Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

So, now that Obama is in office, things are finally going to change!

New and worse secrecy and immunity claims from the Obama DOJ - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com

TPM: "Obama Mimics Bush on State Secrets" - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com

Yes, yes they are. Obama not only supports Bush's "state secrets" justifications, but (and this is the change part) has actually one upped Bush. Now, he argues, the government is immune to any and all lawsuits pertaining to illegal surveillance. Now, even if the surveillance is undeniably illegal, no lawsuit can be filed unless the government willfully discloses the information allowing you to file a lawsuit. This is a pretty big expansion of the theories put forth by Bush on the subject.


So what do you guys think of this? Is this the kind of change you can believe in?

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I never believed in it in the first place.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I never believed in politictions

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

What does that have to do with anything? Regardless of whether he elicited your trust or not at any time during his campaign is as of this point irrelevant, he is now the President and nothing you believe is going to change that. The real issue now is what he has done, now what people think about it.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Exactly, and I never believed in it in the first place, so seeing him do things like this is no news to me. I expected it.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I must say I am a little shocked by this. I did not expect much by the way of change but I never expected him to push for more government secrecy and immunity. Neither did most of his supporters. Hell, I'm sure many conservatives are even surprised by this.


What made you suspect he would do this?

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

He's a Chicago style politician, one of the most politically corrupt areas of the country, who rode on a wave of ignorant and uninformed people who didn't so much as listen to his words as listen to the sound of his voice, and duly has had his ego so inflated that he feels that he shits gold bricks. I have a leery eye on most politicians, but Obama reeked before he even became a front runner of the Dem ticket. He's bombastic, arrogant, and has no clue about what the rest of the world outside of his many mansions is like. He's your classic limo democrat, the kind who drives past a homeless person, hands them a dollar, feels good about himself, then goes home to a multi-million dollar mansion thinking that he's changed the world.

I expected him to do things that he said/says he wouldn't do, and to not do things he said/says he will do, because of this huge ego he has. He feels that he can say things and it doesn't matter if he follows through, or if his programs even work. What matters to him is FEELING like he's accomplished something, not actually accomplishing it. He FEELS like he's a nice happy open administration, even if that's the exact opposite of what he is doing in his administration. Its all looks, and no substance.

Finally, an important point that most people have forgotten with the term of Bush...Democrats are PRO-big government, and Republicans are ANTI-big government. Now, this may come as a surprise to people, who will note that there was a huge expansion of government under George Bush. Well, Occam's Razor, the simplest explanation is usually the correct one:

George Bush was a Republican In Name Only, aka, a RINO. Sure, he talked like a republican, prayed like one of the nut religious right, and had a foreign policy of a republican, but at home he was anything but. Illegal immigration, economy (2nd term at least), and expansion of government, every time he sided with a Democrat perspective. Now, a careful observer will wonder "Why did the democrats still not back him on the expansion of government and illegal wiretaps?" The answer is simple: It wasn't politically prudent. If the democrats had backed Bush on such things during his term, they would have lost support. Instead, they attacked him for the wire taps/government expansion and rampant government spending, things that they normally support. Once he was out of office, and their boy was in, it goes out the window. Now, they feel they can get away with doing these things, as they hold the power and the political sway. You can never, ever, out democrat a democrat, and that's exactly what Bush tried to do in many cases.

Duly, Obama expanding wire taps is just something I, and any properly researched observer, could have easily expected. Its arrogant (check), expansion of government powers over the citizenry (check), going back on promises (check), and living in a dream world, where everything he does is great and wonderful, despite what it actually does(check). Sounds right.

Sorry to go on a bit of a aimless rant, but its hard to get my thoughts on the matter condensed to something readable, and especially at 1AM with a couple White Russians down my gullet :P

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Not really. They may say that because it sounds good, but if you spend as much money on the military as the Republicans did in the last couple of years and add in the bail-outs formed by the last administration you have a government that is much bigger than most of the "liberal" European governments or even the last few Democrat administrations.

