Chuck Schumer finally gets it

[IU1]

In this video he outlines what went wrong and what Democrats need to do to get back in America's favor.

If there is one thing we can all learn from the Obama Presidency it's that America needs to govern for the people and not for the fringe. Obama was a political sensation and Democrats got high off his vapors back in '08 but now most of the Democrats who supported him have either been voted out of office or didn't run for reelection.

I don't know if the next political phenomenon will come from the Republican or Democratic Party but the lesson learned is voters and politicians need to make the best decisions for the country and not take a ride in a race car with a driver who doesn't have a license.

The latest executive order was done out of anger. His own party has not only turned on him, they're firing at him and he's decided to go at it alone and show up this country.

 

[NPT]

He's just trying

to save his job. You don't think he believes what he's saying do you? The popular thing now for some liberals is to pretend like they didn't support Obama and his agenda. The sad part is that a lot of ill informed voters will fall for it.

On edit: He's doing the same thing that a lot of Republicans did in 2008 when they were distancing themselves from Bush.
This post was edited on 11/29 6:58 AM by NPT

 

[hoot1]

Obama did campaign on health care reform in 2008 , and...

...l still believe reducing health care costs are part of reducing the long term deficit problem of entitlements as Obama also contended in 2008.

Having said that, it is obvious a majority of voters aren't happy with the Obama health care reform at this point in time, and the deficit problem as it relates to entitlements really isn't on their radar yet, although it should be.

Schumer's belated thoughts about Obama turning to health care reform before doing more to stimulate the economy are about six years too late and does sound rather self servicing in my view.

This post was edited on 11/29 10:27 AM by hoot1

 

[dugger1973]

He doesn't get anything. He's a

career politician if there ever was one. He's determined that he needed to say this in order to better protect his future electability and his party, nothing more.

I hate politicians like him.

 

[meridian]

Are you sure the majority aren't happy with the Obamacare?

Or, is it that the Republicans did an incredible disinformation campaign? It appears that good many people who are against the Obamacare are the very ones who are/will be benefiting from it. It doesn't make sense.

As for me, I don't like Obamacare. First, it doesn't do anything for me. Second, I think we should nationalize the healthcare system as most civilized countries do.

 

[Rockfish1]

Chuck Schumer is a political animal

With his finger on the pulse of wealthy Manhattan. He loves Wall Street, he loves Israel, and he hates anything that would impose any political cost on Democrats. But as the hated Nancy Pelosi aptly put it, "We're here to do a job, not to keep a job."

I don't know what color the sun is on Chuck Schumer's planet, but here on planet Earth, both Hillary and Barack ran on health care reform in 2008. I agree that Democrats should have pushed harder for more economic stimulus in 2009-2010, but unlike Chuck Schumer, I actually said so at the time. Like Chuck Schumer, however, I supported the ACA he now belatedly rejects, because it was the best we could get from political hucksters like Chuck Schumer.

Now Schumer claims that Democrats should have been much more aggressive on fiscal stimulus he didn't support in 2009, and that Democrats should have waited to pass health care reform until after 2010, when Democrats couldn't pass anything. This is the sort of political analysis that only IU1 could respect.



This post was edited on 11/29 7:49 AM by Rockfish1

 

[hoot1]

I did add "at this point in time"...

...which means over time ACA's popularity might improve.

What we keep forgetting is that health care costs and therefore the cost of insurance would probably be increasing without reform along with employers dropping coverage. These trends existed before ACA, so we cannot really cite ACA for making something happen which would have occurred anyway.

Getting back to Schumer and the stimulus, the stimulus included some of what the GOP wanted (tax breaks) and some of what Democrats like to see (more government spending). Like most packages neither side of the aisle got exactly what it wanted in terms of specifics or amount, but at least Congress and the president did something.

Personally, I think the recession could have been much worse, so for this, we should be thankful.

 

[CO. Hoosier]

Are you kidding?

Do you really believe Schumer has an "electability" problem in New York State?

I never agree with Schumer, and he is infuriating with many of his comments, but I think he deserves credit for these remarks. I'll nuance my comments a little by pointing out that the Democrats didn't fail the United States in 2009, government failed us. We MUST elevate the game of governance if we have any hope of improving things. Everybody values power and influence more than they value policy and government.

 

[NPT]

I don't believe

that he as an "electability" problem either but I don't think he is as sure as you or I am so he's making sure that he runs for cover. Do you think he would be saying the same thing if Democrats had won the last election? I don't either.

 

[CO. Hoosier]

I don't think he would have said those things if the Democrats had won

But that is a little different from Schumer believing those things are true.

The Democrats were in a very unusual situation in 2009. They had total control of the government for the first time since 1993. They were elected not because of ideas but because of circumstances disconnected from ideas. The ideas that forced Clinton to the center in the 90's were still held by the public. Obama was the least accomplished, least experienced, and probably the least prepared individual to ever be elected president. He breezed through on the strength of his charisma, speeches and not being Bush. Wrong person at the right time. It really would make no difference what Obama's agenda of ideas was, he would win in a walk. Obama's framework for health care reform was made up on the spur of the moment before one of the 2008 debates with Hillary. It shows. Obama thought his framework was his mandate instead of the easily fixable problems of insurance abuse and pre-existing coverage problems. The clown from MIT has finally exposed the fiasco known as Obamacare.

I don't know if Schumer understood this in 2009 or not. But it really made no difference. Circumstances have changed. Obama has pissed off Reid with his tax reform veto promise. He pissed off Biden with the way he treated Hagel. He pissed off many congressional democrats by not consulting with them on numerous issues, most importantly, Syria. He pissed off everybody with his smugness about hearing the people who didn't vote in 2014. Obama is shrinking his circle of advisors. Schumer is anything but a dumb politician. Schumer now knows it is safe to say what he really thinks about Obama.

