Comments

1
I can survive without the tax cut. Let them expire and lower our debt.
2
FUCK I wanted so bad to keep supporting Obama but if they cave on this and don't make the rethugs own their piece of it, no mo'. What is so complicated about this? Effing sad to watch is what it is.
4
I've been done with him for a long time now. I just hope someone totally fucks things up and ALL the tax cuts get revoked.
5
He's already backed down, we just haven't heard the details yet. The generation you refer to is already lost.
6

An entire generation...of what? the unemployed?

Trust fund babies will be his for life if he cuts taxes for the 1% bracket.

And that's half of SLOG right there alone...
7
a deal on jobless aid was possible if Democrats agreed to cover the cost.

Which really means, the Republicans will get the Democrats to "compromise" and do whatever the Republicans ask and then the Republicans will fuck over the Democrats and renege on the "deal".

And the Democrats will act surprised.
8
Supreme Moron strikes again!
9

#8

Hello, Joan Jett calling...she wants her head back.
10
obama is what he is. a right to center-right establishment politician wo/ a fighter's bone in his body. he's had plenty of time to stand up on this issue, and instead has shrunk away to tend to the war he decided to expand instead of end (another broken promise, btw/). why would anyone think obama would do the right thing on this? what reasons has he given for such hopes?
11
But... don't you know that tax cuts pay for themselves?
12
Supreme Moron get it right! I was going for Chrissie Hynde.

Geez!
13
I have to admit, I was suckered by Obama. He's either a fraud or a coward. I see no other way around it.

He and Michelle are set for life, as are their kids. Why would they want to see those taxes raised, even it all were talking about is a pretty paltry increase?

Pitiful. That's what it is....
14
Republicans to Obama: Get back on the floor, bitch! We're not done fucking you yet!
Obama: (sigh) oh, all right...

He talked a good game, but it's getting harder & harder to see any other conclusion to this whole thing. I still hope I'm wrong.
15
Obama's a fraud. He's always been. He gave a wedge of lipservice to the left during the primaries to get them to STFU. In the intervening years, he normalized and solidified Bush II's fascist regime, which he seems intent on strengthening.
16
Well, the Wobblies still exist people. Class warfare might not be such a bad thing. Time to empower ourselves.
http://www.iww.org/
17

@12

Next time, try Nancy Spungen

http://famous-relationships.topsynergy.c…

18
@12 Works for me!
19
Charles,
Indeed, it's getting worse:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/04/busine…

However, I'm not sure the tax cuts extension or cessation will matter. We (the USA) are a consumer and no longer a producer. For our economy, nothing is more important than gainful employment now. I fear it will get worse.
20
I remember laughing at the worthless "liberals" celebrating his victory on pike and broadway. Those fools actually thought there would be change? Sadly, those racist (yes) fools will continue to vote for right wingers (dems and reps) hoping for a change.
If voting changed anything it would be illegal.
21
@12, no worries, you got it very right. Well done.
22
@20 That celebration was way more about Bush is gone than Obama is here. While it is correct that he's probably lost a generation, it has little to do with what goes on here. Sure, tax policy is important, paying for the things our government does is important, but really he lost me when he gave that speech for the noble about how necessary war was to peace. That's a huge line of bullshit used to justify indefinite deployment to Afghanistan. I also don't believe it should be Obama's call, it should be congress's, per the constitution. You caught me though, call me brainwashed, kool-aid drunk or just plain stupid, but I really did think Obama would end the wars. But knowing what I know now? He won't get a second terms, and it's looking more and more like I don't even give a fuck if Palin is elected, Obama doesn't deserve it more.
23
I'm sure everything will get better once President Palin takes power.
24
Goddammittt!!!! I've been trying to hold onto the Hope for too long, I've tried to tell myself that he's playing the 'long game", like he seemed to do very well during the primaries and election.
"He's smarter." I've said, "Playing chess, while the rest of them are playing checkers."
When he signed us up to be required to buy health insurance from the same criminals that have been screwing us all along, though, I knew.
Like a girl who realizes that, not only is he NOT going to call you, but he also took all the cash from your wallet, I am now embarrassed and ashamed, and my butt kinda hurts.
25
w/r/t Afghanistan, Obama is actually following through on his promise scale back in Iraq and ramp up in Afghanistan, where supposedly we had taken our eye off the ball, or whatever the phrase was. I had hoped that that was all just bullshit campaign rhetoric designed to look tough, but there you are.

On this tax deal, though, I'm just about ready bail on Obama.
26
I'm afraid he's lost more than one generation. People past 30 aren't too happy either.

