USA Politics

He has finally seen the light, another round of bad jobs numbers may have helped.

* EPA to drop major initiative to clean up smog * Obama Administration move cheered by GOP, business * Environmental groups to protest loss of key initiative
(Adds reaction, background) By Christopher Doering WASHINGTON, Sept 2 (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama
unexpectedly asked the Environmental Protection Agency on
Friday to withdraw a plan to limit smog pollution, handing a
big win to business and Republicans who have argued the
initiative was a job killer in uncertain times. Obama said the move to kill one the EPA's major initiatives
to clean up the environment was part of a broader government
effort to reduce regulatory burdens and uncertainty. Reaction was swift from business groups and Republicans
that the White House was making the right decision as the
country's economy continued to struggle. "Job creators scored a major victory today in the fight
against Washington's red tape," said Republican Senator John
Barrasso. Obama's announcement follows the grim report on Friday that
U.S. employment growth ground to a halt in August, with the
unemployment rate stuck at 9.1 percent. The EPA, under pressure from business and Republican
lawmakers, had delayed several times issuing the new rule that
would limit smog pollution in the United States. EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, supported by a broad range
of environmental groups, has said the ozone rules would save as
much as $100 billion in health costs, and help prevent as many
as 12,000 premature deaths from heart and lung complications. Environmental groups lambasted the move as a big win for
corporate America. "The Obama administration is caving to big polluters at the
expense of protecting the air we breathe. This is a huge win
for corporate polluters and huge loss for public health," said
Gene Karpinski, president of the League of Conservation
Voters. The initial standards, proposed near the start of last
year, would limit ground-level ozone, or smog, to between 60
and 70 parts per billion measured over eight hours.The proposal was stronger than 2008 standards set by the
Bush administration. Environmentalists blasted those for being
less aggressive than government scientists had recommended.Under the rule, factories and oil, natural gas and power
generators would be forced to cut emissions of nitrogen oxides
and other chemicals called volatile organic compounds. Smog
forms when those chemicals react with sunlight.Dow Chemical (DOW.N) has said the rule could cost as much as
$90 billion. Several companies including Dow have urged the
administration to delay the rule until 2013.
(Editing by Russell Blinch, Dale Hudson and Jim Marshall)
Click to expand...
 
From the GOP debate last night, it is clear this is a 2 man race.  I thought Romney got the better of Perry last night.
 
Romney thumped Perry. I got sick when the crowd applauded Perry's record of executions and had to turn it off. That disgusted me beyond belief.

Oh, and the Galileo quote. Nice rhetoric. Completely wrong, asshole. Romney has to beat Perry; Perry is a disaster waiting to happen.
 
I do not think he thumped him, considering the voter pool they are going after, it was a slight win for Romney, because he debated better.  The Galileo line was a nice sounbyte and given that is about all that will be covered from these events in the mainstream press, it fit the bill of sending a general message about prevailing opinion not always being right.

Polls still show good support for the Death Penalty, not as much as 20 years ago, but it is a good primary issue for Perry.  I see the potential for him to be a good President, I think he has been a good governor.
 
Looking at some recent polls and the NY-9 election results .. I am really glad I do not live in a contested Presidential state.  Obama's numbers are way down even amongst core groups, his path to re-election is a slash and burn of the GOP candidate .. and given that any re-election campaign is pretty much a referendum on the incumbant, the GOP will certainly target Obama.  I doubt we will be seeing any hope and change type speeches, this is going to be ugly.
 
LooseCannon said:
I got sick when the crowd applauded Perry's record of executions and had to turn it off. That disgusted me beyond belief.
That disgusted me beyond belief.
Click to expand...

:/  That's sickening indeed.

bearfan said:
Polls still show good support for the Death Penalty, not as much as 20 years ago, but it is a good primary issue for Perry.  I see the potential for him to be a good President, I think he has been a good governor.
Click to expand...

