that was like......a lot of politicians.
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Rep. Ilhan Omar: the “hope and change” offered by Barack Obama was a mirage
- Thread starter OtherWorldly
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The daily budget going into healthcare is above 8 billion a day according to my quick research, so not that hard to imagine...
According to Moody's, the price of Warren's universal day care plan at $1.7 billion for a full decade. You'd think that would be passed immediately for all the talk about how a billion is chump change to the US government.
Sanders says his free college plan would cost $70 billion per year, which lines up with what the Dept of Education predicts free college would cost. That's still half of what Trump's tax cuts costs per year and a fifth of what the Iraq war costs per year.
Democrat's infrastructure plan would cost $100 billion per year for 10 years, which they say would create 15 million jobs and catch us up on a very long backlog of structurally deficient roads, bridges, dams, rails, water systems, power grids, public housing, and public hospitals.
It's mostly just health care that would be more expensive to get done than what the republicans waste every time they gain power.
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It's almost too good to be true.
(Not saying that is the actual case)
Slighly off topic but since in general Obama's foreign policy is being discussed.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/04/the-obama-doctrine/471525/
is a good read from a while back. Illustrates some of the things he wanted etc.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/04/the-obama-doctrine/471525/
is a good read from a while back. Illustrates some of the things he wanted etc.
I had a thread closed within 10 minutes for talking about Obama's Warcrimes
It's like many establishment Democrats have no actual convictions and just go whichever way the wind is blowing...
Some of the responses and POV's in here... human (*cough* non-American) lives are nothing but statistics to some of you . OT, glad Obama is being called out ,finally. You couldn't say a negative thing for years without being swarmed and shamed.
The problem with politics is that, even when you're explicitly, technically & completely right, there's a time & a place for everything.
For as correct as she is, she's earning nothing more than brownie points with more militant leftists, who don't make up a majority of the Democratic voting block, who view Obama as their biggest star to date. Part of being a politician is being able to keep your job, and considering how many people she's pissed off so far, she ain't doing too well in that regard.
For as correct as she is, she's earning nothing more than brownie points with more militant leftists, who don't make up a majority of the Democratic voting block, who view Obama as their biggest star to date. Part of being a politician is being able to keep your job, and considering how many people she's pissed off so far, she ain't doing too well in that regard.
Do you know how much she won by in her district? She'll be fine.
People are acting like she said "KILL ALL JEWS/FUCK OBAMA" instead of "AIPAC has too much sway in USA's politics/Obama could have done better job". If these seriously tame comments are causing such controversy, Omar would be better leaving that swamp.
It's like people who consume politics on ERA have the depth of a puddle in relation to their ability to think critically and process events beyond binary situations.
What is the purpose of coming into a thread like this and saying something like this? Are you aware that the conversation at hand is dealing with the slaughter of thousands of innocent civilians? You think were trying to be cool discussing this?
You do know that the vast, overwhelming, majority of people view Obama in a favorable light, right?
Nah. I really like Obama but I can't fault anyone for being honest and realistic.
Gay rights doesn't really fit the bill here. Democrats sold gay voters out completely with DOMA, it's indefensible.
Edit: Not saying Obama voted on DOMA but we're talking Democratic Party in general I believe
So does Ilhan! My God. Why is it so hard to understand that you can support someone but also criticize aspects of their policies? I would bet 99% of people applauding Ilhan Omar support Obama and would vote for him over the orange disaster in the White House any day of the week. Criticizing his done warfare does not mean you view Obama completely unfavorably. Let's not become Conservatives here.
I don't think most of those people are against criticizing him, though. If I was given a survey that asked me if I "approve" Obama, I'd say yes. I'd also have all the same criticisms that Omar has, too. A lot of people would. I like that she is criticizing him on his foreign policy, and I still am generally fine with Obama. Especially with Trump in office.
The topic is about Rep. Omar criticizing Obama and I put my input in. I detest this idea that unless a candidate or a representative is ultra-left, they are centrist, which when I read the thread initially, seemed to be the case. What did Omar and the rest who agree with her expect from Obama? What will happen inevitably if Bernie wins, and he doesn't bring the "change" people expect, will he be the new person to criticize? Obama wasn't perfect but he certainly doesn't deserve to be criticized for not living up to unrealistic expectations. Don't attack me because I don't agree with the common sentiment.
Except I'm responding to someone who has always been pretty adamant in their dislike for Democrats and Obama in general.
I'm not just going to ignore all of the threads discussing Obama and the people labeling him a war criminal in the context of the conversations on ERA. There are tons of people here who think Obama is a "bad person" and have probably diluted themselves into thinking their opinion has gained in popularity over time because a dozen other people on their forum share similar views.
