No Shit - Obama: ""People weren’t paying attention to me when I said change is hard."

Look, I understand. I understand that, but remember what the campaign was about -- hope, change. People weren’t paying attention to me when I said change is hard. People -- a lot of folks, they just missed that part. (Laughter.) They were like, hope, change -- (laughter) -- and they thought, nice swearing-in, you got Bruce Springsteen singing. (Laughter.) Everybody is feeling good. This is going to happen fast. (Laughter.)

Well, no. If it was easy, it would’ve happened before. If it was easy, we would have put in place mileage standards on cars 30 years ago, 40 years ago, 50 years ago -- on trucks. We didn’t do it, because it’s hard.


http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0510/Change_can_be_scary.html?showall

:rofl:

could shit in the woods, the other said they couldn't - the folks in charge of the poll put honey on the button that said they could, thus marring the poll with inaccuracy.

:rofl:

now PUSH!!!!!

to his fur. The rabbit said no. So the bear wiped his butt with the rabbit.

Which is why the USA PATRIOT Act was passed within weeks of 9/11, granting the government sweeping surveillance powers. And why Congress was able to meddle in the affairs of the Schiavo family so successfully. And why a few mere comments to the right people outed Valerie Plame, turned U.S. Attorneys offices all over the country into local headquarters for the Republican National Committee and gave us Supreme Court Justices Alito and Roberts.

It ain't raining, but for some reason my leg is wet.

It's hard work....
:eyes:

:eyes:

:banghead:

Fucking things up royally? Easy. Hell, give me a week at the reigns and I can send us back to the stone age.

Fixing that which is fucked up? Hard.

What's Obama waiting for? CNN did a poll (http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2010/images/05/25/rel8bt6.pdf) that shows well over three-quarters of the people think gays should be allowed to serve openly in the military. This number has been that high for three years. This isn't hard, unless the administration thinks it's the president for 20% of the hide-bound bigots instead of the other 80% of the country.

It's the right thing to do, there's no political price to be paid, it has a proven record all over the world that it doesn't reduce military effectiveness, and still we make an entire segment of the populace second class citizens, guilty by suspicion. But our tax dollars continue to support this naked prejudice.

But since when has Congress exactly mirrored the American populace? Since when has the Senate, with 2 members each deriving disproportionately from rural, Republican states, reflected a populist view?

"You people are unhappy -- your fault. Change is hard."

It doesn't even make sense.

change is so hard that there won't really be any

Yeah, you can anything passed within weeks of the single biggest attack by a foreign entity on American soil in centuries. How you readily dismiss this is utterly beyond me.

Damned straight. I really wonder if FDR could make equivalent inroads today. There was an oligarchy then as there is today, but I think smart, progressive folks in politics had a little more maneuvering room back then, without an idiot mainstream media and a dumbed down populace, and such hegemonic saturation of every mechanism of institutional change.

I believe in my heart that an FDR style message against the wealthy corporate interests would have created so much public support the MSM spin would have been pissing in the wind. I think the conciliatory stance towards the corporate powers who have destroyed our country has been the problem.

That said, I am more convinced now than I ever was that our elected officials' hands are tied. I did not think that, so much, when * was in office. He was in favor of corporate control of our world. I still believe (maybe because I want to believe) that President Obama ran for office because he wanted to do better for the average person. Believing that can only lead me to the conclusion that the forces aligned against us (and possibly, him) are more powerful than we imagine.

are as anti-Obama as usual.

Change is hard, when you appoint the same people who got us into this mess, to get us out of it.

Change is hard, when you continue so many of the same bad policies as the last administration.

But it's a little easier when someone who believes in change, believes that he or she is doing the right thing, is standing up and actually leading.

In the meantime, I'll be over here advocating for my interests. Let me know when you feel like leading, Mr. President.

>Let me know when you feel like leading, Mr. President.<

Gosh. It's hard when people actually expect him to keep his word and fulfill his promises, isn't it?

It's also tough to bring about "change" when one relies on the same old, same old advisors, who are much more concerned with their bottom line than what's good for the country.

Moving as slow as possible (or maybe even not at all) on DADT to appease homophobes.
Assassinating Americans abroad.
Giving a pass to states that enable pedophiles.
Sending 1200 troops to protect us from the poor--poor people that our free trade policies have made even poorer.
Reinstating federal benefits for L&G employees repealed by Bush, then having your DOJ try to shut down those policies.
Expanding Afghanistan War into Pakistan.
Failure and outright lies on Iraq pull out.
Expansion of Bagram torture facility.
Gitmo?

What's the difference between Obama & McCain? Obama send 1200 troops to the AZ border and McCain wants 6000. That's the "left" in this country. Fuck. That's not even a center.

