So how about the Palin announcement? Do you think she is going to run for President? Who is more afraid of her – the Democrats or the Republicans?
How is Obama doing? Has he met or exceeded your expectations (in either direction)?
Anybody attend a Tea Party on July 4th? Wouldn’t be caught dead at one?
We haven’t talked politics here in several months so I thought I would throw it open for a friendly discussion. Just a reminder that we have a wide range of political views represented here, so feel free to pick politicians and their actions apart, but don’t attack their supports no matter how sorely you are tempted.
For the record, here are a few of my general thoughts. And if you are new to this blog and haven’t seen our previous political discussions, I am quite conservative. Conservative, not Republican. There is a profound difference these days.
Obama has been even less effective than I expected. To be fair, I think anyone who would be president right now would have a tough time of it. But I have to say that I’m not seeing any of this brilliance that was supposed to be oozing out of his very being, even in accomplishing things that I completely disagree with. He just seems not very together or sure of himself. The man supposedly has everything going for him in terms of Congress and such, but you would never know it. Our enemies clearly are not afraid of him and his presence in the White House is clearly emboldening them. Appeasement never works and that seems to be the only thing he knows how to pull out of his bag of tricks. That concerns me as much as the horrible financial mess we are in that he is steadily making worse.
Re: Sarah Palin. I think she strikes fear in the hearts of a lot of people for different reasons. The Republican leadership has to be scared spitless of her because if she could somehow run as an Independent, it would totally decimate the Republican vote. The Republicans are so lost and adrift that they have no clue what is going on. All of this talk about her being stupid? I don’t buy it. I don’t know how brilliant she is, but she’s not stupid. I’m guessing she is quite shrewd. It should be very interesting to see what happens over the next few weeks and months.
I haven’t been to a Tea Party yet.
So, what say you about the state of things in America?
Elizabeth Anne
“Our enemies clearly are not afraid of him and his presence in the White House are clearly emboldening them. ”
Sallie, could you clarify this for me? I haven’t seen anything to suggest that’s the case, but I’m in my third trimester so a lot of stories are slipping past me these days!
Sallie @ a quiet simple life
Two words: North Korea
Ok, that is really the short version. But who in the world would be afraid of him? I mean that seriously. I’m not trying to be flippant here. I sincerely think our security has taken a huge nosedive with Obama in office. I fully realize the situations in the Middle East and such are complicated. But four days of hacking our computers? And all of the other stuff going on? They are clearly emboldened and testing the waters. Or at least it seems clear to me. Maybe someone else wants to offer another perspective.
Marianna
Re Obama: I have a much different perspective on his stance with our enemies…my husband is from North Africa and I can unequivocally say that they are much more open to America and Americans at the moment given Obama’s acceptance of their culture/religion (the two are so entertwined it is impossible to seperate them.) I can’t help but feel that the same is true throughout the Middle East. Showing reasonable respect towards people, IMO, can never be a bad policy. I believe that North Korea was being provacative as much as 18 months ago…in other words before Obama came into office. As to Iran…what is happening there would be happening regardless of who we put in office. Outside of Pakistan and Korea, one of Obama’s biggest foreign policy problems at the moment is Netanyahu.
The main disappointment I’ve had is his expansion of government (a compensation czar??) I know, he’s a Democrat what did you expect? but I think it’s gone beyond even the norm for the Dems.
Palin: I’m not sure if she’s crazy or brilliant. I think the jury is still out on that one:) I do think you are right in saying that the Republicans are scared of her…and probably should be. The biggest issue I see with her is that she’s dangerously close to becoming a cartoon character. Is this the media’s fault? To a degree, yes. But she isn’t doing much to help her case these days. My dad is a died in the wool redneck and even he has a hard time with her…and not just because she’s a woman! Part of me almost thinks she is trying too hard to prove that she is just a good old girl instead of focusing on simply being Sarah Palin.
Ann
Palin….
I think her political career is over. If she had wanted one, she would have stuck with the governor job.
She is now going to try to cash in on her popularity with books, speeches, etc.
And good for her.
But politics, she is done, and I know for myself, I would never support her again.
On Obama, eh. He’s not surprising me, he’s exactly what I thought he would be.
Sallie @ a quiet simple life
Marianna – Thanks for sharing a different perspective re: Obama.
Ann – Do you think Palin’s core supporters will care that she stepped down from her governor’s job? I’m not so sure they will hold that against her. And if things continue to go from bad to worse in this country over the next couple years… Who knows what might happen?
Just playing a little devil’s advocate here. 😉
Peggy
I would try to get to a Tea Party, if I knew of one in my area, and take a good sign or two. There was one in the capital a while back that I missed.
I don’t know whether Palin just wants a break from the viciousness of politics as it is practiced today, or if she is getting things lined up for a Presidential campaign. I’m hoping for the latter. I don’t think she’s done being a political figure. It’s more like she’s just getting started.
