play 'pro-level' against guys who have - like Putin abroad, and the Reps at home.

He doesn't actually seem to have an agenda at all - he goes where the political winds and Putin take him, passive and reluctant in a timid way. Clinton was the same - they both want to 'be' President, and not particularly do anything else but enjoy the adulation and the ride. Fun's over now for the little guy -

Putin had to be careful not to rough him up so much that he was defeated, like Carter, at re-election time. That's past now - Putin can do with him whatever he pleases. This should be fun, in a sad-sadistic way, to see.


Brigadoon? . . . yecch, gag me with a sporran. I'll take Sir Harry Lauder, if you please.


"Brigadoon politics" is The Economist's analytical and presentation skills at their very best; well done.


Brigadoon in 1747: King George II.

Brigadoon in 1847: Queen Victoria

Brigadoon in 1947: King George VI and President Truman (but Queen Elizabeth II and President Eisenhower in 1954—in the film!)


The problem is not with the fickleness of an uncaring electorate, it is with the structure of Republic. Parliamentary democracy is far more effective at governing when the lead party is in majority as opposition to its agenda cannot prevent enactment. That legislative record is then taken to the electorate every 4 or 5 years and it is either thumbs up or thumbs down. Now I realize those "greatest nation ever" American exceptionalists will of course claim that a republic provides better checks and balances against outrageous legislative overreach (one might even say tyranny), but it is the current structure of American governance that prevents anything getting done, even those things that everyone agrees must get done like tax code reform. I would go so far as to say, in today's American Republic you are almost better to be in opposition because you can go to the electorate, or more likely your primary constituents and campaign on what laws you prevented so the government can't come and take your guns. Brigadoon is a completely false analogy here, it is more like ancient Rome in the time of Nero, fiddling while Rome burned.
Can Americans say ... complete constitutional overhaul of the structure of their governance???

xaveria in reply to Duckdawdger

They say that democracy is the worst form of government ever, except all of the rest. I would say that a republic, for all its flaws, is inherently stronger than a pure democracy. The current political gridlock is maddening, but compare it to the almost purely democratic political machine of the state of California, the U.S. is the model of good governance. Better get the right thing done inefficiently than efficiently follow the whim of 51% of the population.

riversend in reply to Duckdawdger

Great disagreement (of the barely over 50% to barely below it kind) as to how to proceed on legislation is a strong case for NOT proceeding until more reasoned debate and stronger understanding can occur to tip the scale. The public at large is generally poorly informed of all the consequences of legislation and its members are ruled by their emotions and passions (simply human nature, rational thinking takes more effort). One week they care deeply about A, the next about B. The public can band together to support a general cause of legislation, feeding off of their collective passions, and then once it's passed turn their attention elsewhere, without guarding over the implementation and examining the consequences. Such is the nature of self-governance. Xaveria nailed it: "better get the right thing done inefficiently than efficiently follow the whim of 51%..."

Duckdawdger in reply to xaveria

However compared to the UK, Canada, Australia, etc. all parliamentary democracies the US republic looks like a joke and a sick amateur joke at that, hardly the model needed for the greatest power this earth has ever seen.

teacup775 in reply to riversend

Yet the largest disagreement over policy is found in the two parties, our "representitives", who argue over points only the extrema care about.

The partisan Left and Right achieve representation. 60% of the population does not. In addition, because politicians are fund raising 5 hours a day, each and every day, they are keenly attentive to those with the bucks to donate. Tell me how they represent us, or even have much time to legislate, work on policy on that schedule / environment.

The largest problem is the ossified two party oligarchy.

Yankee Kid

The Economist does a good job of explaning what the problem is. Wining the election is only the start. Obama doesn't seem to understand that. He does not consider the cost of what he wants to do. He now has to convince the congress to do what he wants to do, and not the "people". He seems to just jump into things that he thinks all the "people" like where in fact there is no such thing anymore. I don't like him for these reasons but there is nothing I can do about that. I like what our President says for the most part of what I know.

jouris - old account in reply to MrRFox

Not really. O'Neal disagreed with Reagan on some things, but did not generally view him as the anti-Christ the way current Congressional Republicans do Obama. In fact, they frequently socialized privately, even when there was no immediate issue to discuss.
Which is why Reagan and O'Neal could get some things done. They were willing to treat each other as human beings and work together where they could. That isn't the case today.

Duckdawdger in reply to MrRFox

Just my humble opinion, but I believe it's gotten alot worse since Reagan and Clinton where the GOP are so obstructionist simply because they want Obama's presidency to fail so much they are willing to allow the country to go to rack and ruin for 4 more years, and you're right, Obama doesn't know how to deal with it.