Saying "They would vote Obama over Trump" is a nothing statement, any sane person would do that.
Everyone wants to talk about the drone program, but nobody actually wants to discuss the drone program and where it was executed, how it was executed, what it actually did during it's peak in Pakistan and the overall outcome of the program (or the fact that Pakistan clearly approved it via backdoor channels even while being publicly "against it")
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It's funny how the people coming to complain about the lack of "nuance" in bombing brown people and voting against gay rights are the ones who think she's saying Obama is trash and the same as Trump, despite most of the people being critical of him (Omar included) still being supportive overall.
I do wonder what folks condemning Obama will say if Trump's presidency ends with fewer civilian deaths as a direct result of American military operations during his tenure.
You don't have to be supportive of Obama in order to criticize him.
Please enlighten us about the aspects of this program that you mention and please inform us about its justification.
Please enlighten us about the aspects of this program that you mention and please inform us about its justification.
https://www.lawfareblog.com/us-drone-war-pakistan-revisited
I have also evaluated detailed quantitative data on drone strikes and violence by al-Qaeda and the Pakistan Taliban. This research offers three important findings.
First, the U.S. drone war was damaging for the organizational trajectories of al-Qaeda and the Pakistan Taliban. I found that after the United States surged its surveillance and targeting capabilities in 2008, both groups suffered increasing setbacks; they lost bases, their operational capabilities were reduced, their ranks were checked by growing numbers of desertions, and the organizations fractured politically. These effects appear to have persisted until 2014. In a related paper, my University of Michigan colleague Dylan Moore and I show that during the drone program in the Waziristan region, violence by the two groups fell substantially.
Second, the U.S. drone war disrupted al-Qaeda and the Pakistan Taliban not just by killing their leaders and specialized rank-and-file members, but also by heightening the perceived risk of being targeted. Across a variety of empirical materials, including some collected through fieldwork, I found that both groups were direly constrained by the fear—a constant sense of anticipation—of drone strikes, which crippled routine movement and communication. In addition, leaders and rank-and-file jihadis regularly viewed each other with the suspicion of being spies for the drone program, which contributed to their organizational fragmentation.
Third, the notion of increased recruitment for al-Qaeda and the Pakistan Taliban due to civilian harm in drone strikes is questionable. In the local battlefield, I did not find evidence of any tangible increase in recruitment. Interviews with some surviving mid-level members of al-Qaeda and the Pakistan Taliban negated the impression that the groups benefited from a stream of angry recruits. Instead, a recurring theme was that they experienced desertions and manpower shortages because of the stress of operating under drones. To the extent that new recruits were available, both groups struggled to integrate them in their organizations because of the fear that they might be spies for the drone program.
Exactly, granted it's a 4 year difference between the polls. Obama is still seen positively in most of the rest of the (Western) world, even with overwhelming opposition to his use of drones.
Every modern President is a war criminal. That's the standard of the office. To claim otherwise is to brush off all the terrible things every President has done, including Obama. Civilian casualties should never be accepted (even though it is).
No youre ignoring what she's criticizing him for in order to make it seem like hes just not left enough. Apparently in your mind being critical of committing mass murder on innocent civilians is tantamount to wanting him to be more left. If you read the article and the thread no way you would think this is what was being talked about, it's always beene his problematic immigration drone wars. You're making up a sentiment and not even reading what the thread is about
Maybe that should tell you how little the majority of "people" care about black and brown lives outside the our country. Like they've always done since we started bombing, invading, mass murdering across the globe.
And it's not like majority support means anything - lots of people supported have supported terrible politicians throughout the years, that doesn't absolve them of the crimes and murders they committed.
I do know that, but I don't think popularity should factor into criticisms.
no, not every president is a war criminal. I know boiling things down into simple view points makes topics easier to consume and talk about because you can never have your views challenged, but saying "Obama is a war criminal" is laughable.
Except that's not what you said. You said that criticizing Obama was going to make her more popular.
That's possibly the worst, most uncritical research paper I've come across in a long time. So many faulty premises, zero questioning of the reason for being there, a complete disregard for civilian lives, automatic assumptions about the precision of drone strikes, zero awareness about how intel is gathered, a Fox News level paranoia about Pakistanis being able to commit terorrism on US soil.
This might as well just be a marketing pamphlet by Raytheon rather than a critical assessment that takes into account multiple factors and existing research within military studies and international relations and peace studies. It's straight up propaganda.
You misinterpreted me. I think it's a great look on her because she's speaking truth to power, not that it would make her more popular. I was riffing on the post of the user I responded to. They said it's not a good look for her.
