Thoughts & Commentary on the Obama Administration

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Maybe the jingoist Poles and Brits ought to obsess less about the backbone of France, and instead raise their amount of foreign troops to the level of France.

The UK has less troops deployed in the world's hellholes than France. Poland even has less troops (yes, per capita) in Afghanistan itself than France.

I had a nice breakdown all typed out, then Tosa blipped the forum, so I'll be brief. Your country has a larger military, is more populous, has a larger defence budget and is more wealthy. Despite this, my country contribute's a larger proportion of it's population to NATO engagements.

Take a look at the numbers: http://www.globalfirepower.com/

Also, I'd like to point out that I said I was "tempted" to accuse you of a lack of backbone, but that I recognised that the situation was more complex. Given that I have friends who have died in battles resulting from a strategic lack of manpower, I think that's generous.

[Strike For The South]

When you begin to fight your friends, it's probably time to stop fighting your eniemies.

:wisdom:

[Louis VI the Fat]

Republican partisanship is grinding the US political system to a complete stop. Founding Fathers turning in their grave:

The instinctive reflex is to blame Obama. He must be doing something wrong. Maybe he is doing a thing or two wrong. But the main thing is that America's political system is broken.

How did this happen? Two main factors made it so. The first is the super-majority requirement to end debate in the Senate. The second is the near-unanimous obstinacy of the Republican opposition. They have made important legislative work all but impossible.


The super-majority requirement – 60 votes, or three-fifths of the Senate, to end debate and move to a vote on final passage – has been around since the 19th century. But it's only in the last 10 to 15 years that it has been invoked routinely. Back in Lyndon Johnson's day – a meaningful comparison since American liberals are always wondering why Obama can't be "tough" like Johnson – the requirement was reserved for only the most hot-button issues (usually having to do with race). Everything else needed only 51 votes to pass, a regular majority.


Both parties have contributed to this problem. But guess which has contributed more? In 2007, when they became the minority party for the first time in five years, the Republicans invoked the super-majority measure 60 times, an all-time record for a single year.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Sigh. If you've been watching the Washington healthcare debate, you know what that sigh was about. We Americans have always been proud of our constitution and the principle of separation of powers. The system has always ensured that the minority party has certain rights and that the executive branch cannot just muscle through Congress any old thing that it wants. Our founders wanted a system that moved slowly.


Do they ever have it. In fact, we now have a system that barely moves at all. Watching American politics through British eyes, you must be utterly mystified as to why Barack Obama hasn't gotten this healthcare bill passed yet. Many Americans are too. The instinctive reflex is to blame Obama. He must be doing something wrong. Maybe he is doing a thing or two wrong. But the main thing is that America's political system is broken.


How did this happen? Two main factors made it so. The first is the super-majority requirement to end debate in the Senate. The second is the near-unanimous obstinacy of the Republican opposition. They have made important legislative work all but impossible.


The super-majority requirement – 60 votes, or three-fifths of the Senate, to end debate and move to a vote on final passage – has been around since the 19th century. But it's only in the last 10 to 15 years that it has been invoked routinely. Back in Lyndon Johnson's day – a meaningful comparison since American liberals are always wondering why Obama can't be "tough" like Johnson – the requirement was reserved for only the most hot-button issues (usually having to do with race). Everything else needed only 51 votes to pass, a regular majority.


Both parties have contributed to this problem. But guess which has contributed more? In 2007, when they became the minority party for the first time in five years, the Republicans invoked the super-majority measure 60 times, an all-time record for a single year.


And Obama's problems are not limited to Republicans, of course. Think of it this way: in a 100-seat body, getting 51 votes is hard but not impossible. But getting those 57th, 58th, 59th and 60th votes to end debate … Well, the situation gives those senators incredible bargaining power. They can basically dictate terms in exchange for their votes. Which is exactly what senators Ben Nelson (Democrat of Nebraska), Joe Lieberman (independent of Connecticut), Olympia Snowe (Republican of Maine) and others have been doing publicly for weeks. A sharp friend has mordantly taken to referring to them as "President Nelson", "President Lieberman" and "President Snowe" in emails. My friend is not exaggerating. With regard to the final content of the Senate bill, each has more power than Obama.


Then we have the nature of the GOP opposition. Once upon a time, there were a number of Republican moderates in Congress. Today, out of 217 legislators, the number of genuine moderates is under 10. Maybe even under five.


I do not embellish. Last Friday, the House of Representatives passed a set of financial industry reforms and regulations. It's scarcely a radical package of measures. Speaker Nancy Pelosi had to make several compromises to get enough votes out of moderate Democrats for the thing to pass. So how many Republicans backed it? Yep. Again: zero.


To see David Cameron offer support for the bonus tax is mind-boggling to an American. There is no way a Republican in Congress would ever endorse such a thought. He or she would be destroyed by the conservative agitprop network.


So this is where we are. We now have a distended nightmarish version of what the founders wanted. We've got a Congress that can not only stand up to the executive branch but can (at least on domestic matters) dictate terms to it. And we have a minority that has the power to stop the majority from doing much of anything.


These are the two basic reasons the great progressive dawn of the Obama era has ground to a near halt. And yet even most Americans are dimly aware of all this. It requires a lot of dot connecting. What's needed is a broad public education campaign – and here, Obama should start playing a role – about how broken this system is, bringing a new level of pressure to bear on the legislators who are the problem. But for now, people on the left would rather engage in juvenile carping about how let down they are.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisf...l-system-obama

[drone]

Hey, don't blame the Republicans! They tried to get rid of the cloture rule in 2005, but those pesky Democrats wouldn't let them.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Hey, don't blame the Republicans!

When I get wet on my way to work that is still the result of some devious plot, somewhere, by the GOP.

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

From the Guardian? Yes, probably the most unbiased and trusted news source for American politics.

[KukriKhan]

When I get wet on my way to work that is still the result of some devious plot, somewhere, by the GOP.

I remind the esteemed Gentleman from Paris that Cloture is a French invention that we stole, via the UK, to temper the power of the Executive.

It's not a Constitutional requirement, just a legislative rule. One that could be un-done tomorrow, enough Senators agreeing.

And I would remind Mr. Tomaski that "President" does not equal "Dictator".

[drone]

I find it quite telling that the Democrats, even with their large majority in both houses plus the White House, can't really get anything done. And this is after all the whinging from them during the Bush years when they were the minority. If they had really wanted to stop the GOP then, they could have, but complaining and woe-is-me talk was apparently easier. They either didn't have the balls, or secretly wanted to go in the same direction with plausible deniability.

I'm guessing this is all on the Dem leadership, both Pelosi and Reid have got to go. Both are hopelessly out of their league.