Obama has had some surprising missteps. He is moving faster on his agenda than I expected–what is he going to do for the rest of his term?! Wait…I see that I can answer that one myself: he will devote all his energies to getting re-elected. He has been campaigning all along.
Congress: I hope this pattern of ramming through enormous bills without even reading them really backfires on the Democrats in the next election. But my impression of the Republicans is that they are not well-poised to take advantage of the Democrats’ irrational legislative exuberance. I wasn’t too sad about Franken edging past Coleman in the recount until I remembered that senators serve a six-year term.
Elizabeth Anne
Sallie, I have to agree with Marianna. North Korea pulled the exact same stuff 3 years ago with President Bush in office. And there quite simply hasn’t been enough time for the stimulus to really work. At the least I really don’t think the new administration has made anything worse, and I don’t think they’ve done anything different on that front than the previous administration would have done. In fact, they more or less continued what Bush had started. We were warned before any of this got underway that it was going to take 12 months for any sign of recovery to show, that it WAS going to get worse before it got better. And if we think about how bad we thought it might get back then, we’re doing a lot better than we might have.
I can’t exactly say I’m an Obama fan – I knew when he was elected that a lot of people were going to be very disappointed. But I do think he’s doing better than McCain would have done, as several of the Senator’s comments to the press in the last couple of months have shown.
Palin I’m not sure on. I think I would really enjoy hanging out and drinking beer with her. I like a lot of things about her personally. I also think she has a personality that is poorly suited to national office. She’s feisty, which I love, but she has a tendency to hang on an insult like the proverbial pit bull. Stories that would have faded fast end up getting extra days in the press because she wants to keep fighting them. It’s an instinct I well understand, but I wouldn’t put MYSELF up for national office, either.
Tea Parties I think are poorly named, since the original tea party was in reaction to an ELIMINATION of a tax (namely the lifting of tariffs on the East India Co.), but I ain’t one to poop on anyone else’s party.
Carol
All one has to do to see that he is truly under-performed beyond our wildest imagination is to take a look at our debt. To say we have to give it more time is a serious mis-statement. In Obama’s time in office he has put our nation in debt OVER the amount from George Washington to George W. Bush all put together…to give Obama more times means basically the US as we know it will cease to exist. He is truly scary…our enemies are laughing their heads off at the man who has usurped his way into the oval office. Now he wants us to let the US Government make our medical decisions for us and ration out our healthcare. Woe to you if you are elderly or chronically ill…..or put another way the funeral business will be booming if Obama has his way. I truly believe that and it doesn’t take much research to draw these conclusions.
Good post!
Elizabeth Anne
Usurped? I keep hearing people use this word, and (to quote Inigo Montoya), I do not think it means what you think it means. To usurp means to seize and hold illegally, without right. You don’t have to like the guy. You are certainly well within your rights to think he’s doing a terrible job. But he was legally elected by a clear majority.
Richard
It’s interesting reading what people think is wrong or right with this country. Blame Bush, Obama, Democrats or Republicans, it’s a waste of time. If people want to know who is responsible for the mess we are in, they only have to look in the mirror. People don’t want to know the truth, they want their materialistic imaginations full filled by their governemnt representatives. Their representatives will give them what they want. We don’t need to pay our bills, that’s the old economics. We are better than our parents, grandparents and we can create gold and wealth from nothing. We can give our jobs away and support other countries and give all kinds of aid to countries, because we are better and we have no accountability. Gee, we can see a lot by looking in the mirror. You have to admit, people are great.
Ann
I agree, I don’t think her core supporters will care that she stepped down.
However, I don’t think she will get enough support from the wider Republican audience that she could ever win a presidential primary, especially after quitting. And I don’t think the big party powers-that-be (donors, etc) will support her either anymore, not that they were ever going to.
I think that was actually part of the calculation. She concluded she didn’t have a chance in 2012 so she decided to cash in on her popularity now and strike while the iron is hot with other money-making activities. Smart if you ask me!
Carol
There are two reason I use the word usurp….and yes, I do know the meaning of the word…it’s silly to take shots at folks who don’t hold your views. There is a reason you keep hearing people use that word in regards to Obama. There is no proof that Obama is a citizen of the US. He has habitually blocked access to his birth certificate and posted a phony one online as well as blocking access to his school records. If there’s no problem than Mr. Transparency should be transparent. It may be conspiracy theory but showing the proof would clear it up. The other reason I use the word usurp is because there were numerous instances of illegal voting shenanigans that went on with his buddies at ACORN. A clear majority vote…perhaps…it’s just a shame we’ll never know for sure. It may be he does not hold the office illegally….I just wonder why the secrecy…why all the attorneys and money to hide his records?