The Republican administration also happened to be more repressive, even if salon.com (is that another example of "leftist" media?) thinks otherwise. Obama has some work to do if he wants to keep up with Bush´s secret prisons, wiretaps and torture.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I don't know about the rest of salon.com, but Glenn Greenwald is a Civil Libertarian (sort of, that's just the best way I can think of describing him), and he hated Bush just as much as he hates Obama now. I very much doubt that the last administration was more repressive, very very few of the policies from the last administration have been changed, and others (such as this one) have been greatly expanded.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Exactly what I was pointing out. Bush's economic policies in his 2nd term reeked of the Democrats, the bailouts especially. As for rampant military spending, I agree military should def be a major budget, but even that went overboard. However, I think there are many other areas that need to be cut as well....

Either way, what you said there does nothing more then reinforce my argument that Bush was not an actual republican, but simply a RINO.

Anyways, I'm going to bed, don't expect a response to any comments till tomorrow sometime...>__< I always hate it when I go to bed and I wake up to 100 comments and people wondering if I wandered off or am ignoring the debate...and I get the feeling this will be a fun one.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

When the Government takes away a right or a civil liberty no matter how justified or how urgent the need they almost never give it back. It doesnt matter if its a Democratic or Republican or Libertarian.

This comes as no surprise to me.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

We have not had anything close to a libertarian leader for over 100 years, with the arguable exception of Barry Goldwater. I don't see how you could justify that. Besides, supporting increasing government powers is 100% opposed to everything libertarian, making it inexcusable. Such powers are not inherently anti-Democratic (party) or anti-Republican, so they are excusable. Excusable meaning that a leader could justify his power grab without changing his political philosophy.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

As far as I know the secret prisons and torture policies are being changed, there were several articles in the news about that already. As for the patriot act and repressive policies in general I agree with Anlushac: Their removal is always more problematic than their implemantation. From a political point of view it would be stupid for Obama to reverse all those policies as he can profit from them with relatively little PR fallout.

All this makes perfect sense if it weren´t for the fact that the "Bush isn´t really one of us"-argumentation is relatively new. Of course now everyone claims that they never agreed with any of Bush´s policies, but I can´t remember seeing much of such criticism from Republicans while Bush was still president.

As for big government, it isn´t only Bush who likes to spend money on the military. I think all Republicans like to do that. And even though you may consider the military to be more important than other aspects of government (which is questionable in any case) you´re still advocating a BIG government if you vote for someone who wants to give even more money to the biggest military complex on this planet.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I'm not suprised. The change he brings will be rather limited. It's rather easy to keep some laws you "should" oppose in place as they have some small benefits. The various anti terror laws that take away way too much privacy and freedom to slightly increase the cost of catching a terrorist at the cost of violating he privacy ad freedom of millions of people.

I don't expect him to change more then a few laws, keeping a whole bunch of others in place or only toning them down a little bit as a "compromise". That are politicians for you. As others said, once a law is in place it's very hard to take it down. Especially if certain laws are "forgotten" about (not known by the general public). It's mostly about adding new laws.

It also has to do with strategy, removing a whole bunch of laws might make you loose the benefit of the doubt of people who don't really support or trust you or that are on the fence. Removing only a handfull, tweaking some others etc. might keep some the benefit of the doubt of those people for your actions while also somewhat pleasing your own strong supporters that will say "Well he didn't do X but he did do Y so I guess I should be pleased". And this might apply even stronger to a country were you effectively have two parties instead of a large variety of parties to cross the "entire" spectrum from the far left to the far right.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

A puppet politician lies about his campaign and bows to the will of his masters benefactors constituents? I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS IS HAPPENING!! :rolleyes:

I can't wait until the next fraudulent election. Rinse, repeat, remain clueless.

Heh. Reminds me of the Bush crowd via the 2000 and 2004 elections. It's the same malleable douchebags shouting rhetoric for their corrupt party, but on the opposite side of the spectrum.


You should add a footnote besides "Republicans are ANTI-big government" stating: Not valid after 1980.

As much as you drool over the presidency of Reagan, his War on Drugs was/is incredibly pro-government. Just look how many people have been thrown in jail (and still are in jail) for mere possession. Now, we have the largest prison population in the world. A society frightened and criminalized. And it's not just Reagan either. Clinton even created a friggin drug czar! It's all a gargantuan cocksuck.

