How will Obama be looked at as time goes on?

[1987_Lakers]

Good president? Bad president? Average?

I didn't like him during the first 5 years or so, but this last year I've realized he's done some good stuff. Obamacare for example turned out to be a huge success, the economy has improved, but not by much. What do you guys think?

Much better than Bush IMO.

[DonDadda59]

Good president? Bad president? Average?

I didn't like him during the first 5 years or so, but this last year I've realized he's done some good stuff. Obamacare for example turned out to be a huge success, the economy has improved, but not by much. What do you guys think?

Much better than Bush IMO.

Did you hibernate through '07/'08? :biggums:

[WayOfWade]

As a legend for the simple fact that he is black

[Im Still Ballin]

Increasing taxes in a down economy is not bright. Suggesting it spurns economy growth shows you don't understand the economy to any degree.

Barack Obama took office with 7.8% unemployment in Jan 2009...its still at 7.9% in Jan 2013. I am not a Bush lover by any means, but 4.8% and 5.4% look good right about now don't they, Barack? Facts are scary.

-.1 GDP growth in 4th quarter 2012...heaviest defense spending quarter of the year and him & his party tried to spin this as a good thing. What a joke.

He was against gay marriage...now hes for it...got another 5 million votes in November as a result.

Plays the race card day in and day out. His son...the beer summit. He's another brotha, ya kno?

Wipes his butt with the US constitution: Validated killing Americans with drones without trial by peers or due process is one of multiple examples.

This man appeals to low information voters who are generally the non-tax paying, benefiting from the hand out types.

I never thought I would see the day that the non tax paying people on the government dole would out-vote the people paying for the benefits they receive. Good job Barack, your campaign and administration have fundamentally transformed American into a welfare state in a perpetual race war.

[Nick Young]

An all time great orator but an overall mediocre president who tried to make sweeping changes and ultimately wasn't able to.

[DonDadda59]

Increasing taxes in a down economy is not bright. Suggesting it spurns economy growth shows you don't understand the economy to any degree.

Barack Obama took office with 7.8% unemployment in Jan 2009...its still at 7.9% in Jan 2013. I am not a Bush lover by any means, but 4.8% and 5.4% look good right about now don't they, Barack? Facts are scary.

-.1 GDP growth in 4th quarter 2012...heaviest defense spending quarter of the year and him & his party tried to spin this as a good thing. What a joke.

He was against gay marriage...now hes for it...got another 5 million votes in November as a result.

Plays the race card day in and day out. His son...the beer summit. He's another brotha, ya kno?

Wipes his butt with the US constitution: Validated killing Americans with drones without trial by peers or due process is one of multiple examples.

This man appeals to low information voters who are generally the non-tax paying, benefiting from the hand out types.

I never thought I would see the day that the non tax paying people on the government dole would out-vote the people paying for the benefits they receive. Good job Barack, your campaign and administration have fundamentally transformed American into a welfare state in a perpetual race war.

How's the Dingo baby-eating situation down under? :confusedshrug:


An all time great orator but an overall mediocre president who tried to make sweeping changes and ultimately wasn't able to.

Name a more sweeping change enacted in the last 40 years than the ACA (which will be known as Obamacare until the end of time).

[FillJackson]

Good president? Bad president? Average?

I didn't like him during the first 5 years or so, but this last year I've realized he's done some good stuff. Obamacare for example turned out to be a huge success, the economy has improved, but not by much. What do you guys think?

Much better than Bush IMO.
Personally I have no desire to live through another depression. And there is a lot of growing evidence that we did avoid one.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/30/upshot/what-debate-economists-agree-the-stimulus-lifted-the-economy.html
http://www.cbpp.org/blog/blinder-and-zandi-policy-responses-to-great-recession-a-resounding-success

[nathanjizzle]

one of the greatest presidents to ever do it. straight up skirted a 2nd economic great depression.

[TomBrady]

Good President. :applause:

[Im Still Ballin]

And what ended the Great Recession? Was it the $800 billion Obama stimulus? As I have often pointed out, White House economists thought the stimulus would help lead to roughly 5% unemployment and 4% GDP growth in 2012.

Instead, the US economy is growing at half that pace and unemployment is sharply higher — even before you account for the massive drop in labor force participation.

But what do left-of-center or pro-Obama economists say? Here are Alan Blinder and Mark Zandi in a 2010 paper:

In this paper, we use the Moody’s Analytics model of the U.S. economy—adjusted to accommodate some recent financial-market policies—to simulate the macroeconomic effects of the government’s total policy response. We find that its effects on real GDP, jobs, and inflation are huge, and probably averted what could have been called Great Depression 2.0.
For example, we estimate that, without the government’s response, GDP in 2010 would be about 11.5% lower, payroll employment would be less by some 8

[KyrieTheFuture]

History books are written in Texas so I'm going to go ahead and say not favorably

[Draz]

He's a legend. Mfer took out Osama as a BLACK MUSLIM. God dam this man stronger than mid 2000s Cena

[NumberSix]

Jimmy Carter 2.0

[DonDadda59]

[QUOTE=Im Still Ballin]And what ended the Great Recession? Was it the $800 billion Obama stimulus? As I have often pointed out, White House economists thought the stimulus would help lead to roughly 5% unemployment and 4% GDP growth in 2012.

Instead, the US economy is growing at half that pace and unemployment is sharply higher

[Patrick Chewing]

The most ineffective and ineffectual President of all time.

[Im Still Ballin]

#1 Under Bill Clinton, the average unemployment rate was 5.2 percent. Under George W. Bush, the average unemployment rate was 5.3 percent. Under Barack Obama, things have been much worse. The month after he took office the unemployment rate rose above 8 percent and it has stayed there ever since.

