In The Blogs

Obama=Bush?

| Tue Mar. 10, 2009 8:13 PM PDT

I cannot wrap my head around this op-ed by Jackson Diehl in Sunday's Washington Post. The theme? President Obama is starting to look a lot like President Bush:

The Bush administration pushed through the USA Patriot Act in October 2001 by suggesting that opponents didn't want to stop another al-Qaeda attack. In his first news conference, Obama suggested that congressional opponents of the stimulus package "believe that we should do nothing" about the economic emergency...

So Obama hasn't strayed far from Karl Rove's playbook for routing the opposition. But surely, you say, he's planning nothing as divisive or as risky as the Iraq war? Well, that's where the health-care plan comes in: a $634 billion (to begin) "historic commitment," as Obama calls it, that (like the removal of Saddam Hussein) has lurked in the background of the national agenda for years. We know from the Clinton administration that any attempt to create a national health-care system will touch off an enormous domestic battle, inside and outside Congress. If anything, Obama has raised the stakes by proposing no funding source other than higher taxes on wealthy Americans, allowing Republicans to raise the cries of "socialism" and "class warfare."

Just as Bush promoted tax cuts as a remedy for surplus and then later as essential in a time of deficits, so Obama has come up with strained arguments as to why health-care reform, which he supported before the economic collapse, turns out to be essential to recovery. Yet as he convened his "health care summit" at the White House on Thursday, the stock market was hitting another 12-year-low; General Motors was again teetering on the brink of insolvency and the country was still waiting to hear the details of the Treasury's proposal to bail out banks. George W. Bush might well be asking: Is the president taking his eye off the ball?

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You can make an apt comparison between the rhetoric of the two men, and in Diehl's argument that similarity is the premise for his conclusion that Bush and Obama have more in common than we would all like to think. But such a leap in logic is, at best, a stretch and, at worst, an attempt at being incendiary just for the sake of being incendiary.

Diehl is correct: Bush and Obama's wars are wars of choice, and their language is similar, but Bush's war wasn't necessary; Obama's battle to reform health care is: The U.S. will spend the equivalent of 17 percent of the GDP (about $2.4 trillion) on health care this year—much more than the $634 billion Obama wants to jump start his health care effort. The Iraq war has run up nearly a trillion dollars in direct costs, and has indirectly bled $3 trillion from our economy.

So, as in substance, the two issues differ in cost, but that leads me to wonder why Diehl would put a rhetorical question in Bush's mouth—Is Obama taking his eye off the ball? His evidence of this is that the Dow has tanked, GM is failing and Tim Geithner is dragging his feet in revealing his plan to bail out more banks. Which of these three are at least in part related to health care costs? Mainly the Dow and GM, because American companies are spending ever more on health care every year. Fixing health care will only benefit those companies by freeing up more capital for them to invest in the private sector. Instead of drawing false connections between the two men, Diehl might have done well to give us the answer to his ridiculous rhetorical question: No, Obama is not taking his eye off a ball Bush never wanted to look at in the first place.

Steve Aquino is a senior editorial fellow at Mother Jones's Washington bureau. For more of his stories, click here.

Comments

And the solution???

Submitted by kirkbrew on Mon Mar. 9, 2009 11:29 AM PDT.

Like many, nothing but bitching. No alternate solutions. "the stock market was hitting another 12-year-low" - And that has to do with Obama how? "General Motors...teetering on the brink of insolvency" - They have been for a long time "still waiting to hear the details of the Treasury's proposal to bail out banks" - Considering that banks have no idea what the value of their assets are or to the extent they are in trouble, then one could say he is taking a measured and considered approach.

Its been 6 months and yes, Obama is Bush

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat Jun. 13, 2009 3:49 PM PDT.

tagged as:

When it comes to regulating labor markets, H-1B, Obama is with Bush. When it comes to bailing out billionaires Obama is Bush.

The bailouts of GM will make it impossible for a new generation to compete. Obama is rewarding failure of the rich. And Obama is keeping the banks unregulated. And Obama is even making the too big to fail banks even bigger. Again this was Bush policy too.

Basically, Bush and Obama are pro-mulitnational corporation and anti-US worker.

So yeah, Obama = Bush.

What Obama should do is get the federal government out of labor markets by immediately ending all H-1B visas and other anti-American visas. He needs to enforce the existing regulations on banks and monopolies. Break up these large companies and that will create real competition. There! There are some solutions.

and I should add

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat Jun. 13, 2009 5:03 PM PDT.

tagged as:

solution

And I should add that Obama isn't doing any of these. Obama isn't even talking about ending or even reforming H-1B.

If you think the bailouts are corporate welfare then look at H-1B. If companies had to off-shore to get cheap labor then they would have to deal with the non-existent infrustructure and corruption of other nations. That sort of balances things out. So multinational corporations had and idea, they got Bill Gates to lie to congress that somehow programmers were magical and we needed to import them. So congress did. That allows multinational monopolies like Microsoft to exploit our relatively good infrustructure and exploit the wage difference of India and China. All without having to deal with the problems of India and China! Its sweet for Bill Gates. But it is a disaster for US workers.

And Obama supports this. Bill Gates wants to increase the regulations impact by limiting all restrictions.