 

[hootch1]

We had two problems;

1) we significantly underestimated the depth of the recession
2) the Reinhart-Rogoff analysis showing that high deficit levels will diminish economic growth came out in 2010.

The fact that R-R came out somewhat shortly after we discovered the depth of the recession torpedoed any real chance to get more stimulus. The fact that R-R is flawed is even more unfortunate. The discovery of their errors was too late to help the US.'

At least we weren't Europe.

 

[Rockfish1]

"Obamacare" will always be unpopular

But the law has extended coverage to 70 percent of them are happy with what they now have. Meanwhile both insurance premiums and health care costs are growing more slowly than expected, and even more people will gain coverage during this open enrollment period. These realities have had no effect on public opinion regarding "Obamacare", because Republicans have successfully demagogued that word. Apart from the always unpopular individual mandate, however, the policies that actually comprise "Obamacare" are enduringly popular and will likely grow more so over time, as more and more people benefit from them.

 

[Rockfish1]

I agree with all of that, but . . .

We also had a third problem: The Republican Party rejected textbook macroeconomics for both partisan and ideological reasons and did everything humanly possible to prevent the federal government from implementing no-brainer fiscal policies.

I've often praised Barbara Tuchman's The March of Folly. If she were still alive, I think she would write a supplement for the Great Recession, documenting how Very Serious People here and (especially) in Europe pursued obviously stupid courses. At a time when the bond market would literally have paid us to build ourselves a bright shiny new 21st-century infrastructure -- raising GDP and creating jobs in the process -- we chose instead to cut off our nose to spite our face. This is an historic folly, and the blame for that folly should be placed where it belongs.
This post was edited on 11/30 4:35 PM by Rockfish1

 

[ARMZP]

Can't we/you just wait


until 2017 when the full effect of the law comes in before passing judgment? Remember Obama postponed the most un-popular and harmful parts of this law.

And as someone who works a little bit in the insurance side, we are starting to see kick back against this in year two.

Also, most of those Ten million had insurance before their companies canceled it under the ACA guidelines.

 

[Rockfish1]

Seriously?

Obamacare's opponents passed their judgment years ago. Ever since they've confidently predicted disaster after disaster, and they've been wrong every time. Instead, the law is working pretty much exactly like its proponents expected.

Now you say that the disaster won't occur until 2017. Unless I'm missing something, though, all of the law's significant provisions are now in effect, except for the employer mandate. I'm taking your prediction that that will lead to disaster as seriously as I've taken all of the other doomsday predictions.

Meanwhile, the facts are as I've said. In particular, that's 10 million "newly insured" people. It doesn't include people who lost their noncompliant old insurance and had to purchase new insurance. That's why the percentage of us who are uninsured has fallen to its lowest level since the 1990s. I don't know what you mean when you say that "we are starting to see kick back against this in year two", but enrollment is rising and the uninsured rate is falling, while both insurance premiums and overall health care costs are rising more slowly than expected.

Predictably these inconvenient realities haven't dented conservatives' conviction that the law is a disaster. Apparently the disaster will just be slower in coming than conservatives predicted. Just like that runaway inflation that conservatives have been warning against for the last six years.

 

[ARMZP]

Yes seriously

Unlike you, I am able to look at the facts on the ground. I was one that said this was probably the worse law ever passed, while that might still turn out to be true, I (unlike you) am able to change my stance and say perhaps I was wrong.

There has been some very good things come out of the ACA, as well as some bad. Lets wait for the 2015 sign-ups, and more importantly the 2014 tax returns.

And no, everything hasn't been implemented, and yes the employer mandate is a HUGE thing. What kind of ripple effect will it have? 2017 will tell.

I am open minded enough to say now this hasn't been a disaster, but it also hasn't been a glowing success either, as you seem to think.

As I have said from almost the start....the jury is still out.

I stand by that position.

 

[Rockfish1]

"I am able to look at the facts on the ground."

No, that's precisely what you're not able to do. I've cited and linked the facts. You've misstated and ignored the facts. I think this is because ideological opponents of the ACA don't care about the facts, because they're fervently convinced that they know the Truth, which must surely manifest itself in time, whatever the mere facts suggest.

 

[ARMZP]

LMAO


Want to compare the hours of training on the ACA we each of had?

Have you had to develop W-2 software and train on it to met the ACA?
Have you had to develop employee tracking software and train on it because of the ACA?

Have you went to school to see how the ACA effects your clients small business returns?

You have cited and linked the facts that you chose to link that the DNC sent to you.

I have kept an open mind on this while trying to learn the law and see how it might/does truly effect my clients and employees.

You read something written by someone with an agenda.

I will stay with my opinion thank you... This law deserves an incomplete at the moment.

 

[Rockfish1]

Despite all your hours of training . . .

You keep getting basic facts wrong, and your predictions have all failed. If your input is truly as prodigious as you claim, your pathetic output proves that there's something terribly wrong in between. Maybe you should seek a rebate.
This post was edited on 12/3 4:46 PM by Rockfish1

 

[ARMZP]

Really?

I haven't gotten anything wrong because I have taken a wait and see attitude. It is you that thinks, again, that you know it all.



We should also note that the numbers the CBO used to offset the cost of the ACA will have to be reworked because their prediction has fallen short too.

There are no solid stats on the number of losses and numbers are generally touted as being between 4.5 and 6 million. The sad thing is the legislation was created with the knowledge that there would be winners (the previously uninsured) and the losers (those whose policies were cancelled when insurers pulled out of markets or, whose deductibles increased as did the cost of said policies which they could no longer afford.)