If the election were next Tuesday, would you be a volunteer for the 2012 Re-elect Barack campaign?

[BP2]

A simple poll designed to send a message of either "please give us more of the same," or "fix it now or lose us later."

[Bolo Boffin]

1. It's just not that simple.

If the election were next Tuesday, that would mean we'd been through a primary process and Obama won it.

And that would mean there was a Republican candidate to keep out of office as well. I don't see them nominating Dennis Kucinich, do you?

The time to deal with Barack Obama is in the primary. And things may yet change between now and the 2012 primary.

[BP2]

3. "The time to deal with Barack Obama is in the primary." LOL, you're right! I should have

worded the question in that manner.

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

2. Your poll needs 4 options.

Yes I would volunteer and I volunteered with the 2008
Yes I would volunteer and I did not volunteer in 2008
No I would not volunteer and I volunteered with the 2008
No I would not volunteer and I did not volunteer in 2008

[iceman66]

4. Why would ANYONE volunteer for the 2012 campaign

if the election were next Tuesday?

I would volunteer, to the extent possible with less than a week until the election.

[Political Heretic]

5. I hope to spend my time advocacting on issues, urging people to demand better from "leaders"

or stop supporting political representatives that consistently refuse to address structural injustice or to put the needs of working class individuals and families ahead of the whims of the financial elite.

If Obama or any other Democratic candidate is willing to stop playing politics within the parameters set by the ruling class, and instead lead a radical kind of politics that puts ending poverty, supporting labor, and ending global aggression first, then I'd urge people to vote for that candidate.

Otherwise, I'll urge people to keep demanding better leaders who are interested in more than playing "ball" within the confines of the rules of this failed, fundamentally unjust exploitative system.

[closeupready]

6. Really can't answer that. Had you asked me four months ago, I would have said hell, no.

But in light of what appears to be a gradual change in direction towards more progressive policies, at least in terms of rhetoric, I am going to wait and see if actual policy ends up matching the rhetoric. If so, then I could respond affirmatively. Even enthusiastically. :)

[Arctic Dave]

7. I voted no. I would not volunteer for him.

[CrispyQ]

8. I would vote for Obama,

but no time or money.

[Toasterlad]

9. No. I Only Support Progressive Candidates.

[lamp_shade]

10. Yep.

[FrenchieCat]

11. Hell the fuck yeah, I would!

I'm not into suicide......or going backwards after having come forward.

The future is shaped by concrete end results of what the past was,
not what it could have been.

In otherwords, it ain't about how I feel,
but about making sure that my children and the children of others
can't ever look at me in the eyes and say,
"Why didn't you help make a difference, when you could have?"

So as a liberal invested in making sure that this country progresses in the right direction,
hell yeah I'd work my ass off, and then some, towards the re-election of this President.
Otherwise, my ideal become simply an intellectual exercise
about much to do about nothing.

Talking about primarying Pres. Obama one year in is just that;
an exercise about nothing, and only goes to bring down a mood
which considering all that he has accomplished to date, even
though he gets very little credit, should be much more optimistic.

It's a shame really that folks would be willing to hand back this government to the Repubs,
simply to make their point that all is not exactly as they had wanted.

After one year, I've been somewhat disappointed with the take that many have adopted;
that President Obama's "scant" accomplishments have lacked substance after 12 months,
as was ridiculed on SNL Saturday night.

Perhaps it is because I can't share the belief that there is even an underlying truth in the "humorous" SNL depiction,
and in fact, I find it rather dangerous as many are adopting that line in the real world;
a meme pushed at every opportunity by those who initially said he was "doing too much"
to now saying "He's done very little, if anything at all".

The danger in us allowing this intellectually dishonest meme to become the Conventional Wisdom in accessing our Democratic President's first year is how it implies that we have a do-nothing President, when that isn't true at all.

The "lazy/lack of accomplishment/he's all talk and no action" labels that this President has been handed are in fact re-enforcing insidious stereotypes that are odorous and unfair and that play right into the unfortunate racialized psyche of this country. It is not what the people should be hearing, or buying, and we certainly should not be what we are perpetuating; blatant myths just because we can. It really won't help us to distort the reality that is the present, it can only hurt us.

Pres. Obama had one overarching priority to accomplish in his first 12 months, and it was to insure that we would not be falling into an economic abyss that would be impossible to ever get out of.

