HP: Are Progressives Losing Touch With Reality?

[dennis4868]

This afternoon, Markos Moulitsas wrote an offhanded comment on Daily Kos that seems completely in line with the recent upswing in progressive apoplexy. Referencing a post by Duncan Black about the president's tax cut deal, Markos wrote, "Tax cuts don't create jobs. It's really obnoxious hearing Democrats like Obama trying to make that argument."

Right off the bat, and not to go all Aaron Sorkin nitpicky on Markos, but it's President Obama. Come on. Is it seriously that difficult to type the word "president?" And while I agree with the first part, I'm not sure what Markos is talking about in the second part. The president has never once suggested that tax cuts create jobs.

In fact, he said exactly the opposite as recently as Dec. 10 on NPR. From ThinkProgress:

And in an interview on NPR this morning with Morning Edition host Steve Inkseep, President Obama reflected this point of view, agreeing that the tax cuts for the wealthy will not create "one single job":

The full article os here....http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bob-cesca/are-progressives-losing-t_b_797470.html?view=print

[phleshdef]

1. I'm starting to wonder if a portion of us wasn't ALWAYS out of touch with reality...

...but when Bush was President, I just overlooked it because it was all aimed at Bush. Now that its aimed at Obama, I actually think about the foamy mouthed ranting with a bit more consideration and it brings a realization that we have our fringe lunatics just like the right does. Different ideology, same abandonment of reason, facts and empathy for governing.

[dennis4868]

8. Agree 100%

[BeFree]

10. The lunatics

The only lunatics I see are those who ignore the realities and think America can just keep doing what it's doing and expect different results.

Gawd damned mofo appeasers will be the ruin of this country.

My advice? Turn off fox snoose for starters.

[Beetwasher]

24. You Are Correct!

n/t

[treestar]

37. Absolutely.

One could see it but swept it aside since it was aimed at Bush.

[Name removed]

39. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[green917]

45. +1,000,000,000

I couldn't agree more with you. I'm so sick of the god damned hippie punching that I see here and elsewhere that I could spit! I worked HARD to see Barack Obama become the 44th President of the United States and, although I agree with the 1st sentiment of the OP (the President has earned his honorific), I believe that the rest of it is drivel!

We didn't expect a pony and we didn't really expect him to fix every thing the Republicans fucked up over the last 30 years in 2. What we did expect was two fold. We expected the 2 things that he promised us over and over again during the campaign: Hope and Change. In short, we expected him to, at the very least, fight for the things that go to the core of what makes us Democrats. To, as the original poster put it so eloquently, go all Aaron Sorkin on him, "You don't fight the fights you can win. You fight the fights that need fighting!" -The American President

We have heard over and over and over again, "But, we didn't have the votes!". How do you know what we did or didn't have the votes for if the capitulating blue dogs had been at all accountable for any of their actions? Can you imagine how different the Senate could have been over the last 2 years had Joe Lieberman lost his Committee Chairmanship for going Independent and bucking the party on a slew of legislation? How do you know what votes we could or couldn't have garnered had we actually started major negotiations on substantive issues like health care from a position of strength touting the progressive, Democratic position? Do you honestly believe that presented with nationalized single payer health care as the other option of the bill, that they wouldn't have at least nominally supported a public option that every poll told them was backed by a majority of the American population?

Because of bad politics, worse policy and horrific messaging, this Administration has left all of our (and of every young Democratic voter who came out to vote for the first time) hopes dashed, and hasn't really changed much of anything. Wall street still runs the show with no accountability to anyone, the Government is as secretive and hidden from the general population as ever (if not more so), we're still committing atrocities in the name of "security" (drone attacks on civilians anyone?), we're still claiming "state secrets privilege" in cases with whistle blowers, etc.

I will, more than likely, cast another vote for President Barack Obama in 2012 because, unlike the ideological crazies that the OPer seems to think we all are, I'm enough of a realist to know that the alternative is far worse but, I'm getting sick and tired of being accused of not clapping loud enough and being told that it's going to be my fault when we lose more seats in Congress and, possibly, the Presidency (for the record, I voted a straight Democratic ticket in 2010). This President has, in short, shown himself to be wanting in the departments of spunk and guts and the American people want to vote for a winner, someone who doesn't lay down and take whatever is dished out, even if he's wrong (hence, 8 years of GW Bush). President Barack Obama (and, yes, I do believe he has earned his honorific) is now, unfortunately, operating from a position of weakness, and the other side of the aisle smells blood in the water...going to be an interesting election season.