#2 Under Barack Obama, the velocity of money (a very important indicator of economic health) has plunged to a post-World War II low.

#3 Real median household income has decreased by more than 4000 dollars since Barack Obama entered the White House.

#4 The United States has plenty of oil and we should not have to import it from the Middle East. Unfortunately, Barack Obama has an absolutely nightmarish energy policy. Under Bill Clinton, the number of drilling permits approved rose by 58 percent. Under George W. Bush, the number of drilling permits approved rose by 116 percent. Under Barack Obama, the number of drilling permits approved decreased by 36 percent.

#5 When Barack Obama took office, the average price of a gallon of gasoline was $1.85. Today, the average price of a gallon of gasoline is $3.71.

#6 Under Barack Obama, the United States has lost more than 300,000 education jobs.

#7 Since Barack Obama became president, the number of long-term unemployed Americans has risen from 2.7 million to 5.2 million.

#8 For the first time in the post-World War II era, the employment-population ratio has not bounced back after a recession. The percentage of working age Americans with a job has been below 59 percent for 35 months in a row.
#9 While Barack Obama has been president, U.S. home values have fallen by another 12 percent.

#10 More than three times as many new homes were sold in the United States in 2005 as will be sold in 2012.

#11 Electricity bills in the United States have risen faster than the overall rate of inflation for five years in a row. Thanks Obama.

#12 When Barack Obama first entered the White House, an ounce of gold was going for about $850. Today, the price of gold is over $1630 an ounce.

#13 Since 2008, our economy has lost 1.3 million jobs while at the same time 3.6 million more Americans have been added to Social Security’s disability insurance program.

#14 The number of Americans on food stamps has grown from 31.9 million when Barack Obama took office to 46.4 million today. How much more “hope and change” are we going to be able to endure?

#15 As I wrote about the other day, it is being projected that Obamacare will add 16 million more Americans to the Medicaid rolls.

#16 If you can believe it (and this really is hard to believe), more than half of all Americans are now at least partially financially dependent on the government.

#17 The total amount of money that the federal government gives directly to the American people has grown by 32 percent since Barack Obama became president.

#18 Under Barack Obama, federal spending as a percentage of GDP (25 percent) is the highest that it has been since World War II.

#19 The Obama administration has been spending money on some of the most insane things imaginable. For example, in 2011 the Obama administration spent $592,527 on a study that sought to figure out once and for all why chimpanzees throw poop.

#20 The U.S. government has run a budget deficit of well over a trillion dollars every single year under Barack Obama.

#21 Under Barack Obama, U.S. debt was downgraded from AAA status for the first time ever.

#22 Since Barack Obama took office, the U.S. national debt has increased by 50 percent.

#23 Since Barack Obama became president, the U.S. national debt has increased by an average of more than $64,000 per taxpayer.

#24 During the Obama administration, the U.S. national debt has grown more than it did from the time that George Washington became president to the beginning of Bill Clinton’s second term as president.

[KyrieTheFuture]

The most ineffective and ineffectual President of all time.
Maybe to people who can only name 5 presidents

[FillJackson]

Increasing taxes in a down economy is not bright. Suggesting it spurns economy growth shows you don't understand the economy to any degree.

Barack Obama took office with 7.8% unemployment in Jan 2009...its still at 7.9% in Jan 2013. I am not a Bush lover by any means, but 4.8% and 5.4% look good right about now don't they, Barack? Facts are scary.

-.1 GDP growth in 4th quarter 2012...heaviest defense spending quarter of the year and him & his party tried to spin this as a good thing. What a joke.

He was against gay marriage...now hes for it...got another 5 million votes in November as a result.

Plays the race card day in and day out. His son...the beer summit. He's another brotha, ya kno?

Wipes his butt with the US constitution: Validated killing Americans with drones without trial by peers or due process is one of multiple examples.

This man appeals to low information voters who are generally the non-tax paying, benefiting from the hand out types.

I never thought I would see the day that the non tax paying people on the government dole would out-vote the people paying for the benefits they receive. Good job Barack, your campaign and administration have fundamentally transformed American into a welfare state in a perpetual race war.What a load of nonsense.

This is particular is just stunningly dishonest.
Barack Obama took office with 7.8% unemployment in Jan 2009...its still at 7.9% in Jan 2013. I am not a Bush lover by any means, but 4.8% and 5.4% look good right about now don't they, Barack?

Unemployment was rapidly shooting up when Obama took office. If you actually want to compare to Bush, you could say that unemployment under Bush was 4.2% when he took office and 7.8% when he left 8 years later. In fact, unemployment was 5.0% in January 2008 and jumped nearly 2.8 % in single year before Obama took over. In fact Obama took over during the worst stretch of job losses after the recession became a full out financial crisis.

September 2008 – 432,000 jobs lost
October 2008 – 489,000 jobs lost
November 2008 – 803,000 jobs lost
December 2008 – 661,000 jobs lost
January 2009 – 818,000 jobs lost Obama's is inaugurated Jan 20th
February 2009 – 724,000 jobs lost
March 2009 – 799,000 jobs lost
April 2009 – 692,000 jobs lost
May 2009 – 361,000 jobs lost

This was the avalanche that had to be first slowed and then stopped before you could reverse it. In fact, the unemployment rate of January 2013 represents a 2% improvement from the bottom.

Even started with the economy racing downhill, Obama absolutely kills Bush on job creation. Bush lost almost a million jobs in his first term. Obama even in the disasters of 2009 and 2010 added 1.9 million private sector jobs in his first term and 8 million in this term so far.