Please, Dems, find somebody to challenge him in the primaries in 2012.
27
agreed. (finally, i agree w CM !)
28
@22 obamabush no matter.. Like I told a hardcore gay rights activist (at the time he was super gung ho on obamabush and has now seen that he is the enemy) I'd rather an idiot like bush who I know hates me than some spineless guy who claims to be my friend but hates me just as much (didn't Obamabush's AG argue that there is a correlation between homosexuality and pedophilia?)
fuck democrats fuck republicans
29
One percent of the people in this country control fifty percent of its wealth.
Repeat: 1% of the people in the U.S. control 50% of the wealth in this country.
This same 1% received 24% of pre-tax income in 2007, but received only 9% in 1976.
From 2002 to 2007, their income increased 10% per year.

These super-rich parasites are definitely in need of more tax breaks financed by the rest of us, right? My question is how long are this nation's criminally gullible voters going to continue to bury their heads in the sand, allowing oligarchs and plutocrats to rub their noses in the fact that they are utterly, completely powerless?

Elections used to offer something of a remedy for plutocracy and oligarchy -- but not any more. Elections in this country were turned into Silent Auctions when the U.S. supreme court declared that corporations are people, and are entitled to the same free-speech protections as human beings -- a completely absurd perversion of "human rights."

I'm mystified that anyone could be as obtuse as the people in the so-called "tea party." They actually believe the 1% are looking out for ordinary peoples' interests. What a joke.

The 1% want the rest of us to die from lack of food, clothing, housing, health care and adequate living conditions. Unfortunately for that 1%, when we are gone, they will have nobody to do their work, lick out their toilet bowls or pay their taxes for them. In this way, they are like mindless parasites that kill their hosts.

If you're a right winger determined to flame me, don't clutter up this valuable real estate with your bollocks. With a modicum of research you can find me, but be sure to read my Privacy Agreement -- it means precisely what it says.
30
Absolutely true: with "friends" like prevaricating, turncoat Democrats, who needs enemies?
31
Ahem...let me just say that while I stand by my earlier comments about Obama, he was still the best choice out of a field of bad choices. If I had know he would be Mr. Milquetoast going in, I would still have voted for him. McCain has gone off the deep end. Can you imagine that administration?

Looking forward, I wish there was a viable option to him, but there isn't yet. But the GOP candidate will probably be either Huckabee or Romney. Romney may not be so bad, but Huckabee's an ordained Baptist minister, for Christ's sake.
32
24 danfan503
I know just how you feel! I really want to be wrong on this one.
33
Lose a generation of what? Obama supporters or democrats?

Any idiot who, disgusted by Obama, switches parties to vote for republicans is either completely unaware of politics or is too stupid to even know what they support and believe in.

I don't vote for specific politicians, I vote on issues. Anyone who does otherwise should do everyone a favor and just stay home on election days.
34
@30 ... agreed... and yet, we HAVE enemies.
35
"I honestly believe his whole presidency will be defined here and now. If he backs down on this one, he will lose an entire generation."

Please spare us this bullshit!

Why is it Progressives don't understand that Obama is hamstrung because there simply isn't enough democratic votes to pass a cloture motion in the Senate. This morning's votes on the tax cuts is a prime example. The cloture vote needed 60 D's and it got 53 votes.

He realizes the votes aren't there, but most liberals apparently don't. This morning's votes in the Senate to extend the tax cuts for those making under 250K and expire for the so called rich failed for this reason, and this in in a lame duck congress with 60 supposed Democrats eligible to vote. The majority in the Senate will be weakened further when the new Congress is installed in January and the house will go over to Republican control.

Obama has three choices:

1. Veto any bill that comes to his desk on tax cuts. Therefore raising taxes on everyone rich and poor.

2 Compromise: allowing the tax cuts to continue for everyone in exchange for extending unemployment. benefits.

3. Support what every the tax group he's put together recommends, which will probably be a variation of number two.

The progressive leadership crisis is in the legislative branch of government not in the executive branch. Obama is not a king.

Now that we've had our "symbolic" votes in the Congress on whether to extend the tax cuts for only people making under 250K but not those over 250K, which passed in the house but failed in the Senate, I wish liberals would shut up about Obama "losing an entire generation." This it poppycock, and also blames him for something he for the most part has no control over.

I suppose we'd all like Obama to go on a nationwide tour for the next two weeks and call Republican "heartless bastards who only care about the rich" because it would make us liberals feel better, but in the end the Republicans are going to have their way because THEY HAVE THE VOTES.

This is not Obama's fault, because he's a realist apparently. It's the lame ass Blue Dogs, conservative Democrats and the poor leadership in the Senate that should take the blame.

36
After reading the latest Krugman, and watching this dust-up about taxes and unemployment benefits and the freeze on federal pay, I have about fallen off the Obamabus. What exactly was wrong with HRC? Having a hard time remembering. And Edwards, who turned out to be extremely careless, did help swing the primaries to Barack. I haven't lost hope, but I am losing track.

