From Yes We Can to No We Can't

My first clue should have been the health care bill.  Yes, it was great we were finally getting a health care bill but without a public option it was a gift to the insurance industry.  I have no idea why the Right isn't thrilled with it since it's entirely privatized. It's much like Bush's Medicare Part D only funded and phased in slowly.  It sure as hell isn't socialism. 


Hope is hard to give up on.


Yes. He's done some good things. He rescued our auto industry. He proved we can manufacture cars here and make a buck doing it. We bailed them out and they paid us back. It's a shame the banks didn't didn't treat us as well as the auto industry.  But that's the difference between blue collar thinking and hedge fund thinking. It's interesting that Republicans are still bitching about bailing out the auto industry, since it's the most successful part of the bailout.


Then there was the negotiation over extending jobless benefits for the long-term unemployed. The Republicans insisted the President give them an extension of the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy in exchange for some pitiful extension of unemployment benefits for people looking for jobs—but not the 99ers. Oh no, if you were unemployed that long you were just shit out of luck, but the rich folks got their tax break extended. That one broke my heart and made me worry for the future. 


Negotiation isn't one of his strong suits. He seems far too willing to cave to the least bit of Republican arm twisting. Why? This is our first black President. This is the President who located and killed Osama Bin Laden while roasting Donald Trump.  What the fuck? 


Turns out President Obama either isn't a very good negotiator or he's a really a moderate republican. He's far to willing to give in to the wishes of conservatives. He is certainly not a progressive. At every turn he seems to move a bit farther to the right.


Yes, there have been things on the good side of the balance sheet, but the list of on the side of disappointments is so huge that it tips the scale to the right so horribly I won't be voting with much enthusiasm this time. I'll be voting in fear of a Rick Perry Presidency more than likely.