GW Bush 1 -811,000
GW Bush 2 415,000
Obama 1 1,921,000
Obama 2 8,1231,000*

*137 months into 2nd term: 10,538 pace.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/#VbLVjrFiC92MxWy4.99

Public sector jobs are still way down.
Bush added 1.7 million in his two terms. In Obama's two terms public sector jobs are down 540,000.

The financial crisis was the single most important event of Obama's presidency and folks want to forget about it. Pretend it was just a normal recession.

[DonDadda59]

The most ineffective and ineffectual President of all time.

It's remarkable how much the man accomplished while being faced with the most useless and obstructionist Congress in modern American History, possibly ever. The fact that they bowed down to the BBC is exactly why the common elephant is revolting and the GOP is collapsing before our eyes right now. Barry O exposed just how weak, out of touch, and way past its expiration date your party is Big Pat. What a time. :bowdown:


What a load of nonsense.

Don't waste your energy. Dude is a known snitch from Australia. He wouldn't know the difference between a Bill of Rights and a boomerang. Plus he's posting shit from like 2010.

[cuad]

Bad president.

[Im Still Ballin]

A poll released last week had some pretty bad news for congressional Democrats heading into the midterm elections. But buried in the poll numbers was a figure that just might constitute an even more important turning point.

Respondents were asked:

[Im Still Ballin]

6. He withdrew prematurely from Iraq.

Obama was so eager to not be George W. Bush that he pulled all of our troops out of Iraq as soon as possible, then totally ignored the country, even as a terrorist threat re-established itself there. For most of this year, he foolishly downplayed the rise of the Islamic State. Even as Kurds and the Iraqi government issued increasingly panicked warnings, and the Islamic State took over more and more territory, he let the problem get worse for months without bothering to interrupt his golf schedule.

A few weeks ago, he admitted to having no strategy for dealing with the Islamic State. Last week, he hastily assembled one, but it’s looking like it might be unrealistic and lacks international support.

Bush went into Iraq with multiple UN resolutions, congressional approval, a broad “coalition of the willing,” and (as it turned out) the resolve to use whatever means were necessary to prevent a terrorist state from establishing itself there. Obama is going back into Iraq with none of that. So I guess he really isn’t anything like George W. Bush.

Who could have guessed that he would be the one to suffer by that comparison?

7. He blew the Arab Spring.

When a series of uprisings overthrew dictators across the Middle East, Obama failed to adopt any meaningful policy or to turn the situation to our advantage. He dithered for so long on Egypt that all of the factions there hate him, and most of Egypt’s liberals concluded that he was secretly backing the Muslim Brotherhood. The result is that Egypt went right back to where it was before, except this time the military dictatorship regards America as a useless and irrelevant ally.

Meanwhile, the two places where we could have taken advantage of the Arab Spring to get rid of truly nasty dictators who have been hostile to our interests for decades—Libya and Syria—ended in disaster. In Libya, the killing of our ambassador in Benghazi was just the beginning of a slow collapse into chaos and civil war. In Syria, three years of administration dithering allowed the rise of ISIS, which then spilled over into Iraq.

And let’s not forget about 2009, when Iranians poured out onto the street to oppose their own brutal, theocratic, terror-sponsoring regime—and Obama sat back passively because he preferred to cut a diplomatic deal with the ayatollahs.

8. Obama ignored the threat of a resurgent Russian dictatorship.

During a debate with Mitt Romney in 2012, Obama dismissed Romney’s suggestion that Russia might be a threat to American interests, sneering, “The 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back.” Now it’s looking more like the 1970s are calling, with an aggressive Russian dictatorship invading its neighbors, leaving our European allies feeling exposed and unsure whether they can really count on support from the US and NATO. Poland’s foreign minister has been overheard complaining about—how shall I put this politely?—his country’s unrequited love for America.

The president’s response to Russian aggression has been to impose a few more sanctions, make a speech in Estonia, and otherwise ignore the crisis and hope it goes away.

9. He didn’t shut down Guantanamo, keep the NSA from spying, or rein in the drones.

I know people who sincerely believe that all of these are good policies and who will defend them vigorously if asked. Barack Obama is not one of those people. Yet all of these policies have been pursued during his presidency, on his authority.

President Obama came into office having loudly condemned many of the Bush administration’s measures against terrorism. Then he continued them. You can call this hypocrisy or you can call it subversion. But President Obama has achieved a unique combination: managing to morally discredit America’s anti-terrorism policies without actually ending them.

10. He has made America irrelevant.

You will notice that most of Obama’s failures result, not from taking a bold stand, but from taking no stand and just letting events drift. Certainly, in a lot of these cases, Obama has given speeches or press conference to announce his enlightened intentions—then done nothing to plan for how to actually achieve his goals.

But if he is irrelevant, that makes America irrelevant. We can look at the Arab Spring, at Ukraine, and at Iraq, but let’s add one more example. For most of his presidency, Obama has declared his intention to “pivot to Asia,” extricating himself from the Middle East and focusing on bolstering our Pacific allies to peacefully manage the rise of China. It’s pretty widely acknowledged that he never managed to do it, letting the Asia pivot die of neglect.

This may fit with the quasi-isolationist mood that has taken hold in America in recent years, but it is yet another case where Obama promised something very different. He campaigned on the promise that America would be more respected in the world after the Bush years—not that we would be considered a useless ally and an ineffectual opponent.

I don’t know if you could come up with a more comprehensive list of presidential failures, encompassing foreign policy and domestic policy, economics, race, and immigration. And I’m sure I left a lot of things off this list, not least of which is the targeting of Obama’s political opponents by a corrupt IRS, which continues to announce the oh-so-mysterious loss of potentially incriminating data by its employees.

