President Obama Weighs His Economic Legacy.
Eight years after the financial crisis, unemployment
is at 5 percent, deficits are down and G.D.P.
is growing. Why do so many voters feel
left behind? The president has a theory.
'Two months ago, across an assembly-room table in a factory in Jacksonville, Fla., President Barack Obama was talking to me about the problem of political capital. His efforts to rebuild the U.S. economy from the 2008 financial crisis were being hit from left, right and center. And yet, by his own assessment, those efforts were vastly underappreciated. I actually compare our economic performance to how, historically, countries that have wrenching financial crises perform, he said. By that measure, we probably managed this better than any large economy on Earth in modern history.
It was a notably grand claim, especially given the tenor in which presidential candidates of both parties had taken to criticizing the state of the American economy Many are still barely getting by, Hillary Clinton said, while Donald Trump said that were a third-world nation. Asked if he was frustrated by all the criticism, Obama insisted that he wasnt, at least not personally. It has frustrated me only insofar as it has shaped the political debate, he said. We were moving so fast early on that we couldnt take victory laps. We couldnt explain everything we were doing. I mean, one day were saving the banks; the next day were saving the auto industry; the next day were trying to see whether we can have some impact on the housing market.
The result, he said, was that he lacked the political capital to do more. As his presidency nears its end, this has become an increasingly common refrain from Obama, who, despite his prodigious skills as an orator, has come to seem more confident about his achievements than about his ability to promote them. I mean, the truth of the matter is that if we had been able to more effectively communicate all the steps we had taken to the swing voter, he said, then we might have maintained a majority in the House or the Senate.'>>>
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/01/magazine/president-obama-weighs-his-economic-legacy.html?
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)People who lost their homes, savings, and jobs in the crash have not recovered and likely never will. Banks who committed crimes got bailed out and the people at the top are making more money than ever.
And Obama thinks he just needed better PR....
earthshine
(1,642 posts)Nevermind the will of the people.
He was recently quoted (sorry I don't have a link) as saying the reason why we don't have a public option is that the people didn't want it because they were comfortable with their employer-based plans.
At this point, I don't believe the truthfulness of any words coming out of his centrist, third-way, neoliberal mouth.
And as pathetic as may sound, he still might be the best president of recent memory.
In this video, Obama visibly squirms as he tries to sell the TPP. Even he doesn't believe what he's saying. Just pay attention to his body language. The joke's on us -- or perhaps, the working-class worldwide.