LOVELY, INSPIRING, HOPEFUL
Obama has inspired people, given them hope for change, had an extraordinary rise, promised to cut deficits (in half!) and at the same time help the poor and the middle class, to redistribute wealth, to unburden us from our woes, to solve climate change, to advance alternative energy and highly discourage oil use.
And he is a symbol, the first black President of the United States.
From state senator to President in four years!
Close to our hearts. People get emotional if anyone says something negative about him or anything connected to him. They get emotional about the issues and the war against "the other side" (rich, business, too much profits). They fear losing women's rights and gay rights and immigration rights. People associate emotionally with him and those issues.
How could anyone not love the ideas and great promise in his acceptance speech?
How could anyone not like a deficit cut in half, while providing health care for all Americans,
And he did, despite assertions otherwise, use the government lending power to save GM, taking it through managed bankruptcy (as originally recommended by Romney to save the company) and providing funds no acquiring company might have ever come forth with. That was good and it required eliminating lots of jobs and dealers and distributors, creditor losses, stockholder losses - but it saved the remaining jobs and a good part of the industry. (Of course, other companies would have stepped into the breach with the same effect, but some of them would be foreign owned.)
AND LET'S ALSO LOOK AT WHAT IS ACTUALLY HAPPENING
At the risk of offending people, let's also look at the facts - if you're willing to be objective for a bit, and then you can reintegrate all you know and perhaps return to loving Obama - and, possibly, to the realization that he is unable to do the job, no matter how great his ideals - or you can stick with your original beliefs. I would suggest that we have idealized him and are stuck in "selective evidence", ignoring the facts on the other side, unwilling to come to a reasoned conclusion, though still loving what he stands for.
How could we not love what he stands for? "Tis good stuff!
But the reality is that we are not hiring an "ideal" or a bunch of ideas.
All that matters is what he actually does produce, rather than the promises and the excuses. Yes, there are some legitimate facts that are not excuses, but we need to look at what is actually done by him, the specific pieces, and not some obscure generalities.
The economy is the fault of Bush, it is said. But the real question is "what specifically have you done and what effects have each of those things had" - basically pulling those out of the generality of "the economy is growing" - well, duh, it always grows after the bottom of a recession - the question is what has been done to bring that about.
Is he really the right choice to be President or is he just really a good potential Senator or maybe even Secretary Of State or something to do with helping poor people in some significant way?
Look at his actual Track Record, seeing if you see what I see - or not. Is he acting in our best interests in Integrity And Responsibility to us rather than politics. What we expect from his Presidency? What we expect from Romney's Presidency, by comparison.