Combine all of this with his frequent vacations and golf outings and his fascination with the trappings of pop-culture celebrity, and you get the impression that Obama has checked out of the presidency and lost interest in the responsibility he is neither willing nor able to shoulder.

Obama was originally elected on the basis of celebrity, on vague slogans about “hope and change,” on a sense of self-congratulatory smugness about how progressive and enlightened we would all be if we voted for him. He was re-elected on all of that, plus the smearing of his political opposition as racists and mean rich white guys.

If the result is an utter failure of leadership, maybe there are a few lessons we ought to learn for the next presidential election.

[TomBrady]

When you're ready to stop copy + pasting someone else's words (http://thefederalist.com/2014/09/16/10-ways-obama-has-failed-as-president/), let us know. Thanks.

[Draz]

This man got rid of Osama. Someone who single handily made America his btch and yall worried about jobs? Btch I feel safe asf on top the Empire state building

[iamgine]

He'll be looked at as a pioneer in racial breakthrough as the first black president.

That's all he'll be remembered for in 50+ years.

[Derka]

The rhetoric on Bush 2.0 has calmed significantly since he left office. Now that the extreme ends are focusing their vitriol on current candidates, he's receiving a more balanced assessment of his failures and successes. Same will happen to Obama once the media finds current targets.

[G-Funk]

Top 5 president all-time. His face will be on a bill as well as Mt. Rushmore.

[Micku]

I think he might be looked on a positive light seeing how the economy got better over time. Unemployment is now under 5%, gdp is no longer in the negatives and steady grew until recently (now it's 2.4), deficit is no longer in the trillion of dollars mark. At its peak it was 1,413 billion in 2009 now it's at $439 billion. It's also lower than what Bush left office with. Osama Bin Laden was killed under his watch, gay marriage got passed under his administration even though the Supreme Court decision), and health care reform has finally been passed even though it's been compromised to death. I have to do more research on whatever or not Obamacare has been good for jobs and stuff. I know ppl were fearing about companies cutting the hours of workers since they don't want to have to give insurance.

I don't know how much will ppl blame Obama for getting out of Iraq, because it gave the raise of ISIS. He didn't do anything with the NSA and Patriot Act from my knowledge. He put troops out of Afghanistan and then put them back in. His constant want to do bipartisanship might be considered to be weak since had the majority of the house and senate when he took office, and still wanted to compromise to the other party. He didn't do much to contain lobbyist like he said he would and you had the Supreme Court ruling of Citizens United.

You can also use this site to check out the failed/kept/comprise promises that Obama made here:
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/obameter/

He had a better second term than a first term, as usual when it comes to presidency. He took a stance on immigration finally, but took an executive decision on it to force congress to push for a reform.

Overall, it's not that bad. Pretty decent really. He's leaving office with a more stable country than Bush. Less stellar than Bill Clinton. Approval rating is between those two now. Not as high as Bill, not as low as Bush. I don't think history would view him as a bad president tbh. Not like Bush. I don't know if history would remember what happened in the first term and the middle where things would really bad and he appeared to be a weak president (more so then than now). They might remember more of the end result than the process of getting there.

Again...he wasn't bad. Pretty decent at the end. Weak sometimes when it comes to passing the bills he wanted. Pulled out of Iraq was a mistake, but we shouldn't have gone there in the first place and the American ppl were tired of it by the end. It still was mistake. Going in there and getting out.

His presidency being good or bad also depends on your viewpoints except that he's leaving with a more stable economy than Bush did.

[Funktion]

Wish we could get a statistic of how many people fell completely out of the workforce after the emergency unemployment act ran out in January of 2014. At least before that you could track a "true" unemployment rate.

I bet a lot of them turned to places like Uber, Tasking, work from home, and temp businesses. Hell I bet there are still some out there unemployed.

[masonanddixon]

As one of the absolute worst Presidents ever and the biggest con man since Cleveland.

[fiddy]

The last president of the U.S.

[FillJackson]

Wish we could get a statistic of how many people fell completely out of the workforce after the emergency unemployment act ran out in January of 2014. At least before that you could track a "true" unemployment rate.

I bet a lot of them turned to places like Uber, Tasking, work from home, and temp businesses. Hell I bet there are still some out there unemployed.
The unemployment rate is not calculated by the number of folks receiving unemployment. Rather workers for the Census bureau do a giant survey every month (http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm), they call and ask people if they have a job.

There are about 60,000 eligible households in the sample for this survey. This translates into approximately 110,000 individuals each month,

There is nothing about Uber, Tasking, working from home or temp business that would prevent you from showing up in an employment survey.

The most expansive rate of unemployment is the U-6 rate.


U-6 Total unemployed, plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force, plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force

NOTE: Persons marginally attached to the labor force are those who currently are neither working nor looking for work but indicate that they want and are available for a job and have looked for work sometime in the past 12 months. Discouraged workers, a subset of the marginally attached, have given a job-market related reason for not currently looking for work. Persons employed part time for economic reasons are those who want and are available for full-time work but have had to settle for a part-time schedule. Updated population controls are introduced annually with the release of January data.

Like the official U-3 rate it spiked after the financial crisis, stayed high and gradually creeped down.

https://research.stlouisfed.org/fredgraph.png?g=bLI

[UK2K]

The unemployment rate is not calculated by the number of folks receiving unemployment. Rather workers for the Census bureau do a giant survey every month (http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm), they call and ask people if they have a job.


There is nothing about Uber, Tasking, working from home or temp business that would prevent you from showing up in an employment survey.

The most expansive rate of unemployment is the U-6 rate.



