I have a question.

Why would the American people vote in Obama, a liberal Democrat, when clearly it's shown that since the Democrats took over Congress two years ago, they have handled everything so poorly?

Since the Democrats took over Congress two years ago, we have seen:
*our gas prices go up significantly,
*the mortgage industry go down the tubes,
*people have had their homes foreclosed on,
*more people are unemployed,
*more people are uninsured,
*increase in bankrupties (both corporate and personal)


I remember Nancy Pelosi when she took over, she stated (and I don't have the quote on hand right now), but something to effect that the Democrats would do more in the first 90 days than we had seen.... (can't remember the rest of it).

Well, what have we seen? Nothing but fear and dispair in the American people. The Democrats have done nothing but make us poorer.

I can't imagine why we would want to elect Obama for 'change'. Haven't we seen enough "change" in the last two years to make us shiver and not want more of the Democrat's way of change? We didn't have these problems we're having now when we had a Republican congress. And remember, Obama is part of that Democratic congress.

Also, I wonder how many Americans actually realize that the Democrats took control of Congress two years ago?

seriously? You're stretching....
Gas prices have increased over time--supply and demand theory. Oh and let's through in a couple of major hurricanes and see what that gets us....
Mortgage industry was NEVER regulated--not even when the Republicans had control of Congress.
Homes foreclosed--multitude of factors: No regulation hence loans were given when they shouldn't have been and individuals were either too greedy or too stupid or to idealistic to comprehend that you can't buy a $450K home when you work for $10/hr
The last three go hand in hand. When the economy starts tanking companies start downsizing and cutting benefits. People either lose their jobs and their insurance, or have to choose between insurance or the mortgage (that they probably shouldn't have gotten anyway). And when the ACME Co. who makes widgets cuts back, then the firm that does the advertising for ACME has to cut back.... It's all cause and effect. What we are seeing NOW, started LONG before the Democrats became the majority in Congress. I'd say it all started right around the time that Bush, Jr. started posturing and strutting like a peacock---You know when he proclaimed to be the great uniter.

Really, I expected more from you mom2! I really did. You're reaching and hunting for something and desperation does not suit you well at all. It takes far more time than 2 years to see the kind of damage and destruction we are seeing now.

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Mental that one, I'm telling you. ---Ron Weasley, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets"

marilyn, I understand what she was saying and understand what you're saying, and have my own point to make - lol

Bush took office just when the dot com was going pop - something absolutely out of the control of the President. It wasn't on his watch that it took off, spinning in a crazy upward drugstore.com-fueled spiral that had no basis in reality.... but within next to no time that bubble burst and he took the blame for the economy tanking before our eyes very early on in his presidency.

Then 9-11 happened and regardless of what happened in Iraq, we were destined to go to battle in the Middle East. People have complained that he shifted focus from Afghanistan to Iraq, and we could debate until the cows come home whether the focus should have remained in Afghanistan or move to Pakistan where OBL is supposedly hiding out or to Iraq... but wherever the battlefront *was*, it was going to *be* as a result of 9-11.

So he had an economic bubble burst and then had a terrorist attack, neither of which he caused but both had aftermaths that weren't what any president would relish. It's interesting to think back over the Clinton years - I really don't recall him having any major 'outside forces' that caused major national upheaval like those two things did.

Katrina hit and started messing with our gasoline prices, and since that time they've done nothing but go up, up, up, as the world market for oil has expanded - again, out of the control of the President. We could debate Bush's actions during Katrina, but as I see it 1) He was following long-established procedure and waited until the governor of LA asked him to send guard troops in, and by the time the request came for help lots of damage was done, 2) the President can't control the weather, and 3) procededures were changed and enhanced under his administration such that during these last two storms, there was fabulous cooperation between state and federal agencies, from what I can see.

And now the housing bubble has burst - not something Bush created or caused.

Nor did congress create or cause any of these things.

And I think when terrible stuff happens, it takes time to recover. It just does... and a President doesn't have a magic wand.

Nor does congress.

But I think if we're going to lay all the negative things that have happened in the US in the last years at Bush's feet, we have to also recognize that he can't do much without congressional approval. And that there is a lot niether of them control.

And that I really can't think of a presidency in my lifetime during which so many *large*, troublesome events have been foisted upon one leader.

and that was my point about her "reaching"....In the grand scheme of this world, no one person or group control everything (although I'm sure there are some who would like to control it all...).

What we are seeing now is just a culmination of events. Is it Bush's fault? Not entirely. Is it Congress' fault? Not entirely. It's kind of like a divorce---RARELY is the reason a couple divorcing the fault of just one party. At some level both parties have some culpability in the failure. On the occasion that it is one person's fault (abuse, etramarital affair(s), or the like) those are the exception more than the rule. I don't think Bush is caused all the ills of our country--I don't think he's done much to fix them either, but I don't believe they are all his fault.