Yankee Kid in reply to New Conservative

What The Economist writes I say too. When Obama first ran for President he said he had a way for getting health care for everybody which sounded good to me. but he couldn't get it done. So now he tries again but he can't get it done again. The reason he can't get it done is that he thinks he says his "magic words" and it will get done.
He says "I am the President" and every one will do what I say. Our Congress does not work that way. What he has to do is sell it and that is not easy because of the cost and he needs to back off and do the work required for getting it done. Obama likes to get in his plane and fly arould getting to know people who will clap their hands.

New Conservative in reply to Yankee Kid

How does he sell it?

The Republican strategy for 2016 is to make Obama seem like as much of a failure as possible.

They don't want to do anything that makes him seem effective or look like a leader as that would undermine that strategy.

Whatever or however he tries to sell it, they aren't going to buy.

What is the "work" that he could do to make this different?

bampbs in reply to MrRFox

Tip and Ron fought their political battles, but neither was a rigid ideologue, and they were also friends who understood that it was their responsibility to do their best together for their country. It took immense political courage to reform Social Security; consider how badly off we'd be it were not for their cooperation and their guts.
Any way to get them back to replace what we've got? I've always believed that we do better with a Republican President and a Democratic Congress. No wonder we've had so much trouble since GHW Bush lost [I'm *still* pissed about that] - we're doing everything bass-ackwards.


Obama's problem is easy to figure out. It centers on the fundamental difference between a presidential contest versus actual governance in a democratic republic.

Presidential contests are a dialectic phenomenon: there are (generally) only two choices provided, and voters must pick one. The decision point is therefore never "which guy is the best?", but "which guy is the best OF THE CHOICES PROVIDED?"

Governance in a democratic republic, however, is not dialectic in nature (even if we have two parties). Legislation is influenced by a host of competing interests, some of which have nothing to do with the merits of the underlying bill being debated. Moreover, those interests are not always going to be consistent from subject to subject. That is both the beauty and the curse of democracy -- if you are going to get anything done, it will NEVER be a grand, sweeping act; it will always have to be incremental, so as to appeal to (or at least not offend) a sufficient number of voting interests to get it passed.

Obama has treated governance like its an "you are stuck with either them or me" binary choice, which is why he fails more often than not (of course, the opposition cannot succeed in passing anything either, but they don't have to -- the status quo works for them). He would have been better off chipping away at the iceberg ice-cube by ice-cube, than trying (and failing) to cram the whole iceberg into his glass.


In 2012 Obama received 63 milion votes. Over half of these voters collected food stamps. Many of them also get AFDC welfare cash payments and WIC and Section 8 housing. These are single issue voters...keep my welfare check coming and I will vote for you...cut my welfare benefit and I will vote against you. These voters have little interest in other non-welfare issues.

hmy_ in reply to tryworkingforaliving

You do realize that both parties are roughly even in terms of high-income voters, and the Democrats actually do better among the most high-educated segment of the population. Not to mention, the most solidly Democratic states are the same ones with the best education, healthcare, and highest incomes.

But sure, feel free to disparage half the population if it suits you.

And of course, the Republicans have *no* single-issue voters, right? Besides abortion, guns, Jesus in schools, creationism, gays, invading other countries, etc. Even if your assertion was true (it isn't), welfare and food stamps would be a much cheaper and more humane policy than mass warfare and the suppression of religion and sexual minorities.

bampbs in reply to tryworkingforaliving

And what about the welfare-dependent Whites who vote Republican because LBJ made them treat Blacks like human beings? Be careful about unsupported comments on the economic make up of both sides' voters. You are aware that Blacks only make up 12.5% of the population, aren't you? And you're not silly enough to imagine that there aren't plenty of rich democrats, are you?
Last I heard, the typical welfare recipient was a White woman and her kids, who had been abandoned by her husband. It may no longer be the case; I welcome correction.
Support your numbers, or don't waste our time.

hmy_ in reply to bampbs

Ironically, Wall Street goes in favor of the Democrats all the time, especially in 2008. That said, in 2012 it did favor one of their own -- Mitt Romney (an extremely liberal Republican before the GOP primaries).

And Silicon Valley, probably the wealthiest part of the US (and possibly the world) and the home of a revolution that dwarfs the Renaissance is overwhelmingly liberal by 90-10 margins.

Then there's the other center of wealth -- Hollywood, and we already know how their politics go...

The point is, the rich are not instinctively Republicans and the GOP's electorate is not even remotely composed of those who pay taxes and depend on government the least.


Perhaps at least part of the reason is that a lot of people are like me and that they are more against what the GOP has become than for what the Democrats are?

Give me a break. I am no more for freebies than the next taxpayer but the so-called Obamaphone program was begun under Reagan and expanded to cell phones under G.W. Bush so don't pretend this is something Obama came up with.

