Obama's Candidacy

PrepperMike

After reading this entire thread...how can you wonder why we are prepping?

turbo

Remember that Obama can do a few things in his administrative capacity, but he cannot legislate. The GOP in Congress is doing their level best to stop every initiative that he supports, and he's getting precious little support from some in his own party. When Mitch McConnell says that his #1 priority is getting rid of Obama (not creating jobs or helping to fix the economic mess we're in), take him at his word.

russ_watters

Clearly, those are both the same goal!

WhoWee

When the President could pass anything he wanted - he got the PPACA pushed through without anyone reading the final draft - why not focus on what he has done - promises made, promises kept, and promises broken? If you want to discuss the GOP in Congress - start a thread - please.

mheslep

I'm not so sure.

AlephZero

That's a pretty chart, but it doesn't show one interesting fact: even after 10 years of an incompetent UK administration throwing money at public services in a blatant and cynical attempt to buy votes (IMO) the current UK expenditure of 8% GDP compares with about 16% GDP in the US (source: wikipedia).

Of course you are entitled to claim the US health service is "twice as good" as the UK - for those people who have access to it, of course.

mheslep

I did not intend to do yet another US vs UK health comparison. US health care has its problems, namely that it is too expensive as you suggest. Ok? I did want to back up the earlier claim that government run/single payer healthcare, which Obama said he wanted, is somehow a silver bullet for cost control. Edit: I should have just posted US Medicare/Medicaid spending vs time, which is existing single payer health care in the US. Its spending has also exploded.

Gokul43201

It's likely not possible to say much about the NHS just from those plots (even more so, due to the range of years chosen). I suspect it would require a much more careful analysis that accounts for other significant influences. In fact, one could just as easily argue a nearly opposite point (i.e., that the NHS helped mitigate growing healthcare costs), by noting that while Healthcare spending (as a fraction of GDP) rose by over an order of magnitude in the 60 yr period from 1890 to 1950, it hardly even tripled in the subsequent 60 year period.

mheslep

Sure I grant one can argue either way that government run/single payer healthcare might lower or raise costs. But from the UK record we can reject argument-is-over statements like "no one should doubt we would spend less money going to a single payer."

WhoWee

Again, President Obama gave us the PPACA - we should focus on his promises - kept and broken - regarding lower costs, expanded coverage, jobs creation, plan choice, deficit reduction, etc. We should also be discussing the expansion of Medicaid under President Obama.

ThomasT

I agree in that I think that Obamacare doesn't really address the root problem, which, imo, is the inordinate inflation of healthcare costs. In fact, I'll go as far as to say that the Obama administration hasn't really done anything to effectively address any of the important problems that America and Americans are confronted with. He's a bust. A total disappointment, imho. But I also think that a GOP president would be even worse, if that's possible.

WhoWee

Does anyone else find it humorous that President Obama has cited his on-the-job experience recently? It was a different story in the Dem primaries in 2008. my bold

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/...n3720763.shtml

"AP) By some measures, Barack Obama has a thin record. He's a Senate newcomer who has never worked in the White House, governed a state or run a business.

Democratic presidential rival Hillary Rodham Clinton points to his resume as evidence that Obama is not ready for the White House. "He was a part-time state senator for a few years, and then he came to the Senate and immediately started running for president," she says dismissively.

Obama's accomplishments are more substantial and varied than Clinton suggests. And he has a longer record in elected office than she does, as a second-term New York senator.

Obama was a community organizer and led a voter-registration effort in Chicago that added tens of thousands of people to the rolls. He was a civil rights attorney and taught at one of the nation's premier universities. He helped pass complicated measures in the Illinois legislature on the death penalty, racial profiling, health care and more. In Washington, he has worked with Republicans on nuclear proliferation, government waste and global warming, amassing a record that speaks to a fast start while lacking the heft of years of service."

ThomasT

It's humorous that you would find that humorous. After all, what else is he going to cite? Come to think of it, maybe that's what makes it humorous. Anyway, I'm not an Obama supporter either.

mege

One big thing that President Obama has introduced is unpredictablity in economic policies. He lays outlines for stark policies, begs for change, and has much of the country holding their breath. This unpredictability and 'wait and see' mentality hurts the economy in a way. The biggest example of this of course is the ACA - how much is this going to cost employers that want to continue to insure their employees in the long run? Even in the short term this could be even more important if an expansion is planned. This is a trait of President Obama in particular as I don't think even President Clinton held the country hostage with his ideas quite to this extent. Catergorize this under 'too much rhetoric.'

Even if the 'real impact' of these policies is minimal, the percieved impact can often be damaging.

Campaign promises aside - this is something that a seasoned executive would know (perception matters). I realize that speeches/pressers/etc aren't always the President's call, but he should have enough backbone to say 'Is what I am going to say going to make things better or worse?' (IMO, this is also one of those things that would afflict Ron Paul if elected President) Santorum and Romney both have executive experience both in government and business. I don't think they'd make these perception mistakes and realize when it's time to just say nothing rather than stir the pot and leave people wondering.

ParticleGrl

I contend your chart makes my point for me. Put the US on the same chart If you are using the UK to make a comparison between single payer and our system, you should at least make the comparison instead of putting up the UK numbers in isolation. If you put the US on your charts, you'll find we pay more and have faster growing costs.

Also, to compare like-with-like medicare spends less for patient care then the private sector, despite insuring a riskier population. Its growth has also been slower than private care. Ergo, expanding medicare to cover everyone would result in less money spent on health care.

Pythagorean

That's the point, really. He was criticized for not having experience. Now he has more experience as president than any of the republicans running, so as much as they banked on that argument before, it's no longer a tagline.

turbo

And he can run as a centrist. He has not embarked on any far-left runs that the GOP can use against him.