Democrats worry that Donald Trump will trash Barack Obama’s key achievements, like Obamacare. However, Obama’s aggressive foreign policy agenda is safe, and may be expanded, under Trump.
Trump Will Protect Obama’s Legacy
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication and WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a contributor to Centerclip and co-host of "The Final Countdown" talk show on Radio Sputnik. He is a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "2024: Revisited."
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How could Democrats have been expected to be aware of the policies of Obama while transfixed by his charismatic gaze?
Without a beatific icon of hope to distract Democrats from the continuing horrors of his neoliberalism, the sham is once again revealed.
The state of the Democratic Party does not coincide with the state of mind of its believers because they can’t handle the truth of their party’s betrayals.
No outside help was needed to delegitimize the Democrats; they are quite capable of doing that job unassisted.
The task of the Democratic Party is now to infiltrate the “deplorables” opposition to Trump (that is, if Trump dares to continue the class war waged by the neoliberal neoconservative duopoly against them) so they can win in 2018.
Donald Trump might bury the Democratic Party for years by keeping faith with his pro-single payer campaign talk, taking away the singular object of Obama’s pride.
Also Cheney’s legacy of pocketing taxpayer money.
Also, Cheney’s legacy of getting rich from his Halliburton conflict of interest and profiting from Bush’s trumped up aggressive war of choice.
Did you say “Trump up”? 🙂
That I did.
And I will use that language where appropriate.
I don’t want to chain the beast to a post, I want to chain it to a wagon.
I suppose we can thank our lucky stars that Hair Furor isn’t heavily invested in the MIC. Too bad Trump Airlines took a nosedive – he coulda rebranded it Trump Air Farce and sold it to the military.
tee hee “nose dive”
Mr Rall posted a comment on gocomics linking to a Guardian article.
Once upon a time, the Guardian was a Corbyn Labour newspaper. Then the constabulary intervened and said the editorial policy of a UK newspaper must conform to the edicts of the government, so the Guardian is now a Blair Labour newspaper, strictly neolib, and I stopped reading it.
Obama prepared a causus belli to hand Secretary Clinton on a platter, irrefutable proof that Putin tried to hack the US election and give it to Trump, an act of war, and, when President Clinton took the requisite action and imposed regime change on Russia, her massive majority of loyal voters would know she had been justified.
Only the official version somehow became that Putin hacked the election, got the wrong candidate elected in an illegitimate contest, but it was too late, and Putin’s Siberian candidate would be the 45th (if it had been Xi, Trump would have been a Manchurian candidate), so now it’s Trump who gets the platter, and no one has any idea what he’ll do with it.
No need for any proof or evidence: if the US president says it (as long as the president isn’t Trump) then it must be TRVE, by Thrasamachus’ definition of TRVTH.
The NSA probably hacked Putin’s telephone and has a voice recording of him (just like the recordings the NSA made of Merkel when they hacked her phone) complaining about Clinton, and how she thinks it would be funny if Putin got a knife shoved up his ass just like Qaddafi did.
«Once upon a time, the Guardian was a Corbyn Labour newspaper.» Michael, please inform me – when was the Guardian ever a newspaper that supported policies similar to those of Jeremy Bernard Corbyn today ? I must have missed that – wonder what I’ve been reading all these years ?…
Henri
M. Henri,
When I used to read the Guardian.uk, they said that chemical weapons had been proven to have been used in Syria, but there was no proof of who used them. They said the Syrian government was preferred by a large majority. They said that most of the deaths had been caused by the jihadis. That was then. Anti-interventionist. More like Corbyn than Blair. Then came the constabulary.
The new and greatly improved Guardian.com says it is irrefutably proven that the evil Syrian regime crossed Obama’s ‘red line’ and murdered 1,421 by WMD, that Obama’s failure to enforce that ‘red line’ it has allowed the evil regime to kill almost all of the 600,000 dead, that the evil Syrian regime created the Daesh by releasing jikadis from Syrian prisons to justify its brutal murders, and the US and UK must force regime change to save millions of lives and end the refugee crisis, which was entirely caused by the evil Syrian regime’s murdering those 600,000 causing millions to flee to Europe, where they would never have gone if only Obama had replaced the brutal murderer with a good Wahhabi ruler endorsed by Saudi, Turkey, the US, the UK, and the EU!
