Posts Tagged ‘promises
25
Dec
13
Promises Kept
11
Feb
12
rise and shine
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They Gave Us A Republic: ….…I admit to watching, dumbfounded, as contraception became, in the immortal words of the Vice President, “a big fucking deal” over the last week or so…. I had a busy week, and just left it up to Obama…..
What he was up to, it looks to me like, was positioning his pieces to call “checkmate” in one of those games of eleventh dimensional chess that I am starting to believe might actually exist.
He must have been laughing his ass off when the Bishops and their GOP allies picked this fight… Some pro-choice republicans were aghast, and pleaded with the leadership not to, but they charged ahead, like a two-ton bull, right through the doors of the china shop. And Barack Obama smiled and stood aside, holding them open.
…. Obama wasn’t boxed in. Not at all. But now the Bishops are. So far, they have been silent after thunderously declaring that nothing short of total repeal of the mandate would suit them. And as they lost the healthcare reform battle, they are going to lose this one, too. Because they are wrong and their time is past. And by their silence, I think they are telling us all that they realize they’ve been had.
Full post here
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Deaniac (The People’s View): Nontroversy resolved. Another stroke of genius by Obama.
… now the President has stripped off all the cover for the GOP’s anti-women agenda, and they are still not smart enough to hide it. Now women know for sure that this fight is about birth control and not about religious liberty. Now women also know who stands in their corner to protect birth control and which party wants to take this very basic health care right away from them.
Full post here
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Smartypants: In The Atlantic, James Fallows has written one of the most interesting analyses of the Obama administration that I’ve seen.
…. if you’re like me, you won’t agree with some of the things he says. But what I appreciated about it is that he doesn’t seem to have an ax to grind from either side. He’s not trying to defend Obama or take him down. I’ll admit that its rare to see an analysis these days that doesn’t at least seem to have one or the other agenda – no matter how deep people try to bury it.
More here
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TPM – thanks Loriah
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Addictinginfo: The Republican Party is tearing itself apart and many conservative voters are considering abandoning the sinking ship to vote for none other than President Obama in 2012.
According to a poll conducted by Wenzel Strategies on behalf of conservative publication World Net Daily, 1 in 5 Republicans will vote for or are leaning towards voting for President Obama in the upcoming Presidential Election in November.
Full post here
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Steve Benen: Chronicling Mitt’s mendacity
Several weeks ago, I launched a new Friday afternoon feature, highlighting the most blatant Mitt Romney falsehoods of the week. It moved to Maddow Blog last week, and here’s this week’s installment. (It does not include mendacity from Romney’s CPAC speech this afternoon.)
More here
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Morning everyone 😉
03
Jan
12
‘promises kept’
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Don’t miss the ‘2011 Year in Photos’ at the White House site (here)
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Steve Benen: Jennifer Rubin today reflects on President Obama’s re-election strategy, and argues he’ll struggle to point to meaningful accomplishments …Obama “accomplished nothing,” she says, other than “jamming through” – which is apparently synonymous with “passing with large majorities in both chambers, following a year-long fight” – the Affordable Care Act.
Well, he also passed the Recovery Act, which prevented a depression and created 3 million jobs.
And there was also the Wall Street reform package …. which featured the most sweeping overhaul of financial industry regulations since FDR.
Come to think of it, we also saw a rescue of the American auto industry, DADT repeal, a breakthrough student-loan-reform bill, ratification of New START, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the biggest overhaul of our food-safety laws in 70 years, new regulation of the credit card industry, a national service bill, expanded stem-cell research, the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, net neutrality, the most sweeping land-protection act in 15 years, and health care for 9/11 first responders……
More here
03
Jan
12
catching up
Boston.com: Members of Congress of both parties often complain about fraud and abuse in Medicare and Medicaid (M&M), usually charging that the President is not doing enough to keep bad guys from stealing money from these vital programs.
Guess what? Thanks to provisions in the Affordable Care Act (ACA/ObamaCare) and to an unprecedented effort by the Obama Administration, more progress has been made in the past three years to combat health care fraud and abuse than ever before.
Full article here
More from Steve Benen here
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Four years ago:
Mitch Stewart (from email): People have been sending around two videos here at headquarters this morning, and I thought you’d want to see them, too. This first one was posted to YouTube almost exactly four years ago. It’s Barack Obama’s “closing argument” to Iowans the night before the caucuses in 2008.
It’s pretty incredible to see candidate Obama talk about what President Obama ultimately did. He makes four specific promises – on reforming health care, making college more affordable, ending the war in Iraq, and putting us on the path to energy independence – all of which today, four years later, are promises kept.