That guy executed people in the most dubious circumstances. A ruthless person without conscience.
Read this --> Texas executions: the most controversial cases
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...When Republican voters at a televised presidential nomination debate last week heard that Rick Perry, the governor of Texas, had presided over 234 executions – the highest number for any governor in modern times – they cheered. They might not have been so enthusiastic had they known the details of some of the individuals who have died on Perry's watch...
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Also check this out:
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Rick Perry executes justice, Texas-style
Perry may have lost no sleep over Texas's 234 executions during his tenure, but the death penalty panders to crude bloodlust

"... Once you have the right to kill people, the voters start expecting semi-regular bloodshed as proof that you're doing your job, creating incentives for prosecutors and politicians to cut corners to get those voter-pleasing cadaver numbers up. Each new generation of prosecutors and politicians feels pressure to "best" their predecessor in the number of executions carried out, lest they face accusations of being soft on crime. Which explains why they soon find themselves where Rick Perry stands, having executed 234 people, many of whom had highly corrupt trials and at least one of whom is most likely innocent.

For those who haven't read the tale of Cameron Todd Willingham, I implore you to read the New Yorker article recounting the case of a man executed for killing his three children based on shoddy evidence and prosecutorial willingness to introduce Willingham's love of Iron Maiden and Led Zeppelin as evidence in order to stoke the prejudices of a Bible Belt jury that was high on fundamentalist tall tales about the Satanic influence of rock music. When presented with an opportunity to spare Willingham's life, Perry declined, and in 2004, Willingham was executed by lethal injection. ..."  
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Keep clapping if you don't mind what he's done, but I honestly hope enough people will take off their blindfolds, sooner than later.  :down:
 
I am much less pro death penalty than I was in the past.  I do think it is a proper punishment in some cases, however the process needs to be 99.99999% sure they have the right guy.  The guy that was executed yesterday for the draggin death of the black man 10 years ago and went to his death saying he did it an has no regrets for doing it, I have no problem with his execution.  Other executions, I am much less sure of.
 
I'm a firm believer that execution is wrong, nothing more than state-sponsored murder. I'm glad it doesn't happen here anymore.

The Troy Davis thing simply sickens me. Sickens me.

About Obama: yes, if the election were held today, it'd be nasty. The economy has a year to recover or change before that gets into full gear. It's hard to predict what things will be like then; economics is delightfully difficult. However, in my opinion, the US economy isn't getting any better any time soon; the Republicans in Congress are terrible economists, and it's unlikely Obama's job bill will get passed. Making that a fight, however...will be interesting.
 
There is a fair amount of Dem opposition to the jobs bill as well, it doubt it would pass the Senate either.  I really do not think Obama is being held up as an economic genius either, he had a full 2 years with enourmous majorities in Congress and spent way too much time on a very flawed health care plan that showed the Dem Congress as being really inept (see deals to get votes from Nelson and Landrieux)
 
They passed health care reform, though; flawed, perhaps, but it is done. The Wall Street reform bill (completely unheralded) is a major reform as well. I'm not the biggest fan of what Obama did in his first 2 years, but that is from a progressive standpoint, of course. But it was also particularly difficult to get things through the Senate (and until someone finally takes down the filibuster, probably always will be for both parties).
 
He had as big a majority in the Senate as anyone has had in the modern age (60, then 59 votes and the 2 GOP Senators from ME that were willing to work with Obama, especially Collins).

Putting aside agreeing or not with his proposals or those of other Presidents Reagan pushed though major policy shifts though a slim Senate majority and a Dem House, Clinton pushed though major reforms with a GOP Congress, Bush II pushed though major reforms (pre 9/11 even) with very slim majorities and an election like the one he won over Gore.    Obama had major advantages over those 3, had huge popularity ratiings when he came into office ... he should have  gotten much more done than he did, I really question if he is an effective leader.  He had everything teed up for him, he could have gone big, but he backed away and let events (and Congress) sweep him, versus laying out a bold course. 