Like the official U-3 rate it spiked after the financial crisis, stayed high and gradually creeped down.

https://research.stlouisfed.org/fredgraph.png?g=bLI

If you aren't looking for work, you don't show up in an employment survey as unemployed.

No matter if you have a job or not. You could quit life right now and if you didn't look for work for three months, you are no longer unemployed.

That's why I look at the Labor Force Participation Rate... it tells you exactly what you want to know... How many people in this country are, or are not, working.

http://data.bls.gov/generated_files/graphics/latest_numbers_LNS11300000_2006_2016_all_period_M0 2_data.gif

62.9% in Feb. It's been below 63% since Dec 2013, and before then, the last time the number was so low was 1977.

http://data.bls.gov/generated_files/graphics/latest_numbers_LNS11300000_1996_2016_all_period_M0 2_data.gif

From 96 until now.

[FillJackson]

If you aren't looking for work, you don't show up in an employment survey as unemployed.

No matter if you have a job or not. You could quit life right now and if you didn't look for work for three months, you are no longer unemployed.

That's why I look at the Labor Force Participation Rate... it tells you exactly what you want to know... How many people in this country are, or are not, working.

http://data.bls.gov/generated_files/graphics/latest_numbers_LNS11300000_2006_2016_all_period_M0 2_data.gif
The Labor Force Participation Rate does not tell you the same thing. If I'm not working because I'm retired or I'm in school or I've decided to stay at home to raise my kids I'm not unemployed for economic reasons but I would affect the labor force participation rate.

https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/102015lfpr.jpg
If you look at the labor force rate over a longer period of time, you see it trending upwards through several earlier recessions and peaking around 2000 and then beginning a decline. However, this decline was never mentioned before 2009 nor was the idea using LFPR as the "true unemployment rate." It just never ever happened.

The reasons for this are the longterm trends in the LFPR are structural. We have more people over 65 in this country than ever before. We also have less teenagers who aren't in school....less dropouts and more going to college. In 2006 before the big recession, some Economists at the FED predicted what the LFPR would be. They were arguing for their model would show a steeper decline From page 131 (https://fortunedotcom.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/2006a_bpea_aaronson.pdf)


2004 66.4
2005 66.1
2006 65.8
2007 65.6
2008 65.2
2009 64.7
2010 64.4
2011 64.0
2012 63.7
2013 63.3
2014 62.9
2015 62.5
Their numbers were pretty accurate. The rate went as low as 62.4 in 2015 and is currently 62.9.

LFPR can tell you other things or in can be used in conjunction with the unemployment rate to measure slack in the labor force, but by itself it's not too useful.

[Godzuki]

for intelligent non blacks and some blacks, even if they lean left, he'll be looked at as a case in point never to vote for a black Prez again.

there is way too much black guilt trip or be a sellout attitude by the black community for a black Prez to not to be race bias. the black people in America think the countrys issues are only about them and most intelligent non blacks are tired of the black pandering movement in this country.

i voted for Obama but never again will i vote for a black Prez. not because i don't think one can't be competent but because of the way black people in America are and the power of their guilt trip if the black Prez does not serve them over the rest of America.

black people will never have a black Prez again thanks to what Obama's presidency made people who aren't low IQ realize. you'll still get the ghetto whitie rappers and hollywood try hards like Macklemore but you won't get the ones who graduated at least HS with half a brain left :pimp:

[UK2K]

The Labor Force Participation Rate does not tell you the same thing. If I'm not working because I'm retired or I'm in school or I've decided to stay at home to raise my kids I'm not unemployed for economic reasons but I would affect the labor force participation rate.

If you are unemployed, you are unemployed. You act like kids in school don't work. Did you not have to work? Why shouldn't a stay at home mom be considered unemployed? She is not being paid for the work, nor is she receiving benefits from it.

If you aren't working, no matter the reason, you aren't working. I feel like that's pretty clear.



https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/102015lfpr.jpg
If you look at the labor force rate over a longer period of time, you see it trending upwards through several earlier recessions and peaking around 2000 and then beginning a decline. However, this decline was never mentioned before 2009 nor was the idea using LFPR as the "true unemployment rate." It just never ever happened.

The reasons for this are the longterm trends in the LFPR are structural. We have more people over 65 in this country than ever before. We also have less teenagers who aren't in school....less dropouts and more going to college. In 2006 before the big recession, some Economists at the FED predicted what the LFPR would be. They were arguing for their model would show a steeper decline From page 131 (https://fortunedotcom.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/2006a_bpea_aaronson.pdf)


Their numbers were pretty accurate. The rate went as low as 62.4 in 2015 and is currently 62.9.

LFPR can tell you other things or in can be used in conjunction with the unemployment rate to measure slack in the labor force, but by itself it's not too useful.

That's why I used from 96 until now in the second graph. You can see between 1996 and 2008 it stayed, for the vast majority of the time, between 66 and 67%.

Actually, if you want to get technical, it stayed between 66% and 67% from 1990 or so until 2008... So 18 years with relatively no change.

[FillJackson]

If you are unemployed, you are unemployed. You act like kids in school don't work. Did you not have to work? Why shouldn't a stay at home mom be considered unemployed? She is not being paid for the work, nor is she receiving benefits from it.
Because let's say there's a job opening that must filled in a tiny town.
And in this tiny town the only people who are not already employed are a stay at home mom not looking for work, a retired person not looking for work. They are not going to fill that job and it's going to stay open. It will stay open until they find someone willing to switch jobs or someone without a job.

They are simply not part of the pool of applicants to fill that job.