[WiffenPoof]

64. Excellent Post!

I could not have written it better myself. Not overstated or understated....simply the truth (as sad as it is).

-PLA

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

46. Yep. I'm beginning to believe that, too. And I witnessed this all day yesterday

with my thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x16934

[nyc 4 Biden]

50. I wish i could unrec a reply.

Yea we have our fringe. But our fringe wears tie-dyed shirts and theirs wear strings of ammo. POTUS is reaping what he has sown. He has turned a cold shoulder to progressives since day one.

[phleshdef]

51. Of course their fringe is worse. The modern day American left is mostly anti-violence.

And thats probably the biggest core ideal that separates the far left from the far right (at least by American standards of left and right). That difference in principle alone is the catalyst for a million differences between the 2 ideological spectrums.

I'm speaking more in terms of the thought process that people are using to arrive at critical conclusions. We have become quite knee jerk around here. And we've also started to become very close minded about the reasons certain political events have played out the way they have.

[nyc 4 Biden]

52. i agree but...

...progressives being critical of a dem POTUS is an example of open-mindedness (is that a word?) which their side mostly lacks.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

54. Couldn't agree more

[superduperfarleft]

56. Gawd, you are all so durn SMART!

Why oh why didn't we listen to you?

[quaker bill]

57. Only starting to wonder? this late?

I have had no doubts for decades, and I was in the middle of the movement when Carter was President, and protested right on through Reagan and GHWB, at times in very small crowds. Many of my friends were most joyfully out of touch with reality, and they really haven't changed, they are just older now.

[Number23]

67. "we have our fringe lunatics just like the right does"

Well said and absolutely spot on. :thumbsup:

[fasttense]

2. We wouldn't have had a 2nd bush tax cut if McCain had been President.

It took a Democratic president to push the bush tax cuts the 2nd time around.

[dennis4868]

4. Huh?

Correct me if I am wrong but are you saying we would not have had an extension of the Bush tax cuts if McCain was president? If that is what you are saying, you are TOTALLY OFF! It's scary to think what would have been if McCain was president now....

[ProSense]

5. I read that somewhere else. Pining for McCain is none other than Cenk

Is it Time for Democrats to Fight Obama?

You want to hear something really depressing? If John McCain had won the presidency, there is almost no chance he could have gotten the Bush tax cuts extended for the rich. Think about it. How was a Republican president going to get an overwhelmingly Democratic Senate and House to pass those tax cuts that they hated under Bush?

<...>

Cenk is a pathetic, desperate attention seeker.

[lillypaddle]

9. ditto. n/t

[sadbear]

15. Cenk is right on this one

McCain would have gotten absolutely nothing through Congress. And the public would blame him for it. Yeah, having McCain/Palin for four years would have sucked, but we would still have Congress. (BTW, I'm just making an observation, not expressing a wish.)

[dennis4868]

17. TOTALLY DISAGREE...

Bush got just about everything through Congress when the Dems had control and the hammer of the fillubuster...Dems do not obstruct. Believe me, if McCain would threaten to hold back UI in order to get his tax cuts, Dems would cave in a minute....

[ProSense]

18. Cenk's claim is bogus

He has no clue what McCain would do, and isolating this deal from the rest of a McCain Presidency is absurd.

Where would the economy be under a McCain Presidency? What kind of stimulus package, if there was one, would he have implemented? What about all his other policies?

Is Cenk claiming that the tax cuts would have been allowed to expire? What about the unemployed? Would unemployment be better?

Cenk is a fool.

On edit: "Yeah, having McCain/Palin for four years would have sucked"

There is the proof. Cenk is an idiot.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

47. Hmm... he started out praising Hillary just one week ago. Now he moves

to McCain.

I think it's becoming more and more clear to me now...

[ProudDad]

66. Absolutely true...

"there is almost no chance he could have gotten the Bush tax cuts extended for the rich. Think about it. How was a Republican president going to get an overwhelmingly Democratic Senate and House to pass those tax cuts that they hated under Bush?"

