Obama Press Conference

[BackInTex]

What is there to say?

Those that didn't vote for him gotta be sayin' "I knew it!"

Those that voted for him gotta be sayin' "What was I thinking?"


Me? I can't believe this is the first post about it.

[NellyLunatic1980]

I was saying, "My God! A President who speaks in coherent, English, complete sentences!"

[BackInTex]

I was saying, "My God! A President who speaks in coherent, English, complete sentences!"

You must have seen a completely different press conference. My guess is you didn't even watch.

I listened to the first half on the radio driving home. We have at least 4 more years of "gotta" or "um" chugging games.

[Jeemie]

I thought there were a lot of people on these boards who said they were sick of a President coming on TV and saying "Do what I want, or we're all doomed".

Oh...such a statement is TRUE this time?

I get it.

[silverscreenselect]

What is there to say?

Those that didn't vote for him gotta be sayin' "I knew it!"

Those that voted for him gotta be sayin' "What was I thinking?"


Me? I can't believe this is the first post about it.

I missed the press conference.

I'm not surprised by what went on. I am mildly surprised it's taken so little time for the hope-and-change express to derail...

[Jeemie]

I am mildly surprised it's taken so little time for the hope-and-change express to derail...

I'm not.

I called it...before the election.

I said nothing would change...that nothing substantial has changed for 30 years.

The only pleasure I get from being right is that maybe some people will start to wake up and stop looking to the government for solutions to problems...because none will be forthcoming.

Now...more than ever...what Reagan said so many years ago IS true...government IS the problem.

[Flybrick]

Oh yea of little faith.

He will be tested, but He will overcome such tribulations.

He was tested before and He will rise again.

Hmm, a politician in the White House, who'da thunk it? (Hello, CBS/NBC/ABC/PBS/et al?)

I am more disturbed by this and the lack of reaction:

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama plans to expand the membership of the National Security Council and increase its authority to set strategy on a wide range of domestic and international issues, The Washington Post reported Saturday, quoting his national security adviser.

The council, which was established after World War Two to advise U.S. presidents on military and diplomatic matters, would become “dramatically different” after the overhaul, national security adviser James Jones told the paper in an interview.

“The world that we live in has changed so dramatically in this decade that organizations that were created to meet a certain set of criteria no longer are terribly useful,” Jones, a retired Marine general, was quoted as saying.

He said sections of the government not traditionally part of the council would be brought in on a case-by-case basis — he named the Energy Department, Commerce Department and Treasury, and all the law enforcement agencies, including the Drug Enforcement Administration.

“New NSC directorates will deal with such department-spanning 21st-century issues as cyber security, energy, climate change, nation-building and infrastructure,” the Post said.

Jones said the new structure would be outlined in a presidential directive, probably in the coming week.
© Copyright (c) Reuters

Growth of government aside, this has scary ramifications.

But His will must be done...

[BigDrawMan]

I am surprised he hasnt been able to clean up all the messes made by the most incompetent president in our history by now.

Now the wing nuts are coming out of their closets to proclaim disaster.

makes me laugh


ha

[Bob78164]

I am mildly surprised it's taken so little time for the hope-and-change express to derail...

I'm not.

I called it...before the election.

I said nothing would change...that nothing substantial has changed for 30 years.

The only pleasure I get from being right is that maybe some people will start to wake up and stop looking to the government for solutions to problems...because none will be forthcoming.

Now...more than ever...what Reagan said so many years ago IS true...government IS the problem.

If you're going to worship at the altar of Saint Reagan, at least get his thoughts right.

You've taken the quote out of context (as many others do). Reagan actually said (emphasis added), "In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem." This crisis, of course, is nothing remotely like the economic problems facing the nation in 1981. The risk we face now is deflation and an economy that will not be exploited at anything close to its capacity because people will not spend the money necessary to make that happen. This is precisely the sort of crisis in which government is a necessary ingredient to the solution, because no other institution has the necessary resources.

Later in the same speech (his first inaugural), Reagan emphasized the more limited nature of his point: "Now, so there will be no misunderstanding, it's not my intention to do away with government. It is rather to make it work--work with us, not over us; to stand by our side, not ride on our back. Government can and must provide opportunity, not smother it; foster productivity, not stifle it." And that's exactly what the stimulus package is designed to do. --Bob

[Sir_Galahad]

I will agree with what one of the people I listen to on a regular basis has said:

This is Obama's train to drive. If what he does succeeds in four years, then he will get re-elected. If not, then he is done. Either way we're stuck on the train for four years. As He himself has said, to paraphrase' "they voted me in."

[Bob Juch]

I just hope Keynesian economics is the solution.

What's plan B if it's not?

[BackInTex]

I will agree with what one of the people I listen to on a regular basis has said:

This is Obama's train to drive. If what he does succeeds in four years, then he will get re-elected. If not, then he is done. Either way we're stuck on the train for four years. As He himself has said, to paraphrase' "they voted me in."

Many, if not most, voted him in because he is not Bush. He has done O.K. performing that role.

I don't think too many of the 51% who voted him in want him or his appointees to dictate if or if not they can have a medical procedure based on cost/benefit.

