@Diest TKO,
Maporsche explained to me one day that he was for Hillary but voted Obama hoping Obama wouldn't disappoint (think I got that about right?). As near as I can tell he went into this expecting the worse, looking for the worse and has seen the worse in his own eyes.
To quote a biblical verse, "what went you out into the desert to see?" (Mat. 11:7)
There are some things I am disappointed about, my disappointment stems around Obama carrying on some of Bush's foreign/detainees policies. The economic mess he inherited and I think he is trying to do his best to turn things around.
It seems the loudest critics about the stimulus bill have been the ones to turn around and take credit for the jobs and programs it created in their home towns, take Mitch McConnell for instance. (I deeply dislike that guy with a passion, on it even surpassed what I felt for Bush)
Quote:Yesterday, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) demanded a halt to stimulus spending, saying money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act should be diverted to paying down the deficit. McConnell, who lead the opposition to the stimulus in the Senate, has been an ongoing critic. “You do have to wonder, though, whether the stimulus has had any impact at all,” mused McConnell earlier this month on Fox News. A McConnell spokesman recently summed up the senator’s sentiment, noting, “By any measurable index, the stimulus package has been a failure.”
But despite McConnell’s steady stream of criticisms and demands that money stop flowing to projects, he has been a vocal champion of the stimulus in his home state.
Yesterday " the same day he asked for Recovery Act money to be diverted " McConnell and Rep. Ben Chandler (D-KY) toured a construction site at the Blue Grass Army Depot in Madison County, Kentucky. The facility, which is used to contain and destroy chemical weapons compiled during the Cold War, is in desperate need of repair and has leaked Sarin gas as recently as last year. McConnell quickly took credit for the new construction, noting that he and Chandler had inserted an additional $5 million into the 2010 budget. McConnell bragged:
“This is going to be a source of significant employment. At the peak, we could have up to 600 people working on this, and we believe the substantial majority of those workers will be Kentuckians.”
However, McConnell conveniently forgot to mention that even more additional funds for facility construction were awarded through the stimulus. A Defense Department report states that $5,876,000 has been allocated from the Recovery Act to the Blue Grass facility for repairs. Chandler voted for the stimulus.
It’s not the first time McConnell has championed projects funded by the “failed” stimulus to his constituents. When Kentucky put forth a request for advanced battery technology funds from the stimulus, McConnell lauded the effort to ask for more money as “a major victory for the commonwealth of Kentucky” that would “allow the citizens of Kentucky to play a key role in accelerating America’s independence on foreign sources of oil.” At a town hall meeting last week in London, KY, McConnell slammed President Obama and his economic policies. But he then sheepishly added, “I hope London will get some of” the stimulus money.
Economic hypocrisy may be one of the lasting legacies of McConnell. Though he is claiming to oppose many of Obama’s reforms because of a principled sense of fiscal conservatism, as the New York Times has noted, McConnell won reelection last year on a platform boasting of his ability to bring back “old-fashioned pork” to his state.
links at the source
I think democrats in congress ought to forget about republicans and concentrate on the compromising with the blue dogs to get the health care reform bill passed. A couple of years from now, the proof will be in pudding and democrats will either be able to take full credit for it or they will have to take the blame if it turns out to be a mess. But they should muster some courage and pass it regardless of the republicans or trying to win the message war with the public. According to most polls the public wants the option to pick a government program they are just leery about on account of all the misinformation that has been put out by the insurance lobbyist and shrills of the republican party.