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US Election Thread - Is this heaven? No, it's Iowa


karaddin

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Just now, Swordfish said:

in your opinion, would we have marriage equality today if Obama were not president, and the sitting president had said nothing, or come out against it?

Also, in terms of 2008 I seem to recall him specifically NOT supporting it?  But I could be misremembering.

In 2008 he was against gay marriage as a personal thing but noted that it was something the states should decide, and that he was against DOMA and wanted it gone. It's not surprising he'd take that opinion, given that the black community has been fairly heavily anti-gay politically and John Kerry's loss was blamed on his position of gay marriage support. 

Would we have marriage equality today if the president was against it? No, I don't think we would. I don't think the supreme court would have ruled the way they did. I think Roberts would have swung the other way on that day. I think that is especially true if DOMA hadn't been effectively gutted and then totally repealed. 

As that article from the Atlantic indicates something else that Obama did was change the conversation from gay marriage being something that should be done because of the various rights that it provides to something that should happen because gay people love each other and want to be happy. That was another tactic that was a pretty big change. It's not hard to argue about the contractual parts, but it's pretty hard to argue that two people who love each other shouldn't be legally together. Obama was part of that, and it showed in the various support he gave to the LGBT community. 

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4 minutes ago, Swordfish said:

And being able to give a good speech, which was written by someone else, and undoubtedly rehearsed to fuck and back does not prove someone is a good communicator.  It just proves they are good at giving a rehearsed speech.

 

We're just going to have to agree to disagree. A big part of being a good mass communicator involves skill at public speaking. Those two things are rather inseparable, as far as I'm concerned. 

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3 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

In 2008 he was against gay marriage as a personal thing but noted that it was something the states should decide, and that he was against DOMA and wanted it gone. It's not surprising he'd take that opinion, given that the black community has been fairly heavily anti-gay politically and John Kerry's loss was blamed on his position of gay marriage support. 

Would we have marriage equality today if the president was against it? No, I don't think we would. I don't think the supreme court would have ruled the way they did. I think Roberts would have swung the other way on that day. I think that is especially true if DOMA hadn't been effectively gutted and then totally repealed. 

As that article from the Atlantic indicates something else that Obama did was change the conversation from gay marriage being something that should be done because of the various rights that it provides to something that should happen because gay people love each other and want to be happy. That was another tactic that was a pretty big change. It's not hard to argue about the contractual parts, but it's pretty hard to argue that two people who love each other shouldn't be legally together. Obama was part of that, and it showed in the various support he gave to the LGBT community. 

it was a pretty big change for a politician, but it was also exactly in line with the way that public opinion was already changing.  Hard for em to see giving him meaningful credit for the eventual outcome for being behind the curve on this issue.

We'll just have to agree to disagree on this.  I don't think he played much of a role in the court decision at all.

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2 minutes ago, Swordfish said:

it was a pretty big change for a politician, but it was also exactly in line with the way that public opinion was already changing.  Hard for em to see giving him meaningful credit for the eventual outcome for being behind the curve on this issue.

We'll just have to agree to disagree on this.  I don't think he played much of a role in the court decision at all.

I think that without a lot of  the broad support in the states - support that Obama encouraged and grew - that it wouldn't have been a contest at the supreme court level. 

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1 hour ago, alguien said:

An even more cynical view is that bored college kids thought their participation was done after the election and left the president with nothing to work with. 

Obama is the one that "Post-Partisan" and wanted to work within Congress after the lesson.

Yes, young voters can be fickle.  It is a reason of the need to maintain engagement.

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1 hour ago, Kalbear said:

On Obama and FDR speeches - for starters, you're taking one of FDR's most famous speeches and comparing it to one of Obama's, somewhat arbitrarily. Obama has called people out from time to time - take for example his gun control speech. He didn't call out big banks nearly enough, I agree. That is, however, not the only thing he has done in his presidency. 

I am taking FDR's first inaugural address and comparing it to Obama's first inaugural address. This was the speech in which the two were in the most similar position: they were taking over for somebody from the other party who had presided over an economic collapse. It's not my fault that FDR made the most of it whereas Obama did not. And yes, Obama has called people out... but not people who matter.

47 minutes ago, Swordfish said:

Um...  You realize they don't write their own speeches, right?

Many actors could easily replicate a lot of theses 'great speeches'.  But I wouldn't want brad pitt as president.

They don't write their own speeches, but, unlike an actor who would give the speech, they have the final say over what will be said as well as input into the content. If you look up some of the more famous speeches, you'll see that many of the most memorable phrases were not actually in the drafts presented to the President.

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43 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Would we have marriage equality today if the president was against it? No, I don't think we would. I don't think the supreme court would have ruled the way they did. I think Roberts would have swung the other way on that day. I think that is especially true if DOMA hadn't been effectively gutted and then totally repealed. 

 

Uh, Kalbear, John Roberts did NOT vote against DOMA. He voted to let lower court rulings invalidating California's Proposition 8 stand because the plaintiffs did not have standing to appeal-- but so did Scalia.

It was Anthony Kennedy who might have "swung the other way" on DOMA and on the final same sex marriage ruling.