«Then came the constabulary.» If by the above you are referring to the change of leadership from Alan Charles Rusbridger to Katharine Viner, I can only agree – the quality of reporting and even, to my dismay, of editorial cartooning has sadly declined since then. However, as the change occurred at the end of May 2013 and the sarin-gas attack on Ghouta (demonstrated by Lloyd and Postal to have been launched from so-called «rebel-held» areas) did not occur before August of that year, it is hard to use Guardian reporting on this issue as proof of a change in outlook after the new regime was installed. The earliest two articles on this matter I’ve been able to find in the journal are this one, from 22 August 2013, which discusses the attacks themselves, and this one, from 17 September the same year, which reports on the reaction to the attack in the UNO. Neither of them state explicitly that the Syrian government forces were responsible for the attack, but to my, admittedly suspicious, mind, both are designed to wake that impression in the reader….
However, and here you are quite correct, no doubt about the provenance of the Ghouta attack is seen in an article published nearly three years later, on 14 March 2016 : «The most devastating chemical attack was carried out by the Assad government in August 2013 in the besieged Eastern Ghouta, a sprawling agricultural hinterland near Damascus. The attack used sarin gas and may have killed more than 1,000 civilians.»
I suppose while ironic, it’s only par for the course, that Guardian articles are now frequently accompanied by the following plea :
«Since you’re here…
…we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading the Guardian than ever but far fewer are paying for it. And advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. So you can see why we need to ask for your help. The Guardian’s independent, investigative journalism takes a lot of time, money and hard work to produce. But we do it because we believe our perspective matters – because it might well be your perspective, too.
If everyone who reads our reporting, who likes it, helps to pay for it, our future would be much more secure.»
Henri
«Trump Will Protect Obama’s Legacy» Thanks, Ted ; I was beginning to get worried. What would the world do without a US government that can be relied upon to continue the polices of e g, «regime change» and wars of aggression abroad, that have characterised various versions of it ever since the close of WW II ? One knows what one has, but not what one will get….
Henri
It really is remarkable. I’m sitting here trying to think of the positive things Obama did. And I can’t come up with anything. The economy? Obamacare? I’m reminded of those people who get caught hoarding pets. Some woman has 27 cats in her one bedroom apartment, they’re all emaciated and have eye infections, there’s two litterboxes, and she insists, insists, insists, that she’s doing a good job.
The economy is a mess, propped up with a whole lot of smoke and mirrors. Ledger trickery with the unemployment stats convinces people that everything’s fine. Am I the only one who sees the empty store fronts? Am I the only one who wonders about the millions of people who lost everything when the economy tanked a decade ago?
Obamacare? Please. It’s a plan to funnel tax dollars into pharma/health insurance coffers. I know, I know, it’s giving SOME people healthcare. And drowning people will grasp at straws. You don’t applaud over it. When the Titanic sank, the inquiry didn’t say, “Well, SOME people survived.” The inquiry said, “Wait. There weren’t enough lifeboats to go around? Let me guess! Too many lifeboats would have cut into profits!”
But maybe I’m being unfair. So I’ll throw it out to the group. What did Obama do that was actually impressive? What do ANY of these politicians do that is impressive? I can think of the Apollo Project back in the 1960s. Surely there was something else since.
«What did Obama do that was actually impressive?» Didn’t he build stable and prosperous democracies in Libya and the Ukraine, Alex ? Or am I perhaps confusing Mr Obama with someone else ?…
Henri
One of Mr Rall’s lacuna is the details of his experience with the ACA. He wrote quite a bit about the unbelievably botched roll-out. Then he finally got enrolled. I have been asking Mr Rall to write about his experiences with the ACA after the roll-out. Nothing. Until now, when he writes that it would be an incredibly bad action by Trump to end the ACA. Which implies that the ACA has worked out very well for Mr Rall. But no essay to that effect, only the implication from the fact that Mr Rall does NOT want the ACA repealed.