White Russian? Why don't you just move to Siberia, commie. =p

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Meh, mostly just a measure to keep about 20 million people from arbitrarily suing the government NOW over a program put in place during the last administration. The government is protecting itself from litigation.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I don't know a single republican, myself included, who is even proud to call ourselves republican after the party went south with this sudden neo-con revolution bs, sparked by Reagan and Bush. Yeah, I voted for Bush, but I did so because I prefered him over Kerry, and no other reason.

Mr.Fancypants, the problem is more or less the "silent majority" syndrome in the USA. The radical minorities ALWAYS have more voice then the majority, in both parties, because the silent majority is just that...silent. Its people like me, who yeah, I'd love to change the republican party, but I'm more worried about getting through college, getting through grad school, and teaching history, then dealing with soul sucking politics.


Also, as for the war on drugs, a true republican (ie, a more or less moderate libertarian) is very much against illegalization :P

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I've been waiting to tell all of the people that voted for Obama "I TOLD YOU SO!". This comes pretty close but not quite there yet...

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

What an Obamanation.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Me and a couple friends made a bet that in 6 months to a year of his presidency, he would be a total washout, and the american public would have turned against him. His latest polls numbers show him dropping into the 50th percentile, from his inauguration of 80% or so. And that's not even in his first 100 days. So far, so good.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Change...what change? Its more of the same as expected. Obama and his admin has done more to shit on the constitution and amass the largest debt than all the other presidents combined(that will double after 5 yrs and triple after 10 ala your grand kids might...might be able to pay all this off by the time they die....maybe). What Bush has done is NOTHING compared to what Obama and crew have already done and will be doing. Especially since Obama is clueless on pretty much everything. (President)Pelosi is the one that is actually running the show. Government &quot;transparency&quot; was just another predictable liberal lie. Obama was supposed to sign Pelosi's &quot;anti-stimulus&quot; on TV. Want to know why he instead do so alone behind closed doors? Because he didn't want his supporters to see the ambarrassed look on his face. Gibbs, Geithner, Napolitano...there postitions are jokes...or oxymorons if you prefer. With the way things are happening now, like the whole gov totally ignoring the constitution(...making like it doesn't even exist, doing all of these illegal activites(against the constitution), screw socialism, screw communism, they're serving up fascism with a smile!), there is no doubt that Obama is in the last few years of his presidency. He sure as hell wont be back for 2012. Oh, and heres something else. Fact: The CIA can't have operations in America and the FBI can't have operations outside the US. So, tell me this...why the hell is the FBI in Africa and the middle east? Shouldn't the CIA be there?

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Obama is just screwing things up worse which was totally expected yet people still voted him in even though he didn't have much experience in office. Everyone just said "Oh my! He promises us CHANGE". Well enjoy your change...

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Well played, sir. Well played.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Some rather important news videos on the topic, made during the campaign....

Obama Win Causes Obsessive Supporters To Realize How Empty Their Lives Are | The Onion - America's Finest News Source

Obama Undertakes Presidential Internship To Ease Concerns About His Lack Of Experience | The Onion - America's Finest News Source


;)

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

opposed to what? Mccain? That day you say such a thing I will laugh heartily.

If he was in office we would have no government anymore. It would have collapsed already from the weight of whatever money we had left poured into the military industrial complex instead of places where it's needed. (I'm not talking about bailouts either. I think those are dumb ideas as well.) He's an idiot almost as bad as Bush is/was.

While I don't agree with Obama on this issue, I'd still rather have him than a GWB II.

Obama's reversal on the stem cell research ban is still one positive note in his hat. At least he's not dragging his religious views into government policy.. where it was specifically stated it would NEVER belong.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I agree on stem cell, and even on opening up with Cuba, if only so that when Castro and Raul die, we have a better stance to try and help the Cubans.

Otherwise, I don't think we'd have a total collapse of Government under McCain, any less then the conservatives who thought Obama would do the same. Both were bad candidates, and one had to one, and it turned out to be Obama. He'll be a one termer, mark my words. We survived Carter, we can survive this.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I agree that McCain wasn't exactly a good choice.

