[quote=afx114]Very good point eavesdropper. But you make it sound as if getting those passed were a cakewalk due to the Democratic majority. Are you arguing that they should have been easier to pass? In hindsight, perhaps they should have been. But it’s clear that they were battles. Were they battles due to the president’s political inexperience, or were they battles because the Dems, while a single group, are a diverse coalition of interests, much more so than the Reps? Is a president’s performance based on how many of the opposite party he can bring on board or is it based on the overall ability to bring diverse interests together to get shit done? We can also refer to the Obameter for some insight: http://politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/
No doubt the true test will be when he doesn’t have a majority. And based on what we’ve seen from the Reps so far, it doesn’t look like he will get much help from them. However, there could be more pressure on them to actually get stuff done since their votes will actually matter this time.
Time will tell.[/quote]
Love the Obamameter!! Many thanks for the link.
I was really pumped when the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania came up with the FactCheck.org website. Brilliant idea! Most of our political leaders and their staffs likewise thought so, too, utilizing FactCheck regularly in campaigns, legislative battles, and press releases….until facts came up that were not necessarily in their favor. Now we have a number of similar sites from which you can choose, depending on your particular brand of bias. Oh, well. It was great while it lasted.
In regard to the legislation, mine was an attempt simply to demonstrate the extreme divide along party lines. I have no delusions that any of those battles were easy. As for a change in the balance of the Senate and House, I wish I had your faith. In my eyes, a significant number of Republicans winning the seats of incumbent Dems will confirm what I suspect: that the evidence that the Republicans are drawing large paychecks for obstructing legislative progress hasn’t registered in the brains of American voters, or it simply doesn’t bother them. I’m not sure which of those bothers me more.
