Comment by harry8 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by harry8 | Hacker News Reader

Obama rode to power on change ticket and immediately abandoned it, wholesale.

OK that didn't work so who else you got? Bernie, outsider with nothing, no money, no establishment friends, too old, been a democtat for 5 minutes and nearly got the democratic nomination and the dem establishment hate him and broke the rules fighting him. Donald has fame and got the republican nomination. Republican establishment hate him.

American voters want change. Change at any cost right now. And they'll keep trying for it.

There has been no meaningful political reform. Regulatory capture and gerrymander are the norm. People hate it. They genuinely hate the status quo, the political establishment. Really hate it.

Whoever is judged the most likely to do something, anything, in the way of reform has a huge advantage. You can be inexperienced and African American, you can be a blow-hard who inherited a billion dollars. Doesn't matter if people actually believe you are more for change and reform than the opposition.

It's not the only important thing but having credibility as an agent for change is extremely valuable. Hilary had precisely no credibility on that count and was proud of it .

> Obama rode to power on change ticket and immediately abandoned it, wholesale.

He had two years where he had legislative power, and spent that time shoring up the US economy after the financial crisis and passing healthcare reform. Had he passed political reform instead he would have been accused of putting elite concerns before the practical things affecting ordinary people.

One of the problems in the US seems to be that the President has all the rhetoric of a ruler, but in fact only has power with Congress.

People invest an enormous amount of hope and effort into the federal system, but in fact it's mostly ineffective, if the two parties are at one another's throats no one is capable of action a majority of the time. The system is set up to rely on the states for action, but people move around so much the states aren't seen as worth the effort (because you might be taking a job on the other side of the country in a year or two). It's a system which doesn't really match up with how people live their lives.

> He had two years where he had legislative power, and spent that time shoring up the US economy after the financial crisis and passing healthcare reform.

Respectfully, he shored up the banks that had precipitated the crisis rather than the people most affected by the crisis. Some will call that virtuous and necessary, or 'deeply unfair' and necessary (Timothy Geithner), but the people who benefited are not the people who voted last night.

As for healthcare reform, he chose health insurance rather than health care. From the point of view of most of the people who voted last night, that means another bill to pay, not better healthcare.

He invested his power, to the degree he had it, more in keeping things the same than in the change people voted him in for.

Obamacare is a compromise and it's a compromise required because of the Republican party, there was never enough votes to get real health care legislation. So: not Obama's fault, though it is the fault of the Democratic party letting the Republicans gerrymander themselves to a consistent house majority

Until 2010, the Democrats held control of the House, Senate, and White House. At least consider the possibility that they accomplished what they wanted to accomplish.

Procedural rules in the Senate gave a lot of influence to the marginal votes:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patient_Protection_and_Afforda...

Which depending on which 'they' you are using, may or may not contradict your point.

The ACA was passed with 0 votes from Republicans in the House or Senate, and there was a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. There was no need or desire for real comprise on the ACA.

In fact, after it passes, Speaker Pelosi and Senate majority leader Reid had a little parade where they gloated about getting it through without Republicans.

It was passed on a single vote, the last vote being Joe Lieberman. He required the removal of the public option as a requirement for support.

> Respectfully, he shored up the banks that had precipitated the crisis rather than the people most affected by the crisis. Some will call that virtuous and necessary, or 'deeply unfair' and necessary (Timothy Geithner), but the people who benefited are not the people who voted last night.

Well, even the collapse of Lehman Brothers meant an enormous shock. Given the scale of the crisis, it's very impressive how well the US came out of it, and that is to a significant degree down to his policy. That is, consistent growth for the interim period, and high levels of private sector job growth (up 12 million over the course of his Presidency, compared to a fall for President Bush). That is important for every ordinary individual in the country. It's all very well saying 'he should have let all the banks fail' in retrospect, with the actual prospect of that actually happening.

Also, I'm not just talking about the banking measures in the crisis, but about the moderate banking reforms he put in place, and also about the stimulus bill, which was painted as apocalyptic by the Republican leadership, but which actually seems to have helped a lot.

> As for healthcare reform, he chose health insurance rather than health care.

Well, most European countries have health insurance systems, which work well. The Dutch and the Germans have that system. The French have an insurance system for people earning over a certain level. He chose a moderate reform (which had already been trialled by a Republican in Massachusetts) presumably with the idea that it would be a fairly uncontroversial but significant step to get to universal coverage, which few people would seriously disagree with, and which could then be built on in future. Presumably remembering Hillary Clinton's failure to put a much more ambitious scheme in place two decades earlier. He probably misjudged the mood, should have reconciled himself to the inevitability of being presented as a hate figure, and done a more root and branch reform. Again, easy to say in retrospect.

Obama only had 7 weeks of legislative power. That's how long his party had enough votes to overcome the filibuster in the Senate. Criticizing him for not getting enough done is nonsensical.

> American voters want change. Change at any cost right now. And they'll keep trying for it.

And yet they keep voting in the same Congress which can affect the most change.

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