(For the record, I have been predicting my gloomier friends that Obama and Co. will get elected in 2012. I am not sure I care if I am right now.)
37
Yes, I agree with Charles. He can play chess all he wants but he can't give up the king.
38
Yes. I think it will come down to this. For myself, I'm already hanging by a thread, but some spine, some leadership, some skin in the game by Obama would change everything. Fuck deals, just say no.
39
you were all warned, every day, during the primary, for more than a year.

but no, you didn't listen.

the remedy is not in them but in us; until we organize and demand real social democrats, until we stop reelecting feckless spineless democrats, it's entirely our fault.

and from el pais, via wikileaks:
La Embajada de Estados Unidos en Madrid ha desplegado en los últimos años importantes recursos para frenar o boicotear las causas judiciales abiertas en España contra políticos y militares estadounidenses presuntamente involucrados en casos de torturas en Guantánamo, crímenes de guerra en Irak o secuestros en los vuelos de la CIA. La legación diplomática estadounidense ha dejado constancia escrita de esa actividad en algunos de sus miles de documentos secretos, clasificados o reservados a los que ha tenido acceso EL PAÍS.

Who can support someone who doesn't go after torturers? Torturers.

They even call waterboarding torture in don quijote de la mancha. It's been known as torture a long, long, long long time.
We're the ones not doing anything about it.
40
The only way you could have been fooled into not seeing Obama is/was a centrist would be if you couldn't get past how superbly black he was....yes, loony left racists.

So I'll vote Obama 2012 no problem!
41
If Obama doesn't shape up and start actually standing for something other than "bipartisanship", and SOON, then I'm going to start hoping that his ass gets primaried in 2012. I mean it. I am so sick and tired of him being a spineless Dem who caves and cowers and lets Republicans walk all over him - and by extension, everyone like me who supported him! I'm ok with compromise, but only if it's a compromise between the left and the right, NOT the center-right and the hard right! You can have your pound of flesh, but I want mine too!

If any Dems with actual backbone are out there; have the standing, charisma, and talent to mount a serious primary challenge to Barack Obama in 2012 and then win the general; and are willing to take the risk for our country's good - I hope you are getting your exploratory committees formed, because if Obama doesn't register a large and believable change between now and primary day, you've got my vote!
42
So far, the only thing Obama has consistently and unshakenly stood for is the notion that consistently and unshakenly standing for anything is bad. Centrism, conciliation, compromise, and bipartisanship are all so good, apparently, that everything else can and should be sacrificed to it? Even when millions of ordinary people are being crushed under the weight of the worst spell of unemployment since the Great Depression and strong government action is desperately needed to counter it; even when the other side shows no interest in given concessions of any kind; even when the Democrats had large majorities in both houses of Congress and the voters and given Obama a mandate to change things, he accepted a total dearth of results. Health care was made much, much weaker than it could have been and the only reason it happened at all was Nancy Pelosi, bless her. Financial Reform, too, was weakened so much that it may well fail to prevent another crisis. Climate Legislation didn't happen at all. The filibuster was allowed to be used without penalty to block anything and everything. We had a huge opportunity to turn this country in a much better direction, and Obama BLEW IT.

If Obama doesn't shape up and start actually standing for something other than "bipartisanship", and SOON, then I'm going to start hoping that his ass gets primaried in 2012. I mean it. I am so sick and tired of him being a spineless Dem who caves and cowers and lets Republicans walk all over him - and by extension, everyone like me who supported him! I'm ok with compromise, but only if it's a compromise between the left and the right, NOT the center-right and the hard right! You can have your pound of flesh, but I want mine too!

If any Dems with actual backbone are out there; have the standing, charisma, and talent to mount a serious primary challenge to Barack Obama in 2012 and then win the general; and are willing to take the risk for our country's good - I hope you are getting your exploratory committees formed, because if Obama doesn't register a large and believable change between now and primary day, you've got my vote!
43
I have begun to think that in forming his coalition of "all voices," Obama has failed to bring in genuine progressive voices from the left. In trying to balance his government in the center he has not brought those voices who support his own ideas in and he has been overwhelmed with bad advice. In particular the religious segment he has on speed dial are not progressive voices at all. Where is his UCC, UU, or Quaker advisor? I wish.
44
Oh, this is the moment? Tax breaks?

Not surging in Afghanistan, granting effective immunity to a torture regime, backing telecom immunity, prosecuting whistleblowers with more vigor than any preceding president, backing DOMA, or personally authorizing the extrajudicial execution of US citizens? Not continuing the practice of rendering prisoners to be tortured in the third world, or pre-bargaining away a public option?

Huh, interesting. He lost me a LONG time ago.

Please wait...

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