I thought Ted was just saying Democrats wouldn’t want the ACA repealed. That was my take. Or that there’s no way repealing it under GOP would help.
Hey, Alex – I’m not thinking of anything ‘impressive’ but I think he did do two things well.
One, he restored dignity to the office. (always assuming that droning people is dignified) He came between a boorish make-believe cowboy idiot and an unbelievably yuge boorish moron. He had not one, single, x-gate during his administration. He kept his cool during eight years of personal attacks.
When I think of a country – their leader always springs to mind. Our president represents us internationally, so it was nice to have one that at least looked & acted presidential. I shudder to think what people will think of our country during the Trump Fiasco.
Two, on several occasions he made the GOP look foolish here at home. Remember the ‘budget showdown’?
“We’ll let the country run out of money”
“okay”
“No, really, we’ll do it this time!”
“whatevs”
“Well, all right, I guess we can pass a budget”
(note to those getting ready to flame me. I do not think he was a great president, I do not think he accomplished great things, I do believe he’s a war criminal and should be prosecuted under the same laws as Bush & Cheney. But on the other hand, I don’t let that blind me to his good qualities – I’ll leave that kind of black & white thinking to the wing nuts.)
« Our president represents us internationally, so it was nice to have one that at least looked & acted presidential. I shudder to think what people will think of our country during the Trump Fiasco.» You’re quite right about that, CrazyH, the liberal-conservative-neocon establishment here in Europe seems devastated to see Mr Obama leave office ; when Swedish Radio’s commentators address the matter, they can barely chock back the sob, and our government representatives are really worried that Mr Trump might not continue the policy of unremitting hostility to Russia that has characterised Mr Obama’s administration….
On the other hand, from speaking to ordinary people – mainly retirees, who constitute the vast majority of my social circle – they seem, like Alex, to find it difficult to name anything positive that Mr Obama has done, while still, often admiring him for the figure he’s cut (by contrast, it would seem, with both his predecessor and his successor, neither of whom are particularly admired). So it goes – style before substance….
Henri
Thanks for the alternate view, Henri. Here inside the US bubble, it’s occasionally difficult to discern what’s going on outside.
oh, and a [SIC!!] for you on ‘chock’ – glass houses, and all. 😀
:: Forehead slap ::
Okay, Obama did accomplish something incredible. First Black President. And yeah, he deserves a lot of the credit for that. The DNC did back him, but that’s not enough as Clinton so amply demonstrated.
Now black children can dream of attaining the highest office in the land. The next black person to throw his/her hat in the right won’t face as much resistance. Yeah, that is something worthwhile.
(Still not enough to make him a great president)
“right” S/B “ring” and I blame spell check. 😉
«oh, and a [SIC!!] for you on ‘chock’ – glass houses, and all. » Thank you for the correction, CrazyH – I meant, of course, to write «choke», but as we know, Ted’s site doesn’t allow for corrections after posting – «The Moving Finger writes …» and all that sort of thing. But please note that I use the [Sic !] only when citing a passage containing an incongruity, in order that readers know that I did not introduce it myself….
With regard to views outside the USA «bubble», one should keep in mind that here in Sweden we are blessed with the same sort of corporate media that you are in the USA, and our publicly funded Swedish Radio no more diverges from that peculiar media Weltanschauung than does the NPR in your country. But they are not always as successful in instilling the proper attitude towards the «indispensable nation» as one might wish – here a recent article from the Local on the results of the latest annually conducted official weighted web-panel survey among Swedes between the ages of 18 and 74 performed between 9 and 14 December 2016, which indicates that some 62% of the population regard the US as a threat to world peace. (Gratifying to note, however, that 77% regard those dastardly Russians as a threat to world peace ; here the media are doing a better job….)