I think it is possible things would have gone differently without the things you mention. But I think Obama's most important contribution was just being there to appoint Sotomayor and Kagan to the Supreme Court. It's probable any Democrat elected President would have appointed justices who would have voted the same way Sotomayor and Kagan did on the final issue, but he still gets credit for doing that since it's unlikely McCain would have appointed justices that would have voted the same way.

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2 minutes ago, Ormond said:

Uh, Kalbear, John Roberts did NOT vote against DOMA. He voted to let lower court rulings invalidating California's Proposition 8 stand because the plaintiffs did not have standing to appeal-- but so did Scalia.

It was Anthony Kennedy who might have "swung the other way" on DOMA and on the final same sex marriage ruling.

I think it is possible things would have gone differently without the things you mention. But I think Obama's most important contribution was just being there to appoint Sotomayor and Kagan to the Supreme Court. It's probable any Democrat elected President would have appointed justices who would have voted the same way Sotomayor and Kagan did on the final issue, but he still gets credit for doing that since it's unlikely McCain would have appointed justices that would have voted the same way.

Sorry, you're absolutely right. I was thinking of ACA, not this. 

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36 minutes ago, TheKitttenGuard said:

Obama is the one that "Post-Partisan" and wanted to work within Congress after the lesson.

Yes, young voters can be fickle.  It is a reason of the need to maintain engagement.

I don't think trying to be Post-Partisan = not trying to keep your grass roots movement going. 

I mean, it's not as though the constant emails about movements, pledging, rallies, and contacts stopped coming after he got elected...

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5 minutes ago, alguien said:

I don't think trying to be Post-Partisan = not trying to keep your grass roots movement going. 

I mean, it's not as though the constant emails about movements, pledging, rallies, and contacts stopped coming after he got elected...

Well, I will agree on the pledging E-Mails not stopping.

Building around a Candidate has it perils and Obama exemplify them.  The election of the Candidate is view as the end goal and not as a step along the way.  

I do not think Obama was absolutely cynically on the process, though I do emphasized with that view.  I do think he put a lot in that his election was a new era and that any past antagonisms will not be hard to overcome.

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1 hour ago, Kalbear said:

I think that without a lot of  the broad support in the states - support that Obama encouraged and grew - that it wouldn't have been a contest at the supreme court level. 

it seems odd that you both believe that it would not have happened had he not been president, and also that he shouldn't even get a large chunk of the credit.  it seems like one or the other to me.

 

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20 minutes ago, Swordfish said:

it seems odd that you both believe that it would not have happened had he not been president, and also that he shouldn't even get a large chunk of the credit.  it seems like one or the other to me.

 

Why? I think that if he hadn't been as positive towards it it wouldn't have happened. So it wouldn't have happened without him. However, he's certainly not the person that should get the lion's share of the credit for it. Something can be a success in part because of one person's efforts but it not be their primary credit. Think about a punter in a football game - they might have made a good punt or two, and that contributes so you should give them credit - but they didn't throw TDs. 

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I remember those times.

My take is this:

When we no longer had a POTUS whose party platform included specific planks of denying the validity of your marriage and your relationship, it suddenly made things seem possible that would otherwise be not possible.

When the WH is occupied by a party that didn't shun and marginalize its own LBG (I hesitate to add T here because I don't think the GOP are even aware of the T issues) members, you start to believe that we can make some headway on a national level.

 

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1 hour ago, TerraPrime said:

 remember those times.

My take is this:

When we no longer had a POTUS whose party platform included specific planks of denying the validity of your marriage and your relationship, it suddenly made things seem possible that would otherwise be not possible.

When the WH is occupied by a party that didn't shun and marginalize its own LBG (I hesitate to add T here because I don't think the GOP are even aware of the T issues) members, you start to believe that we can make some headway on a national level.

Let's not forget that the president is the titular leader of his party; when the president favors something, that encourages other members of the party, from elected officials to rank and file, to do so as well. So I think Obama deserves some credit for the same-sex marriage victory, for that as well as the other things cited upthread.

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13 minutes ago, Martell Spy said:

Well good, more debates. Likely more than is needed, but that is far better than too few.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/02/democrats-clinton-sanders-debates/459837/

The Democrats Schedule More Presidential Debates

 

 

Sanders finally stopped dicking around about it.

I think he did agree to Clinton's request to hold one of them in Flint, which is good.

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It feels like too much to give Obama credit for marriage equality imo.  He contributed to the changing culture that brought it about, but I feel that credit in that fashion needs more than this sort of contribution and would require actually driving it rather than clearing some of the opposition out of the way.  He certainly contributed though.

4 hours ago, TerraPrime said:

When the WH is occupied by a party that didn't shun and marginalize its own LBG (I hesitate to add T here because I don't think the GOP are even aware of the T issues) members, you start to believe that we can make some headway on a national level.

 

From the amount of state based legislation that they are pushing last year and this year I feel they are aware of us at least, and are doubly determined not to lose like they have on the sexuality fight.

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1 hour ago, Crazydog7 said:

I love the Hashtag Trumpertantum

 

Acting like a big fucking baby is never an attractive quality.  Has anyone ever told "The Donald" that? 

That appears not to be true since Trump's entire twitter presence is based on childishness.

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