I'm not sure many of the 51% who voted him in think subsidizing Steven Spielberg to produce a movie is economic stimulus.



I've seen many people die from train wrecks. I'm not sure I want to be on his train.

[BackInTex]

I just hope Keynesian economics is the solution.

What's plan B if it's not?

This IS plan B. Kenyan economics.

[silverscreenselect]

Government can and must provide opportunity, not smother it; foster productivity, not stifle it." And that's exactly what the stimulus package is designed to do. --Bob

This stimulus package wasn't designed to foster productivity. It's a grab bag of every pet project that Nancy Pelosi and her pals could come up with, added to a handful of tax cuts to appease the right wingers, added to a lot of pet pork barrel projects. There's a lot of good things in the bill. However, there's an awful lot of junk in there as well that's going to make any future moves very difficult if the economy needs another boost somewhere down the line.

Unfortunately, Nancy Pelosi doesn't care about getting us out of the mess we're in. She's only interested in trying a backdoor method of sneaking her agenda in. Sadly, this comes at a time when a lot of what's being proposed has merit and might well pass on its own.

Barack Obama has no clue about getting us out of the mess we're in. Otherwise, he wouldn't have let the Republicans cut out some thing that will really help (like some of the funding for a COBRA extension) and he wouldn't have turned this whole project over to Nancy to begin with.

And the Republicans, who haven't cared about deficits and government spending for eight years don't really care about getting us out of the mess either. They sense a golden opportunity to badly wound Obama's presidency right off the bat and are using this entire stimulus debate as a way to cut him down to size.

There should be three things and only three things in the stimulus package:

1) Relief for people in financial trouble - such as extensions of COBRA and unemployment benefits.

2) Relief for state and municipal governments, many of whom are on the verge of shutting down vital functions.

3) Creating work in areas that are hardest hit sooner rather than later.

Giving people a few bucks more a week in their checks or giving incentive tax breaks to businesses that are on the verge of failure and have no money to spend on capital improvements with or without a tax break won't help. Pork barrel projects that aren't cost effective in terms of results generated won't help. Spending lots of money on research that may lead to long term solutions to some of our energy problems won't help.

And most assuredly, a president who talked about hope and change on his inauguration day telling the people on national television three weeks later that we're on the verge of a national catastrophe of monumental proportions won't help.

A carefully crafted bill would cost about half as much as this one and do two to three times as much good.

[silverscreenselect]

I don't think too many of the 51% who voted him in want him or his appointees to dictate if or if not they can have a medical procedure based on cost/benefit.

As opposed to our current system, where it's some mid level bureaucrat at an insurance company whose salary and bonuses depend on his generating profits for his company making that decision.

[mrkelley23]

I just hope Keynesian economics is the solution.

What's plan B if it's not?

This IS plan B. Kenyan economics.

OK, even I have to admit, that was a good one.

[slam]

What is there to say?

Those that didn't vote for him gotta be sayin' "I knew it!"

Those that voted for him gotta be sayin' "What was I thinking?"


Me? I can't believe this is the first post about it.

This is why you and I are very going to agree on very few things.

I watched the press conference and my reaction was, "After eight years of the incompetency, we finally have someone driving the bus again."

In my lifetime, I have never witnessed a president who scared as me with his inability to understand the issues and do his job as much as the immediate past president. I had, and still have, much higher respect for Nixon, a president who was forced to resign.

Like all presidents, Obama will make his share of mistakes. His first prime-time press conference was certainly not one of them. He came across as articulate and showed an excellent understanding of complex economic issues. Think back to the ridiculoously shallow approach that Bush used when addressing the very same issues over the past several months.

Moreover, Obama is actually trying to establish a atmosphere of bipartisanship. Bush claimed he was a "uniter, not a divider" and then proved to be the most divisive force in this country possibly since the Civil War. I actually hope the Republicans wake up and avoid the path of political irrelevancy that they are heading down. As someone only slightly to the left of center, I cherish the value of a two-party system and don't want what is good in the Republican party to go down the tubes with what is bad. I am not a hater of the Republican party. I am certainly a hater of President Cheney and Vice President Bush.

BackinTex, I hope you put aside your political philosophical blinders to realize that the election of Obama was actually a good thing for the country at this point in time (though I know you won't). I don't know how this economic mess plays out, but I feel confident that it won't be as bad with Obama as president as it would with Bush or McCain as president.

[Jeemie]

I am mildly surprised it's taken so little time for the hope-and-change express to derail...

I'm not.

I called it...before the election.

I said nothing would change...that nothing substantial has changed for 30 years.

The only pleasure I get from being right is that maybe some people will start to wake up and stop looking to the government for solutions to problems...because none will be forthcoming.

Now...more than ever...what Reagan said so many years ago IS true...government IS the problem.

If you're going to worship at the altar of Saint Reagan, at least get his thoughts right.

You've taken the quote out of context (as many others do). Reagan actually said (emphasis added), "In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem." This crisis, of course, is nothing remotely like the economic problems facing the nation in 1981. The risk we face now is deflation and an economy that will not be exploited at anything close to its capacity because people will not spend the money necessary to make that happen. This is precisely the sort of crisis in which government is a necessary ingredient to the solution, because no other institution has the necessary resources.