[dflprincess]

28. It also took a Democratic president to open up Social Security for attack n/t

[mtnsnake]

34. "It took a Democratic president to push the bush tax cuts the 2nd time around. "

That is the saddest, but most accurate, statement of this entire thread, and look how the apologists were so swift to try and snuff it out. LOL

[treestar]

38. That's nutty. McCain would have wanted them permanent

If he had a Democratic Congress, they might have agreed to a temporary extension to get what President Obama got here.

[Swede]

43. Bomb bomb bomb Iran!

nt

[leveymg]

3. Didn't we hear the same after the HCR fiasco - and what happened next? 11/02/2010

Isn't repeating the same mistakes and expecting a different outcome the very definition of insanity?

It's coming to define the Obama Administration and the Blue Dog Congress.

More cheerleading for Team So-Timid-They're-Not-Even-In-The-Game. So many wasted opportunities. Crazy, indeed.

[dennis4868]

7. So then tell me...

what any other president would have done things differently when the REPUBS ARE HELL BENT ON FILLUBUSTERING everything? No other president in the history of our country has had to get 60 votes in the senate on every fucking vote....not one other president....it's amazing that Obama has accomplished anything (www.whatthefuckhasobamadonesofar.com) these past 2 years with a BROKEN senate. But he gets blamed for the repub abuse of the fillubuster....great :-(

[leveymg]

19. Better to have simply maintained the status quo than make the Raw Deal.

Particularly with regard to Social Security.

Aside from an extension of UIC, really, what have they done that's any good? The Raw Deal gives the GOP the most important things they wanted, right up front, no struggle. Just, "Bend Over, Hear They Come Again".

He didn't even make 'em work for it.

BOHINCA - the watch word for the Obama Administration.

[dennis4868]

25. Aside from an extension of UIC, really, what have they done that's any good?

Take a look at this and then get back to me....

www.whatthefuckhasobamadonesofar.com

[harun]

21. Filibuster used to be a lot more than 60 to overcome. He should have expired

the tax cuts and said show me the bill I want. If he didn't get it let the taxes stay at the higher rate.

[dennis4868]

27. I guess you did not watch...

Rachel Maddow the past few nights....she showe how the fillubuster was never used the way it is used now against Obama...it was actually rarely used and now ITS IS ALWAYS USED against the dems and Obama....

[harun]

41. I know how much more it is used now. Nothing would wake up the American people

to this fact more than a massive tax increase because of Republican obstructionism.

[harun]

20. We are going to show them reality on 11/06/2012.

[leveymg]

23. RUSerius?

[harun]

33. I'M Series!

[DemocratSinceBirth]

6. Without Calling People Names The Assertion That Tax Cuts Don't Create Jobs Is Simply Not True.

There are better means but those means weren't available given the current political reality.

[dennis4868]

11. I agree with you...

the point of the article is that progressives are making shit up and ignoring evidence to make Obama look bad....Markos said that Obama said that tax cuts (for the wealthy) create jobs when Obama personbally does not believe this for a second. I also see where KO shows polls that make Obama look bad but then ignore polls that make Obama look good. We are becoming like the crazy right wing repubs and FOX News....

[KoKo]

59. "Those Dirty Fucking Hippies...Were Right!"....LINK:

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/found-net/145937-dirty-fucking-hippies-were-right-nsfw.html

[ProSense]

12. Kos is

a shit stirrer. He has been making a lot of over-the-top statements lately.

It has nothing to do with being progressive. He's simply joining the ranks of FDL, Cenk and the other shit stirrers.

[Ikonoklast]

48. Controversy drives those mouse clicks.

Mouse clicks = Da Monay.

Cenk is the same guy.

[SidDithers]

13. K&R...

good article. Thanks for posting.


Sid

[ladjf]

14. I believe that the Progressives might be among the few who are

still in touch with reality. nt

[harun]

22. The rest are still drunk on greed. Last financial crisis didn't sober them up, unfortunately.

[ladjf]

32. I agree with your post. And, in addition to the underlying greed,

there are a number of other elements that are effecting their behavior.

1. For many, their religious training has the dangerous side-effect of teaching people to follow the leader in lock-step without enough objective analysis on their own.

2. The Right has successfully bludgeoned the public school system down to a point that is close to totally non-effective.

