Obama Rocks The House In Baltimore

“I am not an ideologue.” - President Barack Obama

This was a high point in the entire Obama presidency, and a rare move on behalf of any president to appear in a oppositional party forum to answer questions directed at them on the public record.


This was the clear and transparent dissolving of the talking points and misinformation spread by conservatives at an alarming rate since the election of Barack Obama.


He was polite, concise, accurate and took a great deal more responsibility of his missteps than is common in politics; whereas the questioners seemed to be mostly delivering boiler-plate talking points that resound across conservative-talk mediums but have little factual basis if any at all.


This was a move of a bipartisan, non-ideologue president seeking a solution and not just a ceasing of partisan fires throw at him. What I have serious doubts about is if the Republican opposition can see clearly enough in this atmosphere to hear his simple words about the Health Care Reform being far less than “radical” and his simple statement that if a better plan that cost less and worked was available from Republicans he would gladly implement it.


This is what I believe of President Obama: he is a pragmatist. He will work with those who have solutions that get results and not by simple partisan standards.

Bill Clinton Downplays the Anti-Obama Rhetoric

Former President Bill Clinton appeared on NBC's "Meet The Press" and when asked about the 'vast right-wing conspiracy' that smeared him during his presidency he said this:

GREGORY: "Is it [the right-wing conspiracy] still there?"

CLINTON: "Oh, you bet. Sure it is. It's not as strong as it was, because America's changed demographically, but it's as virulent as it was, .. I mean, they're saying things about him [Obama] -- you know, it's like when they accused me of murder and all that stuff they did,"

I agree with the former president's assessment that we have changed demographically as a nation and that the virulence of the right-wing smear factory is as virulent as ever, but Clinton failed to touch on two critical points surrounding this current crusade of baseless slanders against these two democratically elected leaders.

Point One: The major platform to carry the broken logic of these claims was primarily talk radio when Clinton held the White House. Today these same kind of untrue slanders are carried by FOX News Talk Radio, FOX Cable News, and other talk mediums that include satellite broadcasting which did not even exist within the time he was in office. Then add on top of that a new spinster has come to rival Rush Limbaugh: Glenn Beck.

Point Two: The McCarthyist and anti-democratic rhetoric coming from the right-wing did not start until several years into the Clinton presidency but have begun almost immediately in the Obama presidency. Likely he seeks to try to disempower the media-jackals of FOX News, by evading the heart of the matter of the foundationless smears directed against President Obama he trying to avoid giving them bait.

But it must be said, these smears have propagated themselves in much more virulent manner and much sooner than they did for Clinton. It took them years to get around to accusing him of anything even half as extreme as some of the myths about Obama that have been floated around from several months back. What is worse is the very foundation of this conspiracy is not the same as the one that attacked Clinton. Only the tactics and one of the actors (Limbaugh) remain from that old sideshow.

This is far, far worse and I can not label it anything less than fundamentally un-American. It seeks to undermine our very system of democracy and our very system of public discourse.

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The government is trying to kill you and everyone not with you is a "shill".

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Or ... if it's not the wild conspiracy theories of those like Alex Jones, it's the equally wild claims of those like Glenn Beck.

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The government is trying to control your life and everyone who doesn't think so is a "Marxist".

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All of this is simply designed to sow fear and distrust for both anyone who supports any not of their opinion then simultaneously spread fear about the government at-large. In a democratic society we cannot afford to simply forgo coming to the table to discuss our positions with facts and reason then replace this with media-crusades and continuous vicious untrue labeling without dire consequence. Those who refuse to educate themselves except from known liars need to be recognized as dealt with non-credible.

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The insidious plot that is in play here is of another caliber entirely.

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It is a giant media body larger and the message is wholly anti-democratic then you add that we have race baiting going on against the first African-American president by both Beck and Limbaugh but nobody on the right wing ever cares that they engaged in it.

