politics

Bush bailed out the banks. Obama handled the auto industry, who had to give up some control of their companies and pay us back with interest, and they did so.

Obama had the kind of mandate Trump thinks he has and he did nothing with it because he didn't want to ruffle feathers.

And they still called him an anti Christ money.

So, he did absolutely nothing radical, and he energized the moron redneck as though he was Satan himself.

Leaving is us with the worst of both worlds. No change, and Magats foaming at the mouth.

He's a war criminal

I'm not trying to defend Obama, especially I abhor his drone warfare, but politics is known to be cut throat, and politicians are beholden to campaign donations. Election campaigning is an expensive endeavour, and those who could throw more money have increased likelihood of winning. There are exceptions to the rule of course, and sometimes those who spent less still wins, but the candidate increases his/her chances of winning by having more campaign funds.

With all that said, this means playing ball with the campaign donors and their lackeys, or else they will gang up on you. Obama is all too aware of this. Consider that Lena Khan's aggressive FTC investigations under Biden on tech giants pissed off the oligarchs. Musk, Zuckerberg and Bezos threw their weights on supporting Trump and now we are here. Apparently, Obama told Bernie in 2016 that he "can't be the president and be the good guy".

What is required is someone who is not afraid dip their hands into the mud and throw some, without being in the mud pit itself. People villainise Machiavellianism for good reasons, but evil don't play by the rules and evil never sleeps. Why still be nice if they already stabbed you? You definitely need to be Machiavellian when the situation requires it. We had that with the Roosevelts, and the fact that they were already wealthy insulated them from being beholden to the whims of campaign donations of the oligarchs and their attack dogs, made them have more free reign to pursue actually more progressive policies. Some people say JB Pritzker has those qualities-- an already wealthy politician willing to be Machiavellian to pursue progressive policies, although I don't know much about the man to warrant the observation.

Edit: JB not Joseph Pritzker

similar thing with the Canadian Liberals and electoral reform

I suspect Obama sees a lot of himself in Mamdani. A brown kid with big dreams and a funny name, with Republicans calling him a Muslim socialist and frothing at the mouth to "prove" he's not a real American? It's like the 2000s all over again.

Also internment camps, and extraordinary rendition, and drastically expanded government surveillance, and the FBI going after Muslims and leftists, and manufacturing an excuse for regime change in an oil-rich country, EDIT: two oil-rich countries... Yeah, maybe it's a little too much like the 2000s.

Exactly. Obama is probably the best stump speakers America has ever seen and he'd be of great value to any campaign by doing more of that... but he really should not be shaping policy.

The American working class really does want 'Hope and Change', but Obama ain't that

As opposed to letting the idiot masses hand the future over to a crybaby manchild being manipulated by proto-Nazi racists?

Idk. I feel like he really gave it an earnest shot.

We are all thinking and talking about health insurance and what that means in regards to the American dream. I think that's good for people to think about.

In my view, one of the better Republican presidents that we've had in my life.

I didn't see eye to eye with him, but that first midterm brought a lot of opportunists that may not have had the good of the nation as their goal.

Plus the economy was absolutely trashed and the poison pills inserted with the wall street bailout.

I can see a way to cut him some slack.

Getting rid of the 2 party system would require a crisis of such magnitude I cannot in good conscience wish for it.

Losing world war 3. A pandemic 10X deadlier than covid, hostile Aliens, something at that level.

Nothing less will do it.

Better edit and add the /s, because there are people who feel that way.

The problem is more that people conflate liberal and left through Obama. Like you are doing in this very comment. If you know what left politics is it's obvious that Obama isn't part of this.

If Obama is good or bad, whether he carried some better than conservative policy, or got something done really doesn't matter because he isn't a left politician, so placing him as one will generate resistance not because everyone on the left sees him as evil, but because he is obviously not left to people who understand what 'left' and or 'liberal' means.

It's an error in categorization on the part of the one conflating Obama and left, not a failure of "left purity" on Obamas part, he never was left to anyone paying attention, at best he used left messaging and heritage to promote a liberal campaign. Which might be the second reason many are sometimes angry with him, he used left aesthetics and talking points, while in retrospect not caring all that deeply about them, which to someone starting out naively optimistic about the prospect of an Obama White house, feels like betrayal, not because Obama really betrayed them as such, more because over time they came to realize he was never really fighting for them to begin with.

Between this and another comment on the same topic in another thread, I get the impression you think Obama is progressive and failed to appoint a progressive DNC chair out of ignorance. Have you considered the possibility that he's actually neoliberal and refused power to progressives on purpose?