In the larger scheme this is academic. It's not like not counting people who are not looking for work is new. The official U3 unemployment rate we use to compare different eras has always not included people not looking for work. U6 has always been the bigger pool of people not working. There's no reason not to be using u3 and u6. You could also use them with additional information like wages for a larger picture.

[UK2K]

Because let's say there's a job opening that must filled in a tiny town.
And in this tiny town the only people who are not already employed are a stay at home mom not looking for work, a retired person not looking for work. They are not going to fill that job and it's going to stay open. It will stay open until they find someone willing to switch jobs or someone without a job.

They are simply not part of the pool of applicants to fill that job.

In the larger scheme this is academic. It's not like not counting people who are not looking for work is new. The official U3 unemployment rate we use to compare different eras has always not included people not looking for work. U6 has always been the bigger pool of people not working. There's no reason not to be using u3 and u6. You could also use them with additional information like wages for a larger picture.

I'm not arguing with why it is counted the way it is, I am just stating that I prefer using the LFPR to gauge the welfare of the economy over the unemployment rate.

Both have their pros and cons, but I believe the guy who hasn't had a job in a year because he's living off welfare should be considered someone who is unemployed.

Of course there's not a 'one size fits all' metric you can lump everything into and get a nice spiffy number, but the LFPR tells me how many people, 16 and older, are in this country and are currently not working. There really isn't any other factors that go into it...

You are either working, or you aren't.

[Nanners]

i think people are going to look back on him more or less the same way they look back at bill clinton.

the moderates look back fondly and remember it as a time of stability and prosperity, the hardcore left wing will remember him as a warmonger and corporate sellout, the hardcore right wing will remember him as a shady nigerian muslim who should have probably been impeached and thrown in prison for treason or whatever.

[UK2K]

i think people are going to look back on him more or less the same way they look back at bill clinton.

the moderates look back fondly and remember it as a time of stability and prosperity, the hardcore left wing will remember him as a warmonger and corporate sellout, the hardcore right wing will remember him as a shady muslim negro who should have probably been impeached and thrown in prison for treason or whatever.

I mean, overall, he wasn't terrible.

He did some very suspect things... his obsession with closing Gitmo to fulfill a campaign promise from years ago is kind of perplexing, especially since current US law prevents moving the prisoners to the US. Releasing known terrorists was kind of odd...

Trading an army deserter for 5 Taliban commanders was probably the stupidest thing I've ever seen agreed upon.

His work in the gay rights arena is to be commended... but there's no doubt the country is more divided along racial lines than I've seen in my lifetime. That one is his fault.

I believe Obamacare will disappear as quickly as it was passed. Now that we've seen several years of it, very few are actually pleased with it.

I'd say... 6 out of 10, with 5 being the average.

[Nanners]

if you think obamacare is going anywhere, I think you have a rude awakening coming.

17 million americans who were previously uninsured have coverage today because of obamacare, and they are not going to give their healthcare away quietly. those newly insured also have the insurance company lobbyists on their side, no way are those people going to let their gravy train stop running.

[UK2K]

if you think obamacare is going anywhere, I think you have a rude awakening coming.

17 million americans who were previously uninsured have coverage today because of obamacare, and they are not going to give their healthcare away quietly. those newly insured also have the insurance company lobbyists on their side, no way are those people going to let their gravy train stop running.

Nice spin there Hillary...


The study finds that 4.1 million people, or 37 percent, of those signing up through the law’s marketplaces were previously uninsured. For those gaining Medicaid coverage, 6.5 million, or 52 percent, were previously uninsured.

The largest source of people gaining coverage, according to the study, was employer-sponsored insurance, with 9.6 million people enrolling. This figure is larger than in other studies, and RAND notes that it could be “idiosyncratic” to the study’s sample, rather than an accurate result.

You actually believed what you wrote though, that's the best part. I'll help clear it up for you:


There are two critical questions embedded in all of these analyses. First, how many of the newly insured people would have gotten health coverage anyway, through some other mechanism (like their workplace)? In other words, is the law simply crowding out other forms of private coverage? Second, how many of the newly insured simply ended up on an expanded (and decaying) Medicaid program? The answers to these questions are an important measure of the ACA’s “success.”

On the latter question, according to the Goldman analysis, about two-thirds of the 2014 coverage increase was from the expansion in Medicaid. For 2014, their figures for net new coverage includes 9 million more people obligated to Medicaid, and about 2 million aging into Medicare. Only about 3 million got commercial coverage.

Moreover, Goldman estimates that employer sponsored coverage declined by about 2 million lives last year, which is at odds with other estimates. The widely cited study by RAND, for example, estimated that 9.6 million people who became newly insured since the fall of 2013 gained their coverage by enrolling in employer sponsored insurance. At the same time, the Goldman analysis estimates that total individual, commercial coverage increased by about 5 million. People migrating out of employer-sponsored insurance, and onto the Obamacare exchanges, explain a large measure of the relative change, under the Goldman analysis. The biggest change, according to their data, was for small employers, where the number of covered lives declined by 2.2 million people, a reduction of 13% year-over-year.

This is in sharp contrast to other analyses, and particularly the RAND study published in Health Affairs, which found that an increase in employer-sponsored insurance was the biggest driver of the total rise in coverage. Moreover, RAND estimates that 43% of the people newly insured by workplace coverage had the insurance available to them in 2013, but opted not to take it. This would suggest that the new tax penalty compelled them to seek the coverage. The RAND authors noted that there were possible methodological challenges with their survey; including confusion people might have had about their own source of coverage. This could potentially explain the wide discrepancies between the two analyses.

The whole thing was passed based on a lie, and you just bent over and took it.