Henri
One might wonder why one would bother to type ‘<i>[SIC!]</i>’ – thirteen keystrokes, including symbols, shifts, and a tricky syntax when ‘[sic]’ – five unshifted keystrokes would suffice.
Personally, the only time I bother to correct someone’s grammar/spelling is when the poster is one of those obnoxious “speak English er git out” types. I find they usually have trouble composing complete sentences, let alone properly conjugating verbs.
But then, I started on the internet long, long, ago. When you’re typing on a 300 baud, full dup acoustic coupler modem it’s simply not worth it to hit backspace. At the time, it was not considered rude to type in all caps, as many popular terminals didn’t have a lower case character set.
It was, however, considered rude to waste bandwidth pointing up typos so long as one could understand what the poster was trying to say.
«One might wonder why one would bother to type ‘[SIC!]’ [Sic ! – I always type the italic code inside the square brackets ;-)] – thirteen keystrokes, including symbols, shifts, and a tricky syntax when ‘[sic]’ – five unshifted keystrokes would suffice.» One might wonder why one would bother to count the keystrokes necessary for someone else to type a phrase – it’s one thing to count them for oneself and decide whether they are necessary or no and quite another to count them with regard to the practices of others….
After all, CrazyH, the issue here is Mr Obama’s so-called legacy and how Mr Trump is prolonging the very best of it, and, since you seemed to be interested, how corporate media outside that country represents the US as compared to how ordinary residents do. Why pick a fight about so inconsequential an issue as the number of keystrokes required to type [Sic !] (besides, for all you know, I’ve devised a macro which allows me to do so with a single stroke, seeing as you give me occasion to use the expression so often) ?… 😉
Henri
“Fight”? I prefer to think of it as “yanking your chain.”
Frankly, I find grammar Nazis to be rather tedious.
«Frankly, I find grammar Nazis to be rather tedious.» Frankly, I find illiterate arseholes like yourself, «CrazyH» rather tiresome, not least when they lack the insight to recognise what they are. But if you enjoy «yanking my chain» – and thus diverting a thread from what otherwise could be a profitable discussion – please continue to do so ; as you hopefully realise by this time, I shall not hesitate to yank back…. 😉
Henri
And here I was trying to be polite.
Let me put it a different way – I’m conducting an experiment in applied social engineering. I wish to determine whether a certain psuedo-intellectual psupposed pswedish psychiatrist can be taught manners.
So far, the results have been rather disappointing (although they are mildly amusing.)
«And here I was trying to be polite.» Surely you jest , or you simply don’t – as the illiterate arsehole you have demonstrated yourself to be – grasp the notion «polite»….
Good luck with your research, and keep yanking !… 😉
Henri
Speaking of protecting a legacy – and one that predates Mr Obam but which he has done his best to follow and enhance – there’s a great discussion between Robert Scheer and William Edward Binney över at Truthdig….
Henri
And speaking again on Mr Obama’s «legacy» – I presume you’ve all seen those reports that Chelsea Elizabeth Manning has been put on the «short list» for presidential pardons prior to Mr Obama leaving office. I hate making predictions about the future, but will here go out on a limb : this one won’t fly….
Hope I’m wrong….
Henri
Speaking of another great piece of that Obama «legacy» – this one domestic – that a Trump administration is certain to «protect», has anyone noted this recent NYT article ?…
«Land of the free, home of the brave» as dear Francis Scott Key would have it….
Henri
“Smooth transition of power” Obama is smoothing the way for his successor to keep an eye on his employees. (née citizens)
We are free to say anything we’d want the NSA to hear, provided we’re brave enough.
«We are free to say anything we’d want the NSA to hear, provided we’re brave enough.» Well, CrazyH, let us hope that the NSA and its principals (and allies ’round the world, like the FRA here in Sweden) will continue to be content to track Ted and his readers and commentators, rather than shutting us down. I doubt that Mr Clapper et al regard us a dangerous, but they are curious as to what we’re up to….
Henri