If space aliens abducted Obama and his entire administration and they were never heard from again that might put us further down the road to accomplishing goals that are vital to our survival than Obama seems likely to accomplish in the time that remains to him. At least there would be the possibility of a real leader emerging. As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
There you go filling in your narrative for me again -- where did I say you should support him (or, below, stay silent)? Are the only choices either supporting him or making personal attacks? Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding. -Hobbes
I'm asking what good your tactic of criticizing him personally is doing.
There is no obligation of loyalty on my part to Obama or the Democratic Party. I have been a registered Democrat since 1964 and have, I believe, always voted for Democratic candidates, not out of principle, but as a tactic. Since 1965 I have become accustomed to being in strong disagreement with the policies of Democratic Presidents. It is not my role to fall in line with the leadership. There role is to decide if my vote and the votes of people with similar views are worth accommodating. In truth, there is no party that has really represented my views. There have only been occasional candidates that came close, such as Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern.
I am becoming more and more convinced that the only way forward is via a political realignment into a Reform Party that has as its prime objective dismantling the financial capture of Washington DC by the financial elites and fundamental reform of campaign finance. There are dangers in this approach, as the paleocons, such as Paul Craig Roberts, and the libertarians, such as Ron Paul, have very different social agendas. But we are, I fear, approaching the point at which the danger of the current system is even greater.
The effectiveness of Obama's political leadership has been such that the Democrats may well loose the House in November and loose ground in the Senate. The economy will continue to deteriorate and may well experience another collapse before November 2012 that is worse than that of October '08. Blaiming all of this on Bush will not cut it by then and we could well have a new Republican President with a Republican majority in both houses. We could then be reduced to hoping that there would even be future elections. As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."