That's why he was elected above all else, and why after September 15th his poll numbers went up, and basically never came down to election day.

Well, he has been effective on this to a great degree, even if he didn't perform instant miracles.....and with all of our debates, discussions and arguments on the best way out of this mess, He has led us out without becoming the socialist that the Right prematurely accused him of day in, day out.....and although it will take patience, the wheels are moving on our agenda, slowly, but surely.





Economy in U.S. Grew at 5.7% Pace, Most in Six Years
Jan. 29 (Bloomberg) -- The economy in the U.S. expanded in the fourth quarter at the fastest pace in six years as factories cranked up assembly lines and companies increased investment in equipment and software.

The 5.7 percent increase in gross domestic product, which exceeded the median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News, marked the best performance since the third quarter of 2003, figures from the Commerce Department showed today in Washington. Efforts to rebuild depleted inventories contributed 3.4 percentage points to GDP, the most in two decades.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=acQASpga4OhM&pos=1

Blue-Collar Jobs in Demand for 2010

http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/career-articles-blue_collar_jobs_in_demand_for_2010-1099




Volcker Op-Ed: Look out, big banks. Change is coming
Paul Volcker, chairman of the president’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board, contributes an important op-ed to today's NY Times. And the message to big banks is clear: Your "too-big-to-fail" ass has been saved for the last time: ......
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/31/opinion/31volcker.html?pagewanted=1

"...Love him or hate him, or anything in between, recognition of the overall effect of the broad points of Obama's emergency economic policies --- quickly passed at an historic moment of looming disaster --- is due. At least along with any honest appraisal of those policies."
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7679

and well, the Barack Obama Admin and Dems in Congress did some other Hopey-Changey things as well.

One down, two more to come

.....because even with the wrench thrown in by Republican Scott Brown's election in Massachusetts, this Democratic Congress is on a path to become one of the most productive since the Great Society 89th Congress in 1965-66, and Obama already has the most legislative success of any modern president -- and that includes Ronald Reagan and Lyndon Johnson. The deep dysfunction of our politics may have produced public disdain, but it has also delivered record accomplishment.

There were also massive investments in green technologies, clean water and a smart grid for electricity, while the $70 billion or more in energy and environmental programs was perhaps the most ambitious advancement in these areas in modern times. As a bonus, more than $7 billion was allotted to expand broadband and wireless Internet access, a step toward the goal of universal access.

Any Congress that passed all these items separately would be considered enormously productive. Instead, this Congress did it in one bill.

Lawmakers then added to their record by expanding children's health insurance and providing stiff oversight of the TARP funds allocated by the previous Congress.

Other accomplishments included a law to allow the FDA to regulate tobacco, the largest land conservation law in nearly two decades, a credit card holders' bill of rights and defense procurement reform.

The House, of course, did much more, including approving a historic cap-and-trade bill and sweeping financial regulatory changes. And both chambers passed their versions of a health-care overhaul. Financial regulation is working its way through the Senate, and even in this political environment it is on track for enactment in the first half of this year. It is likely that the package of job-creation programs the president showcased on Wednesday, most of which got through the House last year, will be signed into law early on as well.

Most of this has been accomplished without any support from Republicans in either the House or the Senate -- an especially striking fact, since many of the initiatives of the New Deal and the Great Society, including Social Security and Medicare, attracted significant backing from the minority Republicans.
snip
Democratic ideologies stretch from the left-wing views of Bernie Sanders in the Senate and Maxine Waters in the House to the conservative approach of Ben Nelson in the Senate and Bobby Bright in the House, with every variation in between. Finding 219 votes for climate-change legislation in the House was nothing short of astonishing; getting all 60 Senate Democrats to support any version of major health-care reform, an equal feat.
snip
specific new policies -- such as energy conservation and protection for public lands -- enjoy solid and broad public support. But many voters discount them simply because they were passed or proposed by unpopular lawmakers. In Massachusetts, people who enthusiastically support their state's health-care system were hostile to the very similar plan passed by Congress. Why? Because it was a product of Congress.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/29/AR2010012902516.html

Obama proposes federal climate change agency
WASHINGTON - The Obama administration proposed a new climate change agency yesterday to provide Americans with predictions on how global warming will affect everything from drought to sea levels.