Per the Section 8 voucher program, not sure what your issue is.

bampbs in reply to grinnell

That's exactly where I am. I don't like the Democrats any more now than I did in 1995, but I have come to loathe the Republicans.
As Reagan said of the Democrats, "The party left me."

grinnell in reply to bampbs

bampbs -- and, as I believe strongly, there is a huge void right now where we need a party to talk about things like personal responsibility, accountability, low taxes, low and effective regulation -- all the things a conservative party is supposed to espouse. There are middle-of-the-road Dems who can talk about those things but I don't know if it's really in their DNA and the nutty left-wing Dems who seem to believe that everyone should be protected from doing stupid or careless things are not going to support that anyway.

FormerRepublican in reply to bampbs

Although I voted for Obama, I would not consider myself to be part of his vision. For me, the choice is between a secular elected party or Christian fundamentalists. The same choice much of the Muslim world faces if they have elections.

hmy_ in reply to grinnell

Although in some respects I have to say I am extremely satisfied the Democrats are in power, especially with regards to foreign policy.

I find myself far more sympathetic to Republican policies (outside religious nonsense, but GOP presidents never actually pursue the stupid policies they campaign on in the Bible Belt anyway) but if either McCain or Romney were in power today, we would currently be invading Syria and would likely find ourselves in another Middle Eastern war for a decade.

Obama is a lot of things both good and bad, but I have to commend his restraint when it comes to military actions. The whole concept of a small footprint and relative non-intervention is excellent, and the president's views were made clear when he nominated another Republican whose party abandoned him for the Secretary of Defense -- Chuck Hagel.

Obama's domestic policies will probably drive up the debt, but even then, they won't do nearly as much damage as any major GOP nominee would do today.

grinnell in reply to hmy_

I, for as much as I (we?) actually know of what is going on overseas, admire Obama for what I see as a "speak softly and carry a big stick" approach.

As for domestic policy, I debated a woman on the Washington Post website a couple of weeks back. She, as a prototypical far-left liberal, seemed to believe that nobody should question what EBT (foodstamp) recipients were buying. I found issue that EBT can be used to buy Starbucks and takeout pizza. I also have been on the pointed end of stupid regulatory sticks. For example, I bought a house to rent out where all the windows were replaced in 2008. The windows were all permitted, replaced and approved and I even asked my local Building Safety manager if I would have any problems getting it certified as a rental. She said I could assume that. So, the inspector comes and tells me one window is 1 5/8 inches too small for egress code and I have to replace it. Seriously? So I have to replace an almost brand-new window for $1000 because of some arcane regulation that is applicable to rentals but not owner-occupied? Now, take that and multiply by 1000 and you get how the environment in which some businesses have to operate.

bampbs in reply to grinnell

I suspect that the inspector was looking for a bribe. Sometime it's best to pay to make these vermin to go away. It's the local regulations and those who enforce them that are the biggest problems for most businesses. They can always find something.

bampbs in reply to grinnell

I think the GOP is bent on suicide. Then we can put together a center-right party that understands, as the Republicans used to, that a stable two-party system requires that both parties compete for the middle third of the electorate. Boy Wonder Rove's 50%+1 made me angry enough to chew nails. For me, it really amounted to a violation of what has been an unwritten part of our Constitution.

bampbs in reply to grinnell

I also think that Obama's foreign policy is sound; I've believed in "Speak softly and carry a big stick," since I first heard it.
I have always judged a chief executive primarily by foreign policy, since that is where he has a freer hand and can show what he's made of. Besides, Congress runs the domestic show.
I thought both Reagan and Thatcher promoted fiscal and financial regulatory policies that were mad, but I supported both because they were so firm against the USSR.

grinnell in reply to bampbs

As I have posted elsewhere, my first presidential vote was for George Bush Sr. I grew up in a strong Republican household in MN. It has gotten so bad that even my cranky 74 year-old father who used to be a big-wig in the county Republican organization voted for Kerry in 2004. My mother, who I have thought would vote for a dog as long as it was running on the GOP ticket, gets so infuriated by these (male) religious morons spouting stuff about rape etc. that she has even voted for Dems. There is obviously still a huge cultural chasm between the South and pretty much everywhere else and as long as Southern Republicans are setting the agenda for the GOP they are going to lose at the national level, in my opinion.

grinnell in reply to bampbs

Per your comment about Thatcher and Reagan, I guess I don't know. If we're just talking about fiscal and financial regulation then I probably agree although at the time it was obviously not clear that they were sowing the seeds of future problems. The oppressive union and regulatory environment in Britain appears to be stifling and in the US regulation is still the area where the Democrats could use a lot of improvement. Seems to me that we are writing more bad laws and regulations these days than ever.

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