It's Right-Wing Versus Proto-Fascist.

Actions speak louder than words and Obama just does a whole lot of talking.

As the song goes.

PS. It gets harder to change things when you don't try hard enough.

he sold and certainly not what we voted for.
:thumbsup:

Most "changes" made so far have been to ratify the changes initiated by Bush. So far.

We'll see if President Obama has finally had this wake-up call: NeoCon/DLC bad, Progressive good.

And I cringed then, because as you say, it was his predecessors claim as well.

Clinton made fun of George's "compassionate conservatism" line on the same basis.

Clinton's defintion of compassionate conservatism. "We'd like to help the poor and disadvantage, but it's too hard".

The Audacity of Hype, Brand Obama style, is more like it.

Bitter. You betcha. I'm god damn bitter right now.



Catherina. Legal Alien. Alien nonetheless.

but so did many of my close personal friends, and the ones of those who were behind him from the start, and not say behind Edwards/Clinton/Kucinich etc, now RARELY even mention him or politics anymore. And nearly everyone I talk to regularly (about 10-15 people) do not trust him and are very tepid in their support.

THIS is his own fault. I cannot believe he would be so naive to go into this job and not know that they were going to force him to prove he's the president with action by the Atty Gen/FBI/pushing Congress/US atty's/Courts etc, to stop them from screwing up his plans.

Which means, he's a bit too corporatist in his beliefs as a centrist, because he is not dumb.

They said more than half of the country disapproves of how he has handled the BP oil spill. That will climb when it starts coming ashore more throughout the next month.

I keep waiting for him to inflict the full force of the US gov't on the criminals and it just doesn't seem to ever happen.

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DO NOT like...

who should have won the primary?

:eyes:

has come far too easy.

Now they talk about trashing Net Neutrality; adding to the list of "change" against the American People's voice and democracy

The Party out of power over the past year and a half have virtually set the agenda, apparently "change" isn't too difficult for them.

Thanks for the thread, kpete.

You are doing what the Democrats have been doing for decades: compromising with the very people that are destroying America and the world. We didn't elect you to deal with them, we elected you to fight them.

THAT would be change.

Hello to my fellow Santa Rosa denizen. How are you DH?

Just got back from the city and am taking a little DU break. And you?

I work at the local PBS NPR affiliate and we are setting up a booth for the event. I have jet lag from a trip to Austin and don't really feel like working too hard. Man where is the sun?

So enjoy it while you can before it disappears again!

We need to plan a DU Sonoma Co meet & greet. There are quite a few of us in these parts. I will PM you once I begin to organize.

Look forward to it!

:hi:

"I hope he doesn't give in to RW pressure, anymore."

I hope for that as well, but I'm not holding my breath.

The day he picked Rahm Emanuel as chief of staff, and then the rest of the cabinet went down hill from there.

ignore those accomplishments. And more change is coming. DADT is about to be repealed. Financial regulatory reform is about to be passed. A new energy bill is on it's way.

Yes, change is hard - and slow. But it is happening, slowly but surely.

Um, you got RICK WARREN up there, not just Springsteen.

That, you could do right away.

Guns in national parks, you could change right away.

Surges in Afghanistan you could do right away.

Funding and accepting the SOFA you could do right away.

Oh, but, it isn't "right away" any longer. It's 16 months. You remember, the same amount of time you said it would take to get out of Iraq. That, we're not suppose to remember. We're not suppose to remember you said that DADT would be repealed in the first 100 days. We're not suppose to remember you campaigned FOR the public option, AGAINST cadillac taxes and mandates.

But you'd said it was "hard". Yeah, I remember, and I cringed, because that's what Bush used to say.

..we got the invisible man... instead of a caped crusader...

harry f'ing potter is something else all together.

I think he's pretty super, myself. I wonder how say - you - or anyone else on DU would fare - in the same role? (all except that guy who can "guarantee he's do a better job" - that just made me laugh. A lot.

First off, I wouldn't start by loading my cabinet with Bush-Bots like Geithner, Summers and Bernake.. the very people who caused the depression in the first place.

let us know when you run for office, m'kay?

:rofl:

When and if you try.

It's easy to bail out main street. It's easy to ignore malfeasance by oil companies. Dear Mr. President, STFU until you are going to help your average, every day American. Cut our military budget by 10%. That would go a far way towards feeding the starving.

Did that not signal we needed to change and change fast?

Do we have 40-50 years to solve global warming?
Do we 20 years to get health care right?
How long until we close Guantanamo or stop the wars?

How insulting he is to his supporters! We are just a a bunch of pollyannas
waiting for the O to wave a magic wand. We are now just a bunch
of immature brats stomping our feet.

from an anti-war speech.

which makes it even sadder

everything they can to thwart change. They are the "brats".

for not paying attention.

