Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

Obama: History's Verdict?

camouflage said:
A skin-deep understanding you could say. I don't know if the man himself is a cunt... it's a complete mystery how much power any US president has, they must beg and scrape power where they can and the system they're in has it's own imperatives. I see the office of POTUS as probably like being strapped into a sort of giant robotic exo-suite (a Mech, in skiffy-geek speek) that amplifies some of ones own strengths... but also has a mind of its own if that makes sense. Be interesting to see what Trump will do wearing the thing.
Click to expand...

The more I read up on Bernie sanders tbh the more I think he's a bit of a massive cunt too ." Not as bad as Hillary Clinton " is the best I can come up with . But then again you could say that about Dracula or Jeremy Kyle . I'm quite perturbed about a few of things he might have done foreign policy wise if he'd been strapped into the POTUS suit .
 
He did some decent things, some terrible things, and little to ruffle the status quo. What is going to haunt us all for years to come is that his impressive charisma and apparent trustworthiness, enabling him to win two elections, covered up the deficiencies and failures of the Democratic Party just at the point when they most needed to be exposed and understood - i.e. at the peak success/failure of neo-liberalism. You could argue that this wasn't his fault, that if he had been a middle-of-the-road president in some other period he would not have served this function, but history is a fucker you can't dodge with 'ifs' or 'in other circumstances'. He was, sadly, the fresh, shiny, renewed gilding on a rotten piece of furniture. He lacked the ability to grasp how rotten the furniture was, and thus how easy it would be for a PT Barnum to dance in and offer a new gilded chair made of horseshit.
 
Brainaddict said:
. He lacked the ability to grasp how rotten the furniture was, and thus how easy it would be for a PT Barnum to dance in and offer a new gilded chair made of horseshit.
Click to expand...

Even with this though theres a massive benefit of the doubt . we need to be asking ourselves did his blackness and cool aesthetics blind us to the very real possibility he was a bullshitter who was just fine and dandy with most of the rotten furniture . Like Blair , Clinton , Bono and many other liberals . Like liberals everywhere, pretty much .

He was a masive cunt , I'm firmly convinced of it .
 
Casually Red said:
Even with this though theres a massive benefit of the doubt . we need to be asking ourselves did his blackness and cool aesthetics blind us to the very real possibility he was a bullshitter who was just fine and dandy with most of the rotten furniture . Like Blair , Clinton , Bono and many other liberals . Like liberals everywhere, pretty much .
Click to expand...
One test of this is whether he takes the Blair route after government I guess.

But I suspect he believed in the system as it was. He never had the air of a dodgy salesmans that Blair had. There are so many people who do believe in the system. I've worked with lots of well-intentioned people in (minor) branches of government and in NGOs - people who don't even benefit in any extraordinary way from the system apart from being comfortable - who are firmly of the opinion that the system is basically fine and just needs a few tweaks to it in order to eliminate injustice. They believe it, they really do, in their hundreds of thousands, in their millions even, if you're looking globally. And I suspect this type of person threw up someone who happened to be a perfect frontman at perfectly the wrong time.
 
Brainaddict said:
One test of this is whether he takes the Blair route after government I guess.

But I suspect he believed in the system as it was. He never had the air of a dodgy salesmans that Blair had. There are so many people who do believe in the system. I've worked with lots of well-intentioned people in (minor) branches of government and in NGOs - people who don't even benefit in any extraordinary way from the system apart from being comfortable - who are firmly of the opinion that the system is basically fine and just needs a few tweaks to it in order to eliminate injustice. They believe it, they really do, in their hundreds of thousands, in their millions even, if you're looking globally. And I suspect this type of person threw up someone who happened to be a perfect frontman at perfectly the wrong time.
Click to expand...


Sounds a fair enough summation .
 
Brainaddict said:
One test of this is whether he takes the Blair route after government I guess.

But I suspect he believed in the system as it was. He never had the air of a dodgy salesmans that Blair had. There are so many people who do believe in the system. I've worked with lots of well-intentioned people in (minor) branches of government and in NGOs - people who don't even benefit in any extraordinary way from the system apart from being comfortable - who are firmly of the opinion that the system is basically fine and just needs a few tweaks to it in order to eliminate injustice. They believe it, they really do, in their hundreds of thousands, in their millions even, if you're looking globally. And I suspect this type of person threw up someone who happened to be a perfect frontman at perfectly the wrong time.
Click to expand...
Having said this, there are a couple of things that make me doubt this analysis. Mainly his failure to address the vast scale of imprisonment in the US. There's no way he could kid himself that was anything but rotten.
 