There isn't any proof of this, now, is there? I doubt the last of the coffers would be poured into trying to one-up the PLA.

Bush was a democrat with a big R next to his name. So, in essence, you want somebody even farther left than the last failure?

I won't even try to discuss the belief issue.

Now we can waste money on something that has yet to show any promise whatsoever!

Unless something horrible happens and our beloved government seizes power in the name of our protection.

But that'll never happen...

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

At first before Obama got in i thought he would be a good man to lead american, Over the past few months i have been shown how wrong i was to think that

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

:rofl:

Seeing as Bush is right winged and Obama is too (though a bit closer to the centre) it would be rather refreshing to see a left winged person like Kuchinich as president. If only...

Wait, are you saying stamcell research has no potential what so ever? Or that because you think it has no potential (never mind the tons of scientist that wil disagree with you) it's not worth allowing scientist to explore this field of science to see what potentials are there?

That makes a lot of sense... let's ban clean energy research and silly militairy gadgets research while we are at it. :uhm:

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Personal, I think a left winged person in power would end very baddly. From what i know the left has a very bad track record around the world.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Oh I dunno, Europe doesn't seem to be doing badly.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Will ya Europe is mostly Socilist(sp?) goverment which is basicly in the middle, That works fine but any more left you are going into Communism, Something i do not agree with

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Either way, don't blame me.... I voted for Theodore Roosevelt....=/

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Yeah, but communism is left taken to the extreme. A moderate leftie in power might be a good thing for the US.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Socialism is to the left (and on the left of the left end scale, though not as far as communism which is too the extreme left), a bit more to the centre is social democracy and social liberals (or for the Americans "libertarians").

Though ofcourse you can't simply capture a goverment or party's political stance or position on the left to right scale that easily. One party that calls itself "social democrat" might be more to the left or right then it's competitor.

And no, I would not discribe Europe as "socialist" , in recent years it seemsto have become rather centrist overall or even a bit more conservative. The Dutch went from a Social-liberal ("libertarian") goverment to social-christian (or christian social as the christian party's have the biggest slice of the pie and thus brought back some conservetism). Then again, Europe is quite large, so is the EU so putting a tag on them is a crude generalisation to begin with.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Thanks that was really helpful, I will admit i have very little knowledge on modern day goverments in Europe

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I decided to check the famous politcalcompass site which seemed reasonably reliable/accurate with it's conclusions on past elections and data.

I noticed they have a quike / basic overview of the politcal position of EU goverments in 2008. I'd have to look more into it but at first glance it doesn't look that bad. Though I expected more dots towards the centre. I do know the UK is around the centre or right of it. And so is our pityfull Dutch goverment (thank you christians and your conservatism).

On second thought it is putting a whole load of countries more right then I'd have thought. I don't consider my country that far to th right (I mean, our current goverment has a piss poor coalition and the opposition is either on the more left and right wing such as the "party of animals" and "socialist party" on one end and the "Party of Freedom" and "Liberal" party on the other end but still... The Auth. to Liberal scale seems to be about right though).

http://www.politicalcompass.org/images/eu2008.gif
"While most of the old Eastern Bloc countries appear to have taken to the free market with the zeal of the recent convert, the simulaneous development of social freedoms has, in some instances been rather slower. The previous Polish Prime Minister, for example, alone among EU leaders and in conflict with EU policy, wanted his country to re-adopt capital punishment. In the western member states, however, the progressive abolition of economic restrictions seems generally to correspond to the extent of curbs on certain certain civil liberties. The most obvious example is the UK. But in other states, such as Denmark and the Netherlands, extremely liberal traditions in certain social policies have somewhat eroded as neoliberal economics have expanded."
http://www.politicalcompass.org/euchart

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

http://www.politicalcompass.org/face...4.62&soc=-2.51

There's mine ;)

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

http://www.politicalcompass.org/prin...8.25&soc=-6.72http://www.politicalcompass.org/prin...8.25&soc=-6.72http://i566.photobucket.com/albums/s...raphpngphp.png

Oh lawdy.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

http://www.politicalcompass.org/face...0.12&soc=-3.03
Predictable. I haven’t moved much one way or the other. However, in six months I moved further up by 3 grids from Libertarian and about two hairs to the left.:beer:

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Civil Libertarians. Libertarians as in those in the Libertarian party (really a sort of right-libertarian) support the Austrian School of economics, and hate almost all government actions in the economy. You would be hard pressed to find a libertarian that likes any of the governments in Europe from an economic perspective.