The initiative, modeled loosely on the 140-year-old National Weather Service, would provide forecasts to farmers, regional water managers, and business operators affected by changing climate conditions. It is being proposed as skeptics have become increasingly effective in attacking the credibility of global warming forecasts.

The agency would be part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which monitors climate and conducts research. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration also directs similar operations.

“We currently respond to millions of annual requests for climate information, and we expect those requests to grow exponentially,’’ said Jane Lubchenco, NOAA administrator, adding that with recent scientific advances, “the models will continue to improve, and we will be able to provide more and more information.’’
(snip)
The agency launched a web portal yesterday at www.climate.gov to provide a single entry point for access to climate information, products, and services.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2010/02/09/obama_proposes_federal_climate_change_agency/



here is one extremely consequential area where Obama has done just about everything a liberal could ask for -- but done it so quietly that almost no one, including most liberals, has noticed. Obama's three Republican predecessors were all committed to weakening or even destroying the country's regulatory apparatus: the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and the other agencies that are supposed to protect workers and consumers by regulating business practices.

Now Obama is seeking to rebuild these battered institutions. In doing so, he isn't simply improving the effectiveness of various government offices or making scattered progress on a few issues; he is resuscitating an entire philosophy of government with roots in the Progressive era of the early twentieth century. Taken as a whole, Obama's revival of these agencies is arguably the most significant accomplishment of his first year in office. <...>
<more>
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com /


Presented two Budgets that, considering the state of our economy are more Progressive than any budget in 2 decades!

Specifically addressing FDR’s mistake in reducing spending in 1937, Orszag indicated the Administration will not make drastic cuts that will threaten the fragile recovery. The path to deficit reduction is based on reversing the fiscal policies of the last 8 years including allowing the Bush tax cuts for those earning over $250,000 to expire, ending the fossil fuel subsidies, ending the Iraq & Afghanistan wars, implementing the Fiscal Commision, and instituting the 3 year freeze. In addition, Orszag said strict adherence to PayGo will prevent irresponsible spending as it did in the 90s. This is also the thinking behind the freeze in that departments will have the ability to raise spending provided they find reductions to pay for it. These tactics are expected to reduce the deficit to 3.9% of GDP by 2015, just above the accepted target of 3% of GDP. Even so, in order to set the country on solid ground for the long term, Orszag acknowledged the need to reform health care in order to reduce the costs of Medicaid and Medicare. Health care has the potential of consuming over 10% of GDP by 2050, which is not sustainable.
http://obama-mamas.com/blog/?p=1162

Report Card on Civil Liberties

Obama pledged to reject the Bush administration's fast-and-loose adherence to constitutional rights. How is he doing?


During his inauguration speech, President Barack Obama declared, "As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals." These were words many Americans who voted for Obama longed to hear -- an acknowledgement that American security could not be purchased by shredding the liberties guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States.

Interrogation
On Jan. 22, 2009, two days after having taken office, Obama issued an executive order instructing all agents of the U.S. government to follow interrogation procedures outlined in the Army Field Manual, which bans the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques." The executive order states plainly that individuals in U.S. custody shall "in all circumstances be treated humanely and shall not be subjected to violence to life and person (including murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment, and torture), nor to outrages upon personal dignity (including humiliating and degrading treatment)."

This is a marked change from the Bush administration's guidelines, which held that the "executive branch's constitutional authority to protect the nation from attack" trumped all legal and treaty obligations governing how detainees should be treated. The Bush administration's definition of torture "was so narrow as to allow almost anything," according to Ken Gude, an expert on human rights and international law at the Center for American Progress.

"This is the one area where I think we've seen the most change. There will be no gray areas; we've got a pretty clear standard," Gude says. By instructing adherence to the Field Manual, the administration has signaled "there will be no attempt to redefine language to allow things that people would generally consider torture, or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment."

Verdict: Change we can believe in.

Rendition
The same executive order that banned "enhanced interrogation" techniques also ordered the CIA to close the infamous "black sites" where detainees were interrogated and held without trial. It also prohibited the transfer of individuals to other countries to face torture, or transfers with the "purpose or effect" of undermining the United States' obligation to "ensure the humane treatment of individuals in its custody or control."