Pronouncing imminent failure as a reason for not even trying is something that we tolerate in 3rd graders, not the POTUS.
:kick: & R

From the link:

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Move faster on “don’t ask, don't tell”!

AUDIENCE: Boo!

THE PRESIDENT: It’s good to see you again.

AUDIENCE: Yes, we can! Yes, we can! Yes, we can! Yes, we can!


Chanting and condescending doesn't trump civil rights but it's a lot easier.

That would have been much better than Romney Care but harder in that it goes against Modern Republican Values, the ones that destroyed our economy and national security.

Yes, I was listening to you saying Change is Hard. That's why I thought you wouldn't take the easy road and endorse more offshore drilling-- we could do that later-- I thought you would take the hard road of decentralizing our power sources-- getting hundreds of thousands of solar, wind and conservation projects up and running-- putting millions of us back to work while Republicans shouted about how horribly socialist that was.

Yes I was listening to you saying Change is Hard. That's why I thought you wouldn't push for more nuclear plants just to show you could stand up to environmentalists-- that's not hard. That's easy. Standing up to fossil fuel giants is hard.

Standing up to giant multinational corporations is hard-- shoving millions of people full of hope for a new FDR aside is easy-- we've been trampled for decades. We're used to it.

Try shoving multinational corporate power aside-- that is the "Change is Hard" that I believed you wanted to pursue.

Its just tooooo hard.

"Yes We Can!"...has morphed into
"We said we would, but it was tooooo hard..Waaaa"

America will just have to settle for MUCH LESS Health Care than the rest of the civilized WORLD takes for granted because....
Real Change was too hard for the "Centrists", and would have made their friends, the Republicans and CEOs, uncomfortable.
Waaaa.

"Excuses" sounds like some hard assed high school teacher. Unpleasant people you work for, who are mean and usually conservative, who give no one a break and refuse to understand the pressures on another. Liberals I think of as more tolerant. I am surprised to see liberals using such language.

I associate it with right wingers - the mean, you're never doing enough, it's not good enough attitude that they tend to have.

Bleeding heart liberals are not judgmental. And that behavior is.

If you have an opinion about "Centrists", you have earned some credibility in that area.

Just at different people? Like the ones who actually have to do the shit?

I bet you're just a joy to have as a patient or client. Or parent. That would be the worst.

I am aware of mine.

One of the great paradoxes:
Calling someone else "judgmental".

No one can say anything else is judgmental because to say so is judgmental. Got it.

shame on you

Don't sound very liberal to me. they sound more like martinets. It's odd. Am I not allowed to comment on that? I thought liberals were all for free speech.

It's very odd and does not ring true.

"There's no excuse." "not fast enough." They sound like mean bosses.

I think of liberals as willing to consider the failings of others.

:wow: pot kettle.

Insinuating that other people don't know what "hard" is? I bet 9 out of 10 people in the progressive base know what "hard' is more immediately than he ever will.

He took on a bigger job and in fact here he always said he expected us to be part of it. Of course it's hard. And there are people who don't seem to recognize that and are reacting as though they thought it would be easy.

We did, however, think he would put up a better fight. Instead, we've gotten bipartisan capitulation on many key issues & outright right wing policies on many others.

He has squandered an opportunity that we may never have again.

Unfortunately it seems fairly easy to toss any change that may go toward the left into the bin while embracing every right wing half assed bit of nonsense in the name of being "bipartisan"

or not it was hard.

In the meantime, I want my old screen name back. That would be a change I can believe in.

shit, 19 hijackers changed this country in one morning.

Praise be to corporations! :eyes:

:evilgrin:

No wait... that was the other guy.

The bankers still run the show. We're still fighting pointless wars. Government privilege and secrecy remain unchecked.

I'm wondering just what freaking change he is talking about.

;)

Judging from the continuation of many, many Bush policies.

Change is hard, my fucking ass.

On edit: minus a few bones thrown to progressives here and there....

Yeah, no shit - McCain would've been probably 10 times worse; but still the overall direction of this administration is to the right of the status quo.

If anyone merits the breaking of the 20-something amendment, this guy does.

He can do some real reorganizing if he has a decade to work with.

Anyone with me?

That idea is fucked

I heard him say it's hard. I know it's hard. Silly me, I believed he would fight the hard fight for US, not the repukes. I thought he was up to the task. Jesus, what a con job.

would be sooooooooooooo much better?

yeah. right. sure.

Is that all you people can come up with? That's a pretty fucking low bar, isn't it? Well, he's better than McCain/Palin!!11!!

I want him to do the things he fucking said he would do. Fierce advocate, my ass.

following the obviousness of that, then what else can one surmise?

