Tag: Obama Presidency
Obama’s Checking His List and Checking Things Off
He’s going down a checklist of thorny, longstanding problems, and he’s doing whatever he can to tackle them. These are things that have been tearing at us for decades and generations. My sense is his feeling is, I’m not going to leave office without doing everything I can to stop them.
— David Axelrod, quoted by the New York Times, on President Obama’s recent actions.
This is Going to Piss Off Ted Cruz’s Dad
Not to mention little Marco Rubio. But America’s policy toward Cuba makes no sense, and these reforms are long overdue. There will be a hew and cry from the old guard in Miami, from FOX, and from the far rightwing, but since when have they been on the sensible side of issues?
Obama Prefers Watching ESPN to Politics
I spend most of my time watching ESPN in the morning. I get so much politics I don’t want to be inundated with a bunch of chatter about politics during the day.
— President Obama, quoted by Business Insider.
Boehner’s Reasoning for Allowing a State of the Union Address
The more the president talks about his ideas, the more unpopular he becomes. Why would I want to deprive him of that opportunity?
— Speaker John Boehner, quoted by the Wall Street Journal, on reports that Republican might not invite President Obama to deliver his State of the Union address.
Cruz Tries to Tie Clinton to Obama’s Foreign Policy
The failures of the Obama-Clinton foreign policy are manifest. It’s almost as if the whole world is on fire right now.
— Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), doing his best to tie Hillary Clinton to President Obama as he offered sharp criticism of the “Obama-Clinton” foreign policy, the New York Times reports.
Obama Regains His Relevance, Sticks It to GOP
Less than a month after suffering an electoral drubbing, President Obama has succeeded in placing the majority of the internal party angst back in the other camp. The president’s move on immigration has made that the overriding issue as Republicans face down a government funding deadline of next Friday. In fact, it now looks likely to become the overriding issue when Republicans try to do much of anything, in the current Congress and the new Congress, for the next few months at least. GOP leaders’ early plans of avoiding shutdown talk have already been forced into rewrite. It’s now clear that Republicans will have to work through their internal party discord – yes, again – even as they reconvene in Washington in substantially greater numbers.
— Rick Klein, on ABC’s “The Note” blog.
Malloy Explains How He Survived the Midterms
I was never going to run away from the president. It was not even in consideration. I support the president. I think the president has been right. I mean, look at the numbers, look at the job growth, sustained job growth—the greatest in American history. The. Greatest. In. American. History. Why didn’t people run on that?
— Connecticut Gov. Dan Malloy (D), quoted by the Daily Beast, on why he was one of the few Democrats who survived the 2014 midterm elections.
Why Republicans Don’t Need to Govern
You can’t simply assert, like it’s some sort of natural fact, that Republicans ‘must show they can govern’ when an alternative course is available. Not only is it not a secret — this other direction — but it’s being strongly urged upon the party by people who are a key part of its coalition. … The alternative to ‘show you can govern’ is to keep President Obama from governing. Right? Keep him from accomplishing what he wants to get done in his final two years and then ‘go to the country,’ as Karl Rove used to say, with a simple message: time for a change! This is not only a valid way to proceed, it’s a pretty likely outcome.
— Jay Rosen, on his PressThink blog.
On the Playground
“We won! We won!” the Republicans say,
“Now you must do things just our way!”
But Obama, he’s coy,
He’s no little boy,
And it’s a whole different ballgame he plans to play.