So far, even if you accept the most optimistic math, Obamacare is hardly the unmitigated success that its many apostles proclaim. Whatever minimal gains in the level of commercial coverage that’s been achieved has come at a huge fiscal expense. This is not to mention the massive growth in costly and restrictive regulation.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottgottlieb/2015/05/14/how-many-people-has-obamacare-really-insured/#3a76f8dc777f

17 million people gained healthcare coverage, but those 17 million didn't magically become eligible thanks to the Savior.


17 million americans who were previously uninsured have coverage today because of obamacare

Now read what Forbes wrote on it, and tell me again, how many people gained healthcare BECAUSE of Obamacare? The answer is not 17 million.

However, Obamacare did succeed in forcing people to pay for something they didn't want or need.

[Nanners]

If you want to argue numbers I am sure kevinnyc will show up here sooner or later. The bottom line is a lot of people who could not otherwise get coverage have it now because of obamacare, and they arent going to let anybody take it from them. There is no way to put this genie back in the bottle.

and **** you for calling me hillary, i am more of a jill stein.

[UK2K]

If you want to argue numbers I am sure kevinnyc will show up here sooner or later. The bottom line is a lot of people who could not otherwise get coverage have it now because of obamacare, and they arent going to let anybody take it from them. There is no way to put this genie back in the bottle.

btw **** you for calling me hillary clinton.
:lol

My bad.

But, if the goal was for everyone to have insurance, there are more simple ways of doing it then FORCING everyone to buy shit insurance. The simple fact that it took them several years and $2.1 BILLION DOLLARS to build a website should tell you all you need to know about it.

But truthfully, if the government's illustrious record of failed projects wasn't going to convince you this was a terrible idea, I don't know what would.

You know what the next step is though, right? The ones with shit insurance will complain they can't afford the good insurance. If enough people can be convinced its not fair, then everyone will be on the same healthcare. Except for the rich of course, they'll get the finest treatment money can buy.

[Nanners]

i definitely agree there are much better ways to give everyone health care than obamacare. obamacare is basically just a big handout to the parasitic private insurance industry.

we should be using a universal healthcare system like you see in virtually every other developed nation on this planet, but in the meantime I suppose obamacare is better than nothing.

[DonDadda59]

Nice spin there Hillary...



You actually believed what you wrote though, that's the best part. I'll help clear it up for you:



The whole thing was passed based on a lie, and you just bent over and took it.



http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottgottlieb/2015/05/14/how-many-people-has-obamacare-really-insured/#3a76f8dc777f

17 million people gained healthcare coverage, but those 17 million didn't magically become eligible thanks to the Savior.



Now read what Forbes wrote on it, and tell me again, how many people gained healthcare BECAUSE of Obamacare? The answer is not 17 million.

However, Obamacare did succeed in forcing people to pay for something they didn't want or need.

You forgot to count the people who can stay on their parents' plans until age 26.

[UK2K]

You forgot to count the people who can stay on their parents' plans until age 26.

In that case, let's make the age 50 and then EVERYONE has health insurance.

[DonDadda59]

In that case, let's make the age 50 and then EVERYONE has health insurance.

Jesus :facepalm

[joe]

Who cares how he's looked at? History books lie, so does popular opinion. People look at a lot of things fondly that don't deserve it.

How Obama should be remembered, is just another in a long line of US puppet presidents who ruled over his slaves for 8 years. He is yet another president to trash the constitution, and the people of course have no care/understanding for this, so they cheer.

As a role model for black people, I'm sure he's positive. Well polished, good looking, well spoken. Yet, to look up to any politician is a sad thing to do.

The history books will write the surface narrative. He stopped the recession, he got Bin Laden, he started this awesome socialized medicine. Yadda yadda.

They won't write that he kept the empire business going as usual. Ever expanding military budget, ever expanding government spending, ever expanding rule of the rulers over us, the slaves.

And when this fake economic "recovery" ends, and we slowly watch our economy turn into shit over the years, nobody will realize Obama is partly to blame for that. They will blame whoever is in office when it happens, not the many decades upon decades of bad policy that led to it, of which Obama played his small part.

[Dresta]

Kevin is a master of disingenuity. Ascribing the unprecedented fall in labour participation rate since women entered the labour force to demographic shifts is hilariously inaccurate. That chart he posts to verify his silly point shows a steep decline from 2009, but the fact that this directly coincides with the implementation of Obama's economic policies, is just a kind of strange coincidence in his eyes, explained solely by shifting demographics (as if they weren't shifting prior to 2009). You only need to look at the graph you posted to tell this is a sudden and steep decline, and not the result of a long-term trend.

All the "jobs numbers" are boosted by the fact that more over 55s are working than ever before, and that large numbers of people are working more than one part-time job. One well-paid full-time job lost, and replaced with two part-time and low-paid jobs, comes up on the statistic as a job gained, when it is not a sign of health, but a sign of sickness. These are the jobs that are lost quickest when a recession hits. Everything Obama has done has been focused on short-term perceptions rather than long-term stability.


The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports a 12% increase (3.1 million) in the number of 55-and-older workers. By contrast, there's been a 6.5% drop (6.5 million) in workers 25 to 54 years old.

Young people can't find work, and old people are working in record numbers.