3. As the greedy and shortsighted rich who are in power have acquired more wealth, their ability to
gain more money as accelerated. They have successfully bought the media, politicians, judges,
military leaders and even the police. It works like a "black hole", the more mass that is acquired,
the rate of gain accelerates exponentially.

[chimpymustgo]

16. It's blind, head-in-sand sycophant Obama apologists who are out of touch with REALITY.

[mtnsnake]

26. Amen to that

A perfect example is how the apologists were ready to lynch Bush over his obscene tax cuts, but now that Obama's name is on those same tax handouts for the rich, the tax cuts make perfect sense. You also have the same unrealistic people who all of a sudden are saying how the tax cuts for the rich will create jobs, when it's been already proven that Bush's tax cuts had zero trickle down effects.

[myrna minx]

29. We had much worse lobbed at us when we marched against the war in Iraq.

We had our sanity questioned and were told we were crazy, we were condemned as anti-American, we were told we hated freedom and that we loved and sympathized with terrorists blah, blah, blah and now we're being rebuked for not loving Republican trickle down economics and the poison pill to defund Social Security.

Folks sure do get worked up over the people who don't matter. :shrug:

[KoKo]

60. "Those Dirty Fucking Hippies...Were ...CORRECT! LINK:

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/found-net/145937-dirty-fucking-hippies-were-right-nsfw.html

[cbayer]

30. dennis 4868,

Please be aware that our posting rules require that you limit copyrighted material to four paragraphs or less with a link to the original source.


Thanks,

cbayer
DU Moderator

[emulatorloo]

35. Have you ever talked to Huffington Post about their position?

I would expect they would be happy to work with DU because

- DU posts generate hits for Huffington Post, which means more eyeballs for their site, which means more revenue.

I understand trepidation over WAPO, NYT. But maybe Skinner should contact huffington post

[TommyO]

31. Just a reminder, DU's copyright guidelines state that no more than four paragraphs from an original

source. In the future, please observe this limit.

[Hello_Kitty]

36. Progressives have been right about everything.

So describing us as "out of touch with reality" is nothing but a cheap gaslighting tactic.

[Name removed]

55. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[treestar]

40. they definitely live in a fantasy world

It must be a bubble where there are no republicans and no filibuster and no Blue Dogs and that Blue Dog states will send progressive Democrats rather than Republicans - then why didn't they in the first place?

And the OTT emotionality of attributing the worst possible motives to Obama and the Democrats are indicative of extreme negativity.

[polichick]

42. Only if "reality" is defined as right-wing policies being good for the country. nt

[Clio the Leo]

44. I'm gonna go with "yes"....

.... but as to the "Obama" thing .... to each their own, but I call him that all the time .... it speaks to his seeming approachability. I've said all along he seems like one of my RL friends (IE not a stuffy old white guy.) Jonathan Alter writes in his book that the President introduces himself that way ... as in when he calls someone he'll say, "hey, this is Obama..."

I think it's fair to say that the overwhelming majority of the "loud left" ... Markos included and I know he's been kinda out there as of late ... genuinely LIKE the President and want him to do well. Where *I* think they're having problems is their general and apparent lack of understanding who they were supporting to begin with and their failure to LISTEN to what he's said while he's been in office. They made him out to be someone he never was .... something he predicted would happen long ago.

Give it time ... they'll all come home.

[Phx_Dem]

49. Sadly, yes. And it's becoming more obvious each day. n/t

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

53. YES!

Good fucking god, YES YES YES YES YES!

[KoKo]

58. But, if Obama's Across the Board Tax Cuts don't Create Jobs...why is he pushing it?

:shrug:

[Exilednight]

62. There you go using logic. n/t

[Exilednight]

61. Who was the president that said during his

announcement speech, and I paraphrase, "it's okay to compromise, as long you don't compromise your principals"?

[Warren Stupidity]

63. Yeah we are all insane, that must be it.

Because only insane people would think that Democrats backing the Bush Tax Cuts, now Owning the Bush Tax Cuts, is an outrage.

[Mimosa]

65. "progressives" started worrying in the 1980s when working class jobs (rural & urban) were expedited

So, what did we miss? We predicted the lowering of income, the enrichment of vulture investors...

We predicted wars. What did we miss?