Brainaddict said:
Having said this, there are a couple of things that make me doubt this analysis. Mainly his failure to address the vast scale of imprisonment in the US. There's no way he could kid himself that was anything but rotten.
Click to expand...

And then go on to endorse " super predator " Clinton herself . One of the US gulags cheif architects .

Commuting Mannings sentence was an indication of at least a shred of some human decency . But the least he could do bearing in mind he ...as president..pronounced Manning guilty as hell before the trial .
 
Brainaddict said:
Having said this, there are a couple of things that make me doubt this analysis. Mainly his failure to address the vast scale of imprisonment in the US. There's no way he could kid himself that was anything but rotten.
Click to expand...

The President only has limited ability to change that though - it's mostly a States rights thing. He could have moved towards decriminalizing marijuana at the Federal level, I suppose, but I'm not sure how many prisoners are held in Federal prisons for marijuana offences.
 
Considering the opposition he faced campaign to prove he wasn't actually american and trying to crash the global economy due to some mild tinkering with americas healthcare industry:mad:.

The hatred he faced for suggestting maybe military rifles shouldnt be treated like toys:hmm:.

He looked good in a suit and attempted to clear up George W mess
 
camouflage said:
Great article here by Daniel Lazare over on Consortiumnews... and in my view, pretty definitive.

America’s Putin Derangement Syndrome – Consortiumnews
Click to expand...

That's nail on the head territory right there . A welcome sanity from the nonsense and hysteria spouted in the msm and by the crew on here . I seriously shudder to think at were we might be now in that regard had Clinton won . Trump will bring new worries and threats, no doubt about it . But there would have been an immediate doubling down there . And backed to the hilt by all and sundry . That hubris the article describes in detail would have been the end of us .
 
I'm afraid that Obama lost respect with me, when he failed to shut Guantanamo Bay, which he promised to do in his first year.
 
Sasaferrato said:
I'm afraid that Obama lost respect with me, when he failed to shut Guantanamo Bay, which he promised to do in his first year.
Click to expand...

He signed an Executive Order on his second day in office to close the detention centre at Guantanamo Bay, which given how that all panned out demonstrates that POTUS isn't actually a God-Emperor. That may be some comfort these days, I guess.
 
TheHoodedClaw said:
He signed an Executive Order on his second day in office to close the detention centre at Guantanamo Bay, which given how that all panned out demonstrates that POTUS isn't actually a God-Emperor. That may be some comfort these days, I guess.
Click to expand...
I wasn't aware of that. You are bang on with your second point.
 
Casually Red said:
And then go on to endorse " super predator " Clinton herself . One of the US gulags cheif architects .

Commuting Mannings sentence was an indication of at least a shred of some human decency . But the least he could do bearing in mind he ...as president..pronounced Manning guilty as hell before the trial .
Click to expand...
Manning was guilty. He should not ever have been in the army. Having read a considerable amount about his conduct, he should have been discharged when they first intended to do so. A shortage of specialists led to him being in a position to commit his despicable act of treason. He should have been shot as an example for others.

I appreciate that this will not be the majority view on here, perhaps it is an age thing on my part, but he was guilty of a dreadful act.
 
Should have run in 2016 after Clinton.

Bit like Brown and Blair.

Personal ambition undoes progressive politics.

Hindsight etc
 
Last edited:
newbie said:
sfa to do with age, all to do with being flat out wrong.
Click to expand...

Well, I have a sense of both duty and honour, both things that Manning lacked.

There is a lot of biographical detail on the net, I suggest you read it.
 
good for you, I've always thought those particular virtues were cover for servility to power, but there you go. Whatever, your views are yours, I'm just pointing out that they have nothing to do with age.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

RD2003
Was it inevitable? A short history of Russia’s war on Ukraine
2
Replies
33
Views
2K
Pickman's model
Pickman's model
Proper Tidy
Ayia Napa gang rape case - verdict and discussion
2 3 4 5
Replies
120
Views
9K
Athos
Athos
Pickman's model
who's been sending bombs to obama and clinton then? and cnn?
2 3
Replies
73
Views
4K
nogojones
nogojones
Stanley Edwards
On this Day in History.
2 3
Replies
82
Views
5K
petee
petee
1%er
Obama is going to Cuba
Replies
5
Views
504
Casually Red
C
Back
Top Bottom