If you HAD NOT have worked your ass off and voted for him and all the others who voted for him and now "wish they hadn't" -well, if you had your way and all "had your votes back - just WHERE THE F? do you think we'd be right now, eh?

Cause. Effect.

YMMV.

But maybe people are wishing they had supported someone else in the primary so they could have voted for a real liberal. Maybe people are getting tired of being shown a liberal candidate only to be shown the door once they are elected and put corporations, money, power and political considerations before the people who got them where they are.

As my aunt mable used to say, "if wishes were wings, frogs wouldn't bust their butts everytime they hopped."

I took as your saying you wish you'd've voted for McPalin - even if that "vote" was a vote not taken. . . and those people who are saying they WON"T vote for Obama in 2012 - well, IF there's a primary candidate - I'd certainly take a look, but if it's Obama and one of the republican ijits, then I'll pull his lever with absolutely NO hesitation.

was a magical being.. and when he turned out to be human slogging it through.. he was suddenly not "good" enough

magical being is something obama loyalists assigned to those who dare to criticize him, EVER. Nice! :eyes:

like that I am speaking to you in a condescending way (in fact I was not speaking to you.. who are you by the way? I was replying to the op).. If it does.. well then we have a case of who owns the problem..

hahahahaha! :eyes:

I mean, he and they are just openly laughing at us. It's a little frightening, actually.

No problem there.

:eyes:

Always easier to tear down than put up.

Puhleeze! :eyes:

Wanna borrow my glasses? (And no, they're not rose-colored.)

So what exactly has Obama changed?

1. Significantly, he buried the Imperial Presidency of George Bush and restored the Constitutional balance of government by respecting the equal standing of the legislative branch of government. As a former constitutional law professor, this is a major matter of change of tone and style that he promised during the campaign, and he has delivered. (Not pretty or necessarily effective given the Reid-less leadership in the Senate, but we are a constitutional democracy.)

2. Passed and signed the stimulus package, the biggest piece of legislation--ever--in blinding speed, thus being able to start to stabilize the economy, with GDP now projected to grow at the rate of 3 percent by the end of the year. Check the comeback of your 401K since Obama has taken over.

3. Stabilized the top 20 banks without federalizing them.

4. Reduced the rate of foreclosures inherited from the Bush administration.

5. Signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act that makes it easier to sue for wage discrimination, a dramatic reversal of the bill's fortunes under Bush.

6. Granted regulatory power to the FDA to control tobacco products, another dramatic reversal of the Bush years that industry has lobbied hard to prevent.

7. Signed the Matthew Shepard Hate Act that expanded federal hate crime protection to categories of sexual orientation and gender, to the major consternation of the Religious Right.

8. Killed the F-22 fighter jet program, a popular program with Congress, saving billions of dollars.

9. With a stroke of a pen, enacted, by executive order, (see correction below in comments, it was a bill signing) the largest conservation measure in 15 years, spanning the Bush and Clinton records.

10. Implement an electronic medical record system before any healthcare legislation was introduced. This new technology will be singularly responsible for saving lives and reducing the high administrative costs of healthcare, a key element of reform.

11. Extended a $2500 tax credit to 5 million families to help with college tuition.

12. Cooperated with Japan in bringing a $5 billion stabilization package for Pakistan.

13. Engaged the Muslim world in a dialogue, beginning with his unprecedented speech in Cairo, followed by an interview with Al Arabiya, and face-to-face discussions with Iran, a total reversal of the Bush years of Muslim baiting and hate.

14. Dramatically reversed the reputation of the United States around the world, with now most nations looking favorably on the US, and receiving the Nobel Peace Prize as one consequence.

15. Agreed to plan for bringing the troops home from Iraq, at a slower pace than what he promised, but based on knowledge that commanders-in-chief, not candidates, have.

16. Brought the White House online, doing for the White House what he had done for political campaigning. There are now online Q&A's with the administration, and a White House blog.

17. Released the names of all visitors to the White House, a total reversal of the secret Bush years.

18. Told Mexico that the US is responsible for some of their drug problems, a no small, but truthful admission.

19. Restored the rights of states to regulate the medical use of marijuana without fear of federal law enforcement intrusion.

20. Banned the use of torture, and he has begun a complete review of the torture policies under Bush.

21. Appointed the first Latina to the Supremes: Imagine what would have happened to the Supreme Court under four more years of radical Republicans. Obama has thus averted a long-term dramatic swing to the extreme right on the court, and appointed a progressive to keep matters in check.

http://bestoftheblogs.com/Home/22497

taking over something, come in hard and strong and you don't have to be nice. Once things are moving your way you can start backing off and getting nicer. Come in nice, everyone will walk on you and it is harder to go from being tough to nice then nice to tough.