Elizabeth Anne
Carol, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to take shots at you. But you might want to take a look at this:
http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/born_in_the_usa.html
Staff members from FactCheck.org did, in fact, easily get a hold of the birth certificate, which WAS the same as the one posted online. Fact Check is a non-partisan organization that has, in my experience, been fairly good at being a neutral clearing house of information. They have pictures of them holding the actual certificate, as well as images from the Honolulu newspaper from 1961 containing the announcement of Barack Obama’s birth, in Honolulu.
Carol
I’ve read factcheck.org. I”ve also read sites like wnd.com. You see, it’s easy to find sites that tell you what you want to hear. One is left to try and decipher fact from fiction. So the question remains…why would Obama need to spend over a million dollars to NOT release his true birth certificate AND his school records?? He has done that. Numerous sites verify the birth certificate shown is a fake. They have Obama’s grandmother saying twice that she witnessed him being born….in Kenya. Was she lying?? Conspiracy maybe…..maybe not. ACORN fraud….without a doubt truth. The debt he has saddled on the back of current and future American’s is obscene.
I understand lots of people want this man they call president to be all they had “hoped”. The America I live in has become a place where fear is the word of the day…lack of hope pervades our country….It is not a safe place to be if you are unborn or elderly. It may not be a safe place for anyone if Obama’s foreign policies are totally put in place. I don’t like the change Obama has brought….Quite frankly it scares me. I guess that’s what it boils down to for me.
Kate
Re: Palin
I like Palin a lot, but I hope she stays out of politics now so that I can continue to respect her. She sited family reasons for giving up her seat as governor, so if she were to run for president, she would be throwing her family right back into the fire… only worse. For that reason only I hope that she stays away from politics and puts her talents to good use somewhere else.
Zan
I love Palin. I watched her resignation speech and don’t understand why nobody gets it. She resigned because she was ineffective as govenor due to all the distractions from litigation. She transfered power to someone who could carry out her administrations policies more effectively. So, a politician actually put their constituency before their political career. I guess that this is unheard of in American politics and that may be why none of the pundits really “get it”. Yes, she will make a ton of money and be a major conservative voice out there…that was going to happen anyway.
I think that pundits (I hate to say it) really think that mainstream America is deeper than they really are. The reason Obama was elected is because the economy was tanking and they didn’t like the war. It was also cool that he was black and was well spoken (still is…as long as TOTUS is working properly). Very few Americans look at the issues unless they are ideologues. Most mainstream voting Americans want financial stability and peace (we got this under Clinton). If America’s economy is tanking and N. Korea and Iran are doing their war thing than Sarah Palin (or whoever the Republican nominee is) will be a shoe-in. That’s my opinion.
I’ve talked to many people (professional, smart people) and they don’t have a clue about the issues. They just know that the economy is bad and that it’s Bush’s fault and they were tired of the war and that was Bush’s fault, too. Maybe they’re just too busy to take a look at the real issues.
Must stop. Very busy today.
Michelle
Carol you state that there is no proof that Obama is a citizen. I’m sorry, but I really don’t understand that. Obama’s mother was a citizen. This automatically makes him a citizen. One can be a “natural born citizen” by simply having an American parent. My husband and I are Americans but our son was born abroad. We immediately received a birth certificate from the US consulate titled “Report of a US citizen born abroad.” You don’t get more natural born than that 🙂
We live in Hawaii now and I have no doubt that Obama was born here. The idea that his American mother gave birth in Kenya , then flew back to Hawaii where the entire family perpetuated an elaborate conspiracy just in case some day he wanted to run for president is a bit of a stretch for me you know. Especially considering it doesn’t even matter since his mother was a citizen.
Sorry I just think this “controversy” detracts from the real and more interesting issues about his presidency.
Carol
Michelle – Obama’s mother was not old enough to confer citizenship on him and his father was not a US citizen. The laws were different then. You may be right…..but why won’t Obama produce the birth certificate OR his school records???? Why has he spent over a million dollars to NOT do that. What’s he hiding?? You are correct that are certainly some real interesting things to be discussed about his presidency…..the load of debt he has produced, his pro-abortion stances, how he wants to ration healthcare in America, how he has put “czars” in place, the cap and tax he wants voted through, how he promised transparency and then his administration added things to the stimulus bill in the middle of night and had it voted on the following day……lots of stuff, but that’s just of the top of my head….
Elizabeth Anne
Probably for the same reason that Palin has gone to such great lengths to not release “proof” that she’s actually Trig’s mother: because being asked to provide any more proof than she already has is downright insulting.
Mary
There is so much to say…Where to start? For me, I’ll just say this:
I am prioritizing more here at home and reading God’s Word.
Zan
This was linked from the Drudge Report. It goes along with what you ladies were discussing. http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=104009
BTW, there is a huge difference between the need to publicize Obama’s birth certificate and Trig’s…(!) Obama is our Commander in Chief and Trig is a baby. Being a natural born citizen of the US is a prereq for being President, proving that your baby is really your’s is not.
I’d like to know why his school records aren’t public.