The second video is from yesterday – posted by the New York Times reporters on the ground in Iowa. It’s a sneak peek into the “the best-organized presidential campaign in Iowa.” Spoiler alert: It’s not Mitt Romney. Or Ron Paul. Or Rick Santorum.
Both these videos are pretty near and dear to my heart. I was the campaign’s Iowa caucus director in 2008, and I know how hard people are working there right now, opponent or no opponent:
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10
May
11
promises, promises….
by Bobfr:
The ads not only ‘write themselves’; they’re written.
Republicans promised jobs, instead they attacked Medicare
Republicans promised jobs, instead they attacked women
Republicans promised jobs, instead they focused on disenfranchising young, disabled and elderly voters
Republicans promised jobs, instead they voted tax payer dollars to subsidize big oil
Republicans promised jobs, instead the blocked job creation and essential 21st Century infrastructure
And on and on and on.
Reality is that the Republicans now not only own the deficit, an illegal war on Iraq; fanatical attacks on American women and girls; monomaniacal commitment of tax breaks for the wealthy, corporations and subsidies for big oil; intentional disenfranchisement of voters; and active blockade of implementation of 21st Century infrastructure – they own unemployment. And I assure you the Democrats in the White House and Congress are not about to bail them out of any of it.
Come Election Day 2012 Americans will have one thing to say to Republicans – You’re FIRED
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Bob, I want you working for the campaign: now!
20
Jan
11
promises kept
It was two years ago today that Barack and I were sworn in, and I remember what he said like it was this morning: “The challenges we face are real, they are serious, and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America: They will be met.”
Even then, we knew it would take time. We knew it would be hard. And we knew we would sometimes make mistakes. But we did not lose sight of what we came to do.
Together, we took on difficult issues that had been put off for decades … take a look at the Promises Kept report of all the work we’ve done in two years … there’s a whole lot to be proud of.
Of course, the big ones come to mind first: historic health insurance reform … Wall Street reform … and the end of combat operations in Iraq, which brought more than 100,000 troops home … the Recovery Act, which saved and created more than 3 million jobs … we made critical investments in General Motors and Chrysler, saving tens of thousands of jobs … spurring a rebirth of the American car industry .. we wrote into law student loan reform and credit card reform, which ended the worst abuses of the banking industries and are making lending fair for American families … we put two new Supreme Court justices on the bench – Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, who bring rich and diverse experience to the Court … we finally repealed “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” …
Telling the story of the past two years will be critical to the fights ahead… take a few minutes to read Promises Kept — and let’s keep moving…
Thanks for everything,
Joe
Click here
Anchorage Daily News: Speaking to 500 people representing 320 Native American tribes, President Obama pledged last month that he wouldn’t forget his campaign promise to give Native communities more of a voice in the White House. “I said that so long as I held this office, never again would Native Americans be forgotten or ignored,” he said. “And over the past two years, my administration, working hand in hand with many of you, has strived to keep that promise.”
For the most part, tribal leaders say the president has been true to his word….”There is this feeling that there is traction, that we’re having a true dialogue,” said Jacqueline Johnson Pata…
Some of the work has been symbolic – Interior Secretary Ken Salazar early in the administration restored the historic painting “Navajos Breaking Camp” in his office, after it had been mothballed during the Bush administration, for example.
But other accomplishments have had more tangible and far-reaching effects on thousands of people, including the settlement of the long-simmering Cobell lawsuit, which compensates thousands of Native Americans whose land was mismanaged while held in trust by the federal government.
There’s the passage of the Tribal Law and Order Act … the inclusion of Indian Health Service in the health-care law, and the $3.2 billion in stimulus spending, which went to schools, roads on tribal lands and technology upgrades in some of the poorest and most remote corners of the nation.
…Others point to what they say is a shift in tone from previous administrations. Late in 2010 the administration decided to support a United Nations declaration defending the rights of indigenous peoples. The U.S. voted against the declaration when the U.N. General Assembly adopted it in 2007, arguing it was incompatible with existing laws.
“The reversal of that policy and the support behind that … showcase the U.S. change in policy and what they’re doing are historic,” said Julia Kitka of the Alaska Federation of Natives. “I would put that very much at the top of the list.”
Full article here
Thank you Donna
“I don’t think there’s a single Democrat out there, who if they looked at where we started when I came into office and look at where we are now, would say that somehow we have not moved in the direction that I promised. Take a tally. Look at what I promised during the campaign. There’s not a single thing that I’ve said that I would do that I have not either done or tried to do. And if I haven’t gotten it done yet, I’m still trying to do it.“
President Barack Obama, December 7, 2010
Some day, maybe, people will take him at his word.
The Obama Diary 
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