Obama's domestic policy has been bad (too focused on "legacy building" and cultivating a positive image of himself, rather than actually adhering to and upholding the law of the land, or thinking about long-term problems, as the Executive is supposed to--this is not so much his fault though, as the fault of how most view history, which justifies and vindicates short-termism and abuses of power, with the result of the Executive now being close to completely unaccountable, so much power does he have through all the patronage he can dish out, and all the agencies under his control). But his foreign policy has been disastrous, and the West is going to be dealing with the consequences of his recklessness for decades to come. The Libya catastrophe has destabilized most of Africa, and the blind support for the Gulf States, and the brazen lies about the Assad regime, has, in concert with the Libya foolishness, has created a civilisational catastrophe in Europe, as well as a safe-haven for islamist lunatics.:


However, when the US pitched in to “lead from behind” and destroy the Libyan state at Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s urging, even though Libya was surrounded by relatively vulnerable, at-risk states unable or unwilling to project power beyond their borders, the U.S. refused to go “Pottery Barn”, to use Colin Powell’s analogy, and fill the power vacuum in Libya with its own forces.

The United States did worse than just walk away. In a misguided and morally and intellectually lazy (my opinion!) gambit it tried to “export” its way out of the Libyan problem by supporting the migration of destabilizing elements, i.e. the Islamist fighters who had brought down Qaddafi, to another adventure in Syria. Now, with the Syrian project faltering despite 5 years of foreign-funded Islamist insurrection, Libya has emerged as a preferred destination not only for returning Libyan fighters, but also a growing population of transnational fighters from dozens of countries.

Security analysts are quietly flummoxed about the establishment of the Islamist fighter “colony” in Libya, because after three decades of cynically exploiting Islamist fighters as a deniable asset against the Soviet Union and uncooperative secular regimes, the number of transnational Islamist fighters has roughly quintupled. Fact is, the number probably more than doubled in the last couple years alone, thanks to the competing recruitment efforts of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, and ISIS in the Syria/Iraq theater.

Qaddafi was no friend of Libyan Islamists and not a few of them became radicalized fighters who fought all over Asia until the Libya regime change campaign provided a local outlet for their energies. They formed the core force, supported by US/NATO/GCC air and special operations forces, which overthrew Gaddafi.

Notably, after the deposition of Qaddafi in 2011, both Libyan fighters and leaders found their way to Syria in bulk. Solidarity with Sunni Islam against another apostate potentate undoubtedly played a role, but the United States was apparently anxious to give the US-backed civilian government of Mustafa Abdul Jalil some breathing space.

Abdul Hakim Belhadj, one of the renditioned Islamists, a veteran commander who received planeloads of aid from Qatar, whose Tripoli Brigade had broken through to the capital, occupied it, and administered it, and hoped to become Minister of Defense in the new order, was instead encouraged to take his talents to Syria—via Turkey on a ship with 400 tons of munitions. By early 2012, the US and GCC had responded to the collapse of the local Syrian democratic revolution by turning unambiguously to a strategy of foreign-supported insurrection using imported Islamist muscle and supplying them in part through the Libya ratline described by Seymour Hersh.

I wouldn’t be surprised if this was regarded as the cleverest of clever tricks: channeling Libyan fighters to Syria where they would become Assad’s headache instead of our headache: two birds with one stone!

Libyan fighters established a significant presence in Syria, providing training to inexperienced locals as well as serving as a fighting force eventually organized as the Katibat al-Battar brigade. The brigade provided a home for a variety of European militants (the Libyan dialect is intelligible to the European descendants of Moroccan and Algerian immigrants who form the backbone of the radical Islamic groups in France and Belgium). Its Euro-alumni formed the core of the group that perpetrated the Paris outrage in November 2015.

Now the original fighters are coming home to Libya with their stature enhanced, their skills and connections upgraded, and their perspectives internationalized.

On top of homeward bound emigres, Libya can also attract a growing population of footloose transnational fighters brought into being by lavish Gulf and Turkish support of paramilitaries in Syria, and the fruits of an ISIS strategy to bulk up the Iraq/Syria Caliphate through the import of amateur enthusiasts as well as experienced fighters from around the world.

In addition, ISIS has taken advantage of the assets and opportunities offered by Libya to port its foreign-fighter driven insurrection model to the Libya platform and build a local operation from the ground up using freshly-recruited foreign fighters from places like Tunisia, Morocco, and Algeria.

A March 2015 report commissioned by the United Nations Security Council found that the number of foreign fighters for Islamist causes worldwide was higher than it has ever been and had soared by 71 percent between mid-2014 and March 2015. The study concluded that Syria and Iraq, by far the biggest destinations for foreign fighters, had become a “finishing school for extremists.”

http://www.unz.com/plee/libya-worse-than-iraq-sorry-hillary/


Thanks Obama! That's 3 different continents he's severely f*cked up. If only he could've stood up to the warmongering of dear old Hilary. This graphic says it all about the Libyan debacle:

http://www.unzcloud.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/CcZpd6YWAAEijwH.jpg

Oh, and I forgot FATCA--thanks Obama for making the US into a true worldwide tyranny! This is the most outrageously imperialistic law passed in American history, and yet it is supported by legions of left-wingers. What hypocrisy.

[FillJackson]

20 million people are insured because of the Obamacare law which goes way beyond healthcare.gov.

The website did not cost 2 billion dollars. The GAO found it cost 840 million.

Out of the disaster of healthcare.gov 1.0 came 18F (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/18F)is one of the most important and cool things to come out under the Obama adminstration. Born in the way of wake of the failure of heathcare.gov 1.0, it's a cutting edge software product shop that is part of GSA. It basically brings government software and product development into the 21st century. Essentially to fix the 1.0 they went out and got top guys from Google and Twitter and elsewhere many of who worked on the Obama campaign. Some of them stayed behind to create a lean startup software shop and consultancy that's within the government. They are doing stuff that my company is still struggling to do. I still can't convince stakeholders to build the minimum product and add on from there.

One of the giant problems with healthcare.gov was how government software contracts were awarded. The consultancy side of 18F (https://18f.gsa.gov/consulting/) is changing that.