A certain element of racism exists not just in what Jimmy Carter said about some white people in the US not feeling a black man should lead this great nation, but also within this intense rush to judgment of Barack Obama in terms of the full scope of his presidency.

The matter of those on the right who wished to keep their children home from school because Obama would address the class in a video is more short-term example of this same rush to negative judgment.

I personally will allow no person to wrap themselves in this claim that anyone is saying that everyone anti-Obama is by value of that a racist.

What is disturbing is the number of people who obviously have never looked into what people are calling "racist" or "racialist" on the left but truly have a high level of indignation more about the fact that the issue is being discussed than anything else.

To not even entertain thought long enough to form any kind of argument begs the question if they are within heavy stages of denial.

Make no mistake, once these neo-conservatives no longer have an enemy to publicly defame and lie about they will go right back to trying to get people to vote for The Republican Party.

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And the media in general is not helping by providing massive double standards in their intense questioning of Democrats, but constant softballs to Republicans.

Obama Health Care Speech

Rep. Wilson calls The President of The United States a "liar" at this point in regards to the legislation effecting illegal immigrants; if you failed to hear the audio that caused the interruption.







This was an excellent Address on Health Care by President Obama. All significant issues were cogently addressed, but I found the president should have expounded further upon the specifics of the budget and the concept of "deficit neutrality." Perhaps it is my own failure in understanding but I do not fully understand this notion as it pertains to health care.

I also think this clear explanation was needed much closer to the onset of the national debate instead of at this point in time and also hopefully prior to the town hall debate setting, but I see the issue of Health Care Reform as being underlined and placed in the foreground.

Those who chose not to listen and refute every word Obama speaks will most likely continue to do so.

The issue of a 'failure to sell' Health Care Reform and explain the proposal is put to rest, in my view.

Obama is Not Perfect

Well everyone has to make mistakes, right?

So this is what we got going on that nobody cares enough about you to tell you in the newsmedia:

Obama has dropped the ball on this round of health care reform.

This is not the say he is now failing as president, or anything else the hate-mongers on the rightwing are sure to say.

But this is the first major misstep of The 44th US President.

There are a whole multitude of reasons, most of which very technical and are not coming to mind right now, (and very boring to cover) but as I prefer to 'cut to the chase' I'll just say it like this:

Obama and The Democrats have failed, and failed utterly, to properly sell good health care reform to be proposed in the Congress.

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I'm going to give you all a brief lesson in sales ... pay attention:

The first thing you do is explain the value. Is this highly valuable or moderately valuable or barely valuable? Are we talking about a gold-plated coffee maker, or a plastic one? Is this car made for the long haul, or just for going to the store and back?

The second thing you do is explain the benefits. Are these the greatest benefits you could possibly have or just fine benefits or perhaps no benefit exists at all? Will you be better off in a few seconds after owning this or will you be better off in two months or will you never be better for owning this?

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All the Democrats and President Obama have succeeded in doing at this stage is explaining what this bill won't do.

Not one of them has succeeded in properly conveying the value and benefit of public health care options, nor have they properly conveyed the value and benefit of saving money in a exasperated system.

Call me vastly arrogant, but I feel they need to put my over-the-top with conviction self on this issue. I am a Progressive Reformist to the bone, and I think perhaps that is exactly what is lacking in the Democratic Party these days.

It seems to me the political will to get this done is floating away from the Democrats now that we are faced with actually doing it. After years of campaigning on health care reform, specifically what we are talking about as to medical insurance reform, these same people seem to lost their thunder as the moment in upon them to roar.

I chalk this up to the nature of people and nature of the real world.

President Obama has done an excellent job in terms of foreign affairs and the national security agenda, but seems to have some trouble working toward this particular domestic policy agenda at this time.

In the end, we the people cannot rely on any one political figure or any one group to get what we need from our government.

The fight goes on, and if they fail to achieve meaningful reform then we will pick up this battle once more in days yet to come.

And perhaps in those days yet to be before us, someone can explain clearly and passionately why we need health care reform in the US.

One can only hope....