I really do not care for much of what he proposed,so I am not all that sad about this ... but that more than anything is why he is in trouble now .. especially given all the rhetoric of his 2008 campaign.    I am guessing many Dems are wishing they had voted for Hillary.  She would have been a more effective President.
 
A lot of Dems are thinking that way; I'm not sure it's true. Hillary would have had a similar policy objective, and I can't see any difference in the GOP attitude towards coalition building. Reagan's policy reforms were very easy to vote for; tax cuts in the era where deficits were politically ignored and military bumps, no big deal. Bush II, same thing. His post 9/11 policy was based on the idea of fright and that's scary.

Clinton has been the best president of the modern era, still. But if you actually go look at how it went? Clinton had to endure constant GOP filibusters, the politically-motivated impeachment (nobody impeached Reagan for lying to Congress about Iran-Contra), a near-government shutdown, and other political stunts, just as Obama has had to endure. And what did he do to show for it? A failed health care reform. He was pressured into economic reform by the GOP that almost ruined the global economy 10 years later. His bi-partisan attempt to please the lgbt lobby became a civil rights' failure that was repealed during Obama's term (and serves as a major victory for Obama, that he has yet to trumpet), and then there's DOMA, which will be the next civil rights target.

No modern president has been effective, except for Reagan, in getting their major policy initiatives passed. The last effective president, other than Reagan, was Johnson, and he was so hated by the end of his 1.3 terms that he couldn't run for re-election, and destroyed the Democrats for 10 years. And, I would argue, even Reagan wasn't that great of a president. Obama's probably passed more major policies than any other president since Johnson, and certainly had the greatest effect on the way the US works - in a positive light. It's just that it's still the economy, stupid, and Americans won't vote for an incumbent when they don't have jobs.
 
Let me rephrase a bit to say pass major policies reasonably close to the original proposal.  I would point back to some of the stuff Reagan had to put up with from Tip O'Neil, et.
 
That's true enough. Clinton didn't do a bad job. Obama's policies have been watered down - because he has tried for bipartisanship. Perhaps too much bipartisanship. And he's barely put together a joint proposal. Overall, I believe Obama's a better president than he is given credit for, but history cannot judge right away, not yet anyway.

Perhaps soon.
 
Really Clinton's first 2 years were not all that great either, but (and despite voting against him twice) give him credit for being a good politician and leader.  Things like Welfare reform and other reforms he struck with the GOP Congress were overall very beneficial to the country.  His 1994 mid term defeat was much worse than Obama's, perhaps not in raw number of seats, but that the GOP had not controlled Conress since the 40s, a Dem House was a given in the US to that point.  Though certainly at odds, he and Gingrich/Dole/Lott worked well together on policy as did Reagan and O'Neill, it certainly takes two to tango, but Boehner is more along the Tip O'Neill style of speaker than the Gingrich style.  I think Obama looks bad in these fairly recent comparisons. 

Clinton pulled a "only Nixon can go to China" by reforming Dem programs, that probably would have been the best tact for Obama post-mid term.  Trying Stimulus pt. 2 with tax increases is not going to fly.  Also the Solyndra story coming out is really not helping him with the Green Jobs line.

I am not seeing his "re-elect me because I did X" slogan, his two biggest accomplishments either poll badly (Health Care) or are barely on anyones radar (Wall Street Reform)/he is undermining a bit with calls for less regulation in other areas.

Which goes back to mu earlier post, where I think his campaign will be "The Republican will kill seniors/children/immigrants, I might be bad, but they are worse"
 
The thing is with that one, is that he is probably right. The GOP has some opportunities to lead with ideas; their ideas are no good at all - and Obama's tax the rich plan is polling +20 points on Rasmussen.
As an aside, the people at the debate booing the gay soldier tonight was disgusting.
 
Missed the debate last night ...  I'll have to read about it.  Glad to see Johnson got into this one, if I could pick one of the candidates to be the nominee (based solely on issues) .. he would have my vote.
 
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