That's a lot of words for "I don't want to talk about the findings/article of a Stanford Post-Graduate and I'm not going to talk about the contents of what was posted, and instead will make vague statements that sounds really smart in dismissing the article that was linked"
Please, explain your criticism of the paper. I'm interested in where he went wrong in the sources he linked, since your knowledge is so vast that you were able to strike it down in five minutes.
Being a post-graduate from Stanford doesn't mean shit if he isn't able to engage the existing research literature on our drone warfare in Pakistan and the Middle East. Scholars like Ian Shaw, Kristina Benson, Karl Kaltenthaler, William J. Miller, Kevin Jon Heller, and many, many others who have approached this topic much more holistically and much more critically. Just on the surface of this "research paper", this Mir guy commits the following:
1. His article holds the premise that we should have the legal and moral mandate to be drone-striking and bombing Pakistanis. There is zero questioning of this premise.
2. His argument that drone strikes only need to have better intelligence assumes that civilian lives are expendable with one mention at the end that tries to somehow balance civilian causalities with the effectiveness at disrupting "terrorist" organizational capacities.
3. Nowhere does he question the intelligence that determines who is actually a terrorist. If you look into the critical literature on drone strikes, the concept of 'data double', and the incredibly flawed premise of signature strikes, any scholar or person worth their salt would mention and address this flawed way of committing extrajudicial murder.
4. The guy assumes that a terrorist attack on US soil is likely. Somehow he is able to "measure" this likelihood, as if he's able to predict that some brown people halfway across the world manage to go all the way to the US and commit terrorism. Methodologically and empirically, this is complete bullshit.
5. His recommendation is to gather more data without even questioning if this data-analysis is even remotely true and *suffiicient* for deciding if someone is a 'terrorist'.
6. Everything about this paper is just making huge assumptions about the legality, the morality, the truth-claims, and the "effectiveness" of our drone strikes. On such assumptions alone, it should not be considered a worthwhile paper on the "nuances" of bombing brown people that you wanted to bring up.
If you want to check out the institute that this post-graduate is working for, enjoy all these fine "foreign policy essays" that are simply pro-Empire in almost all of the articles. Almost all of them are about conflict escalation, increase in military expenditure, stating that immigrants and refugees might be potential terrorists, etc. https://www.lawfareblog.com/topic/foreign-policy-essay What a great research institute that he's part of!
Your entire thinking about this issue automatically assumes that "these are the bad guys and we have the moral and legal right to murder them". You somehow think that we *need* to be in Pakistan. Or Iraq. Or Afghanistan. Or Yemen. Or Somalia. Or wherever we have our hundreds of military bases across the world. You're still living in the Bush years where our mass murder and invasion were justified by bullshit propaganda about a bunch of brown people in some foreign country who simply needed to be "dealt with" as this is some Hollywood film. Instead of going for "research" conducted by what would be equivalent to using the American Enterprise Institute's research on global warming, you can just say that your love for Obama is more important than the hundreds if not thousands of brown lives lost to our drone strikes committed by him. But we'll never progress in that conversion, because *all that matters is the latter* and no one can ever justify the loss of these lives in the name of our US empire - regardless if it's a Democrat or a Republican.
We americans still live in a forever war by justifying it with reference to 9/11 - which was almost 18 years ago and resulted in approximately three thousand innocent lives lost. Yet that number is absolutely nothing, *nothing* to the literally millions of people we have mass murdered, and the billions of lives we've made worse with our coups throughout the 20th and 21st century.
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Hey! That's not how friends treat their friends across the aisle.
You really like to talk down to people.
Have fun. Much more than Obama in here. Don't know why Bush Jr. is skipped. Probably for the same reason they skip Nixon.
BTW. Sometimes stuff is terrible, and sometimes it's simple why it's terrible. Like War Crimes. They only seem complicated when your bending over backwards to try to excuse them.
The former Constitutional Law professor, executing US citizens extra-judicially. That's a change from the usual.
Anyone who refuses to denounce those who support nazis is no friend of mine.
Good editorial from Julian Zelizer pointing out the idiocy of Rep Omar making sweeping generalizations and blanket statements without caring to offer up any nuance whatsoever.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/09/opinions/omars-wrongheaded-attack-on-obama-zelizer/index.html
Simple stuff really but something some are clearly incapable of doing.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/09/opinions/omars-wrongheaded-attack-on-obama-zelizer/index.html
Simple stuff really but something some are clearly incapable of doing.
Most accurate damn post of the week holy hell.
Posts in here attacking Omar for not understanding the NUANCE of being president when they can't wrap their minds around criticizing someone you still like.
It's much easier to buildup a "how dare you" strawman and affect a condescending "you children just don't understand how complicated the world is" tone than it is to accept extremely valid criticisms of one's own political party and its mascot and learn from the past.
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