Later in the same speech (his first inaugural), Reagan emphasized the more limited nature of his point: "Now, so there will be no misunderstanding, it's not my intention to do away with government. It is rather to make it work--work with us, not over us; to stand by our side, not ride on our back. Government can and must provide opportunity, not smother it; foster productivity, not stifle it." And that's exactly what the stimulus package is designed to do. --Bob

I fully understood the nature and context of Reagan's quote- and it applies perfectly today.

That's why I used it.

Kindly do not lecture me.

[Jeemie]

I am surprised he hasnt been able to clean up all the messes made by the most incompetent president in our history by now.

Now the wing nuts are coming out of their closets to proclaim disaster.

makes me laugh


ha

Excuse- me- this "wingnut" has descried the "messes" left by Bush...and all the presidents before him...many times.

This "wingnut" will also not let you turn the "mess" we are in into a partisan issue. Both Dems AND Reps have helped to get us into the situation we are in today.

And no one expects Obama to have cleaned it all up in two weeks.

What we ARE saying is that his "proposed solutions" are a ticket to mess things up even more.

[Jeemie]

I just hope Keynesian economics is the solution.

What's plan B if it's not?

It would be nice if he was even attempting a Keynesian solution.

He is not. Even the non-partisan CBO agrees on that.

The other problem, of course, is, that when the US attempted Keynesian solutions to the Great Depression, we had the manufacturing base, resources, and economic potential to pay off any debts that arose from unbalancing the budget (and, of course, FDR short-circuited himself in 1936 by insisting on balancing the budget anyway).

We have none of these this time around. Turning to the CBO again, we find the potential for future growth over the next decade or so will make it very difficult to pay down, or even service, the massive debt we are running up at the present time.

No- we are STILL not addressing the root causes of the mess we are in.

[National Apathy Party]

We found something else to watch....

[Jeemie]

Moreover, Obama is actually trying to establish a atmosphere of bipartisanship.

No he's not.

We can agree to disagree on many things, but this is the last thing Obama's trying to do.

Please do not insult people's intelligence by claiming that he is.

[silverscreenselect]

I watched the press conference and my reaction was, "After eight years of the incompetency, we finally have someone driving the bus again."

In my lifetime, I have never witnessed a president who scared as me with his inability to understand the issues and do his job as much as the immediate past president. I had, and still have, much higher respect for Nixon, a president who was forced to resign.

Like all presidents, Obama will make his share of mistakes. His first prime-time press conference was certainly not one of them. He came across as articulate and showed an excellent understanding of complex economic issues. Think back to the ridiculoously shallow approach that Bush used when addressing the very same issues over the past several months.

Just because Obama doesn't say things like "noocular" doesn't mean he has a grasp of economic issues. The professor on Gilligan's Island sounded like he knew what he was doing, but I wouldn't want him to build a noocular reactor.

Obama is very good at reading rehearsed speeches and rehashing memorized talking points. He proved that time and time again during the campaign. But when he gets off message, due to a rare question that he's not prepared for, as with Joe the Plumber, he shows his lack of understanding, as during the debate with Hillary when he showed he didn't really know how the capital gains tax worked.

This entire stimulus package shows the Obama approach. He isn't driving the bus. He's standing on top of the bus waving at the crowd and when it looks like the bus is getting too close to the edge of the road, shouting down that maybe they'd better do something different, and, if all else fails, looking for someone to throw under the bus. A leader who understood economic policy wouldn't have allowed this stimulus bill to lurch forward the way it has.

[Bob Juch]

I watched the press conference and my reaction was, "After eight years of the incompetency, we finally have someone driving the bus again."

In my lifetime, I have never witnessed a president who scared as me with his inability to understand the issues and do his job as much as the immediate past president. I had, and still have, much higher respect for Nixon, a president who was forced to resign.

Like all presidents, Obama will make his share of mistakes. His first prime-time press conference was certainly not one of them. He came across as articulate and showed an excellent understanding of complex economic issues. Think back to the ridiculoously shallow approach that Bush used when addressing the very same issues over the past several months.

Just because Obama doesn't say things like "noocular" doesn't mean he has a grasp of economic issues. The professor on Gilligan's Island sounded like he knew what he was doing, but I wouldn't want him to build a noocular reactor.

Obama is very good at reading rehearsed speeches and rehashing memorized talking points. He proved that time and time again during the campaign. But when he gets off message, due to a rare question that he's not prepared for, as with Joe the Plumber, he shows his lack of understanding, as during the debate with Hillary when he showed he didn't really know how the capital gains tax worked.

This entire stimulus package shows the Obama approach. He isn't driving the bus. He's standing on top of the bus waving at the crowd and when it looks like the bus is getting too close to the edge of the road, shouting down that maybe they'd better do something different, and, if all else fails, looking for someone to throw under the bus. A leader who understood economic policy wouldn't have allowed this stimulus bill to lurch forward the way it has.

So who do you think should have become President? Certainly not Hillary.

[Jeemie]

So who do you think should have become President? Certainly not Hillary.

You're asking this question like it matters.