What I really love about H-1B is that it grants Indians workers and Chinese workers more rights than US workers. US workers can only work here. We only have rights in the US. But Indian and Chinese workers get a choice we don't have. How awesome is that!?

Another word for jump start

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon Mar. 9, 2009 12:08 PM PDT.

Another word for jump start is a down payment. Bush started trillion dollar wars using the same scare tactics and low-ball estimates. Come to think of it, every new program of his started out with estimates that turned out to grossly understate their cost. Tax cuts. The Medicare prescription program. War on terror.

It is beyond deranged to consider Obama=Bush

Submitted by Anon92107 (not verified) on Mon Mar. 9, 2009 12:12 PM PDT.

It is beyond deranged to consider Obama=Bush in any way, shape or form. Compared to our Founders, for the last eight years the Bush GOP have been traitors to American Democracy and American Capitalism and congressional republicans today keep proving there is no end to their treason in sight. The fact is that Washington republicans have exceeded Osama bin Laden’s most deranged nightmares for America by continuing what bin Laden started. Now that Limbaugh is the new head of the GOP we are still listening to the GOP's Goebbelsian rants that they have used for the last eight years and counting, that Rush has taken to a whole new level of deranged ranting that his role model Goebbels would be proud of: “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

Although different in many

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue Mar. 10, 2009 7:12 PM PDT.

Although different in many important ways, some disturbing similarities are his retention of extraordinary rendition, near absolute executive privilege in litigation and in access to public records, education reforms not grounded in science, 'friendliness' with the Israel lobby, faith in a freer market, and failing to speak in the language and mindset of peace rather than war. Otherwise, I would say most of his other moves have been much more positive, though politically tailored as he seems to think is needed (like his health care summit, for example). On a scale of 1 - 10 better/different, he's probably hovering between a 6 and a 7 for me. He could do better, like maybe putting together a government takeover of the U.S. banking system for starters.

obama=bush light

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed Mar. 11, 2009 12:15 AM PDT.

more like obama=bush light, just a watered down version of bush filtered through the left wing of the republican party, the DLC. Bush and Obama are very similar on support for warrant less surveillance, arguments used to justify "harsh" interrogation techniques and rendition, support for AIPAC and Israel's illegal Gaza siege, bailing out wall street, supporting big ethanol, agribusiness, mythical "clean" coal and nuclear, using the war on terror to crush civil liberties, multiple imperial wars of aggression and subversion against various 3rd world nations for strategic resource and military positioning. You can rebrand imperialism and "collateral damage", aka murder, with a black face but it is still imperialism.

Fight Fire with Fire

Submitted by Cromag on Sat Mar. 14, 2009 11:16 AM PDT.

Maybe he is holding on to the fascist powers so that he may clean up the huge mess that Bush made. And what a mess! OMFG!

Bush=Obama

Submitted by Anthony L (not verified) on Mon Mar. 23, 2009 4:53 PM PDT.

tagged as:

result

The only "change" Obama gives is more change in the pockets of big business. His stimulus also gives money to corporate treasuries or corporate bonuses - like Bush. He stabilizes the "markets" and benefits Wall Street - like Bush. The similarity in results is amazing and sad. But I will say this - Obama has moved race relations ahead a generation becasue we see that politicans - black or white - are all equal! Equally innefective and full of hollow egos! Way to go BamBam! We are so screwed!

Now that Limbaugh is the new

Submitted by Glisk (not verified) on Fri Sep. 18, 2009 10:44 AM PDT.

Now that Limbaugh is the new head of the GOP we are still listening to the GOP's Goebbelsian rants that they have used for the last eight years and counting, that Rush has taken to a whole new level of deranged ranting that his role model Goebbels would be proud of!

Cheers!
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How quickly or completely

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat Sep. 26, 2009 9:14 AM PDT.

How quickly or completely one President severs the failed ties of the previous President is one of the areas most ignored by Americans in their view of history.

The Obama administration may be the ideal analytical target of that premise by virtue of the enormous cost of the bail out which began in the Bush administration, and the knowledge that no person might have been able to achieve success as President in view of that legacy. To the extent that Obama distances himself from Bush and its failed policies must be a look into the transitional process of Presidential elections to determine the positive progress of any President as he/she picks up where another left office.

It may be the only fair and consistent method of determining any President's legacy.

How is Obama different? The

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon Oct. 26, 2009 3:16 PM PDT.

How is Obama different?

The Patriot Act is still law.
The Guantanamo torture camp is still open for business.
The Iraq War is still going on.
The Afghanistan War is still going on.
The criminals in wallstreet are being given taxpayer money instead of being prosecuted.
The deficits and therefore the debt is still out of control.
There are still paid murderers working in Iraq called "contractors" but are really mercenaries.
Halliburton is still living it up fine on the taxpayer's backs.

Just what exactly has changed? I guess we have different promises, different lies, and another "issue" like Health Care which really isn't much of an issue at all, it's just something to stir people up.

The country is headed for bankruptcy, and that's not even being addressed.

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obama bush mccain doesnt mattter

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed Feb. 10, 2010 8:02 PM PST.

I am seriously starting to believe it doesnt matter who we choose...bush lied about weapons of mass destruction, obama lied about getting us out of iraq in 6 months....obama is a clown, so was bush...puppets controlled by a higher society or power.