On April 9, CIA Director Leon Panetta issued a memo to Congress confirming that the black sites had in fact been closed but that the CIA retains the authority to detain individuals solely "on a short-term transitory basis." Gude explains that there is a difference between "extraordinary rendition," the process by which detainees were rendered to CIA "black sites" or to other third countries where they would likely be tortured, and "rendition," which is the transfer of detainees outside the normal extradition process. The purpose of extraordinary rendition, Gude says, is to keep suspects outside of the justice system, while the purpose of rendition is to transfer them into a country where they can be tried for their alleged crimes.

"The Obama administration has ceased the process of extraordinary rendition, but rendition exists as an option," Gude says, adding that it is not necessarily a bad thing. "There are times when it's not feasible for governments to follow the traditional extradition process, simply because cooperation between the United States and another government is not always possible."

On the other hand, the American Civil Liberties Union's Jonathan Hafetz who has acted as counsel in several cases involving terrorism detainees, cautions that even the CIA's limited detention authority may still lead to problems. "The suggestion that the CIA has authority to conduct extrajudicial handovers to foreign governments is ambiguous and troubling, as is the statement that the CIA can still conduct 'transitory' detentions."


Verdict: Change for the better, but questions remain.

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=report_card_on_civil_liberties


And the fact that this government has been more transparent than any others,
Obama administration wins high marks for ‘transparency’
According to the report authored by Common Cause, Democracy 21, the League of Women Voters and U.S. PIRG, "The cumulative effect of the administration's actions has been to adopt the strongest and most comprehensive lobbying, ethics and transparency rules and policies ever established by an administration to govern its own activities."
http://www.peoplesworld.org/obama-administration-wins-high-marks-for-transparency/


and has reformed procurement policies via the defense Department,

Obama backs defense procurement overhaul
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2009/04/obama_backs_def.html

Military procurement reform sweeps through Senate
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/05/07/military.procurement/index.html

Obama signs weapons procurement reform
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/05/22/Obama-signs-weapons-procurement-reform/UPI-75731243011243/


while raising the salaries of our Armed Forces,

Congress approves 3.4 percent pay raise for military
http://blog.al.com/live/2009/10/congress_approves_34_percent_p.html

and passing a GI bill of Rights:
New GI Bill sending veterans to school this fall
http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2009-07-31-gi-bill_N.htm?obref=obinsite


while giving 95% of Americans a tax cut, the biggest tax cut for middle class Americans
ever passed......
BIGGEST. TAX CUT. EVER.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2009_02/016948.php

Leaving Iraq

http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Security-Industry/2010/01/05/Leaving-Iraq-Logistics-move-staggering/UPI-25521262732688/


"DADT....
"This year, I will work with Congress and our military to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they love because of who they are," Obama said. "It's the right thing to do." When the president made the remark, cameras showed Defense Secretary Robert Gates standing and applauding, along with many Democratic lawmakers.

Marc Ambinder reports today that the president's directive wasn't just rhetoric -- the administration is already moving forward with a plan to implement the new policy.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/

The Senate Armed Services Committee, for the first time in 17 years, convened a hearing today on whether the U.S. military should allow Americans to wear a uniform, regardless of their sexual orientation. It went pretty well, though there are some lingering concerns about implementing a change in policy.

The nation's top two Defense officials called on Tuesday for an end to the 16-year-old "don't ask, don't tell" law, a major step toward allowing openly gay men and women to serve in the United States military for the first time in its history.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/

Gay military rights advocate Lt. Dan Choi Back on Active Duty

"Gay military rights advocate Lt. Dan Choi has been reportedly called back into active duty. Photographer Jeff Sheng, who recently turned his lens on active gay and lesbian service members, confirmed the news in a blog posting on Bilerico.com.



Choi was to appear at the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force's Creating Change conference but could not attend due to his being called to serve."
http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2010/02/09/Dan_Choi_Back_in_Active_Duty/


---------------

This Absolutely needed to be said
http://www.balloon-juice.com/?p=34284

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If the midterm elections in November turn out to be more like 1994, when Democrats got hammered, than 1982, when Republicans suffered a less costly blow, the GOP will probably be emboldened to double down on its opposition to everything, trying to bring the Obama presidency to its knees on the way to 2012. That would mean real gridlock in the face of a serious crisis. Given the precarious coalitions in our otherwise dysfunctional politics, we could go quickly from one of the most productive Congresses in our lifetimes to the most obstructionist.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/29/AR2010012902516.html