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Expectations

Submitted by crowbar317 on Fri, 10/07/2011 - 12:36am

Tonight I was listening to my friend Kelly Carlin's podcast, Waking from the American Dream. Toward the end her guest, David Feldman, raised a very interesting question: would liberals be as upset if McCain had won the election and we were in the same state we are in now?

I think that perfectly sums up the enthusiasm gap and dissatisfaction. We expected so much more from Obama. We tend to overlook things like the recession being worse than expected, the 2010 GOP wave and obstructionism, and the real victories Obama did gain.

This is not to say that Obama did everything right and should get a pass. But I do think we should ask ourselves how much we over-expected compared with how much he under-preformed.

Anyway, this is one part thought experiment and one part plug for Kelly's podcast, which I highly recommend.

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Comments

Not just expectations -- promises not delivered

Submitted by usernamehere on Fri, 10/07/2011 - 7:08am.

When politicians have commanding legislative majorities, and a supposedly agreeable executive, yet don't deliver, you toss them.

That's what happened to Congressional Democrats in 2010 (the US Senate is structurally harder to flip, but the Democrats still took a beating), and that's what should happen to Obama in 2012.

Obama campaigned on certain things, then did the exact opposite.

Obama's expansion of the Bush war on civil liberties has been well documented.

More recently (this week), Obama tried to take credit (!) for TARP which did not happen on his watch as a defense for bankers. That's just insanity. Recall that Obama campaigned against such stuff.

And no GOP president would ever be allowed by Congressional Democrats to gut Social Security. But here we are with 2 commissions from Obama calling for the gutting of Social Security.

We elected a Republican President in 2008. He's got to go in 2012. He can choose whether he leaves before the primary or after the general.

To your original point and as others have said, "Obama had an FDR moment, but he gave us more Hooverism."