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Mental that one, I'm telling you. ---Ron Weasley, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets"

I agree with WowItsDark. I had actually read somewhere that when President Bush took over, we were in a recession or a bad economic time. I have just recently started to pay a lot of attention to politics, tho.

I do remember the price of gas going up dramatically in March 2005. One night it jumped ten cents. That was 5 months before Hurricane Katrina. Not sure what caused it.

I remember reading that President Bush cut the Capital Gains tax, and looked into a bit. Here is what I found:

By Mark Matthews
Both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama said during the Wednesday's debate in Pennsylvania that they would consider raising a tax that could impact a great many in the Bay Area.

It's the capital gains tax. Money paid on profits from selling an asset like stocks or a house. Under the Bush administration, the rate was lowered to 15 percent. During the debate, ABC's Charlie Gibson challenged the two Democrats to explain why they want to raise it.

Gibson asked Barack Obama why he would raise the capital gains tax when the last time it was raised revenue to the government went down, and when President Bush lowered the tax, the government took in more money.

Here is the link to the whole story: Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton favor capital gains tax hike - 4/17/08 - San Francisco News - abc7news.com

Not many people understand Capital Gains taxes, but, it does effect many many people, and has many ramifications when it is raised or lowered.

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Doing the right thing isn't always the same as doing the easy thing.

mom2 will have to either validate me or correct me, but I took her post to have sort of a double intention... an illustration that we're so quick to place blame somewhere when the reality is that there is plenty of blame to go around... and anyone who lays the problems of our nation solely on Bush isn't really taking a cold, hard, broad look at the reality that there are Democrats in power in one leg of our three-legged checks-and-balances system.

I didn't think she was poking at *Democrats* so much as she was poking at the blame game that's played at Bush's expense.

What she said.

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"No one believes more firmly than Comrade Napoleon that all animals are equal. He would be only too happy to let you make your decisions for yourselves. But sometimes you might make the wrong decisions, comrades, and then where should we be?"
- George Orwell Animal Farm

Then why didn't she say that? I'm not trying to be snarky...I just hate that people can't/won't or don't say what they mean!

Say exactly what you mean--don't try sarcasm, don't bait others into an argument, don't post misleading thread titles, just say what you mean.

If someone had come out and said "it pisses me off that Bush gets blamed for all the bad things" and gave explainations of how/why it wasn't Bush's fault...that to me is just so much better. Causes less "guessing" and assuming and trying to figure out if the poster is serious or just trying to stir the pot.

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Mental that one, I'm telling you. ---Ron Weasley, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets"

Yes, She was going to get all this sweeping reform done in so many days...and they have done nothing.....I heard somewhere....dont know...but that this Congress and Senate has the lowest approval rating in years........Nancy Pelosi is all talk..no action......They blamed Bush for the high gas prices and gas has gone even higher since the dems took over....uhmmmmmmmmmmmmmm Wonder how can that be????? They had all the answers????? Sherri

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"It isn't that liberals are ignorant, it's just that they know so much that isn't so."
- Ronald Reagan

The Republicans have over 90 filibusters so far, Kinda hard to get anything done when it can't even come up for a vote.

Much of high gas prices have to do with the declining dollar. The dollar is declining because of the massive amount of debt we have taken under Bush.

You wanted deregulation in the banking industry and we got it in spades. Nobody id going to turn this economy around anytime soon. The credit crisis is going to be deeper than the savings and loan crisis of the 80s and the dot.com bubble was relatively minor.

I've been gone all day and just got back home. My sister is in the hospital.

But my post was just what a few of the posters said, and I appreciate the answers. It's a legitimate question. Had I said something along the line of everything that has happened in the past few years was not Bush's fault, I would have gotten flamed, and I honestly didn't want just another post of it's not Bush's fault and just everyone throwing hateful words back and forth. I wanted to word it in a way that would make people think, be able to discuss it and realize that it's not one person's fault our country is in the state it is in, and that it's going to take more than one person to turn things around.

No matter who is elected is going to have their hands full.

Sometimes I wonder WHY a person would actually want to be President. DH and I were noticing the other day a picture of President Bush at 9/11 in 2001 and 9/11 in 2008 and he has aged so much.

copletely agree with this--crap, I've aged just trying to raise 2 kids! I can't imagine how bad I'd look having to deal with what the Presidents of the past have dealt with.

I'd like to think, that the majority of politician start their careers with noble intentions---but those get skewed by circumstances and cynicism over time.

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Mental that one, I'm telling you. ---Ron Weasley, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets"

I think that all the time. Why would anybody in their right mind WANT to be President?

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"No one believes more firmly than Comrade Napoleon that all animals are equal. He would be only too happy to let you make your decisions for yourselves. But sometimes you might make the wrong decisions, comrades, and then where should we be?"
- George Orwell Animal Farm