Libertarian in and of itself is a pretty broad term, so it's hard to attribute a wide range of beliefs to it, but for the most part it involes minimizing the state, and increasing individual liberty.


I actually wouldn't mind having Kuchinich as president. I don't like his economic policies, but right now I think foreign policy should be more of a concern for the government, and his is great. I would be able to deal with four years of what I perceive to be bad economic policy if it would end the wars.


I would still blame you for voting for an interventionist. Though, to be honest, he was a pretty bad ass president. Could you image a president today getting shot and still staying to finish his speech?

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Awww, he's just like Lincoln!


Seriously, I'm looking forward to a decade or so from now, when those annoying "conspiracy theory" things comparing JFK and Abe are changed to our current president. Hopefully he won't go out the way they did, though. Bullets are not good for your health or continued public service.


PS:

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Security has advanced greatly and now its almost impossible for anyone to assassinate a President but than again weapons and technology are advancing too. But yeah another decade :cool:

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Oh no! Their gonna flood the forums!

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Hahaha, and that's pretty much why I voted for him. To be fair, I wrote in exactly this:

President: Reanimated Corpse of Theodore Roosevelt
Vice President: Corpse of William Jennings Bryan


Hee hee :D I even got two other people to vote for that ticket ;)

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Which is exactly the liberals (liberarians) that I meant, there are several liberal parties over here but their core principle is reducing goverment interfearance (or to put it differently: more individualism, less rules to restrict busniness and public etc.).

That goes for most terms. There isn't one "socialist" view "christian" view and so on. But atleast you know what you can generally expect from such a party (their core principal). Or atleast what you used to be able to expect. Most labour parties seem to have moved from "socialist" ( 60-100 years ago) to centrist and further to the right. Just look at were the British labour party is on the politcal compass. The same applies to the Dutch labour party (Party van de Arbeid or "Party of (the) Labour").

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

See, Smitty, the problem is, you have our liberals, the democrats/socialists. Then, you have the classical liberals, which are libertarians/republicans over here, but are still referred to as the liberals over in Europe. Not sure why that name change occurred, tbh.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

Yes, but you said social liberals, which I took to mean people who believe in social liberalism. They believe in a lot more economic regulation than most libertarians. Classical liberalism would, I think, be more closely aligned with most libertarians. Now, when I say libertarian, I mean the most popular school of libertarianism in the US. I suppose the difference in any case is slight, and I would vote for any party that would reduce government interference in the economy.


Of course, as Von Mudra said, things get more complicated since we here in the US like to call things different names sometimes. I have no idea why that happened either.

Re: Change We Can Believe In...Right?
 

I voted on the Socialistische Partij or Socialist Party in the last national elections. It's a left leaning party as the name implies, it also is the only republican party in the Netherlands (all the other's support or don't mind the Monarchy). I myself don't care about the monarchy so I don't care if this socialist party is republican or not.

Yes, I meant two different groups with them. The social liberals (or liberal socialists) are ofcourse for more goverment involvement in some areas (labour rights, wages and other sch wellfare) but also liberal rights when it comes to stuff like soft drugs and what not.

I consider myself a liberal/democratic socialist. I'm not a pure socialist, but I'm not a liberal by far (too individualistic, I feel we should support our fellow countryman that temporary or permanently is in need of aid or suport). I looked at a handfull of parties and checked their party programs to see which one I liked best: Partij van de Arbeid (Party of Labour), Democraten 66 (Democrats 66), GroenLinks (GreenLeft), Socialistische Partij (Socialist Partij) etc. And I ofcourse looked at the other party's aswell such as the Partij van de Dieren (Party of the Animals, way too concerned about animals if you ask me...) and various liberal and christian parties (which where either too convervative or too liberal for my taste).