Can President Obama blame not closing Guantanamo on Republican obstruction?
Indirectly. Although support for "closing Guantanamo" was moderate, support for any actual plan to close it is lower. (Welcome to America, where "cutting the deficit" is good but "shuttering programs with nontrivial budgets" is bad.) Some Democratic politicians start to waffle when you talk about putting the terrorists in their state.At the time Obama took office, a poll showed 53% in favor of closing Guanatanamo. That's a majority, but far from an overwhelming one. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp... And as the torture allegations faded, support dropped further:http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn... Nor is it high on anybody's priority list.http://www.gallup.com/poll/15302... If it was subject only to ordinary 50%+1 majority rules, Obama might well be able to get Democrats to do it. But with the filibuster, it's a complete non-starter; it's not worth the arm-twisting it would take because it would fail. There is no thing that Obama can propose on any subject that Republicans will permit to pass, even if it's their own idea. Today, with fewer horror stories coming out of Guantanamo, it's still a black eye for America, but not the kind of continuous human rights issue that shows up on the daily radar.So Republican obstructionism can be said to bear indirect blame. The fact is that since the 2010 elections, nothing has been done in Congress, big or small. The only bills that have actually gotten passed are the ones that absolutely must be done, routine reauthorizations and budget renewals. At this point, even if we were to wipe that slate clean, support for closing Guantanamo has dropped to the point where it still wouldn't be top priority. Obama could conceivably have struck while the iron was hot, but he seems a deliberate kind of guy, one who prefers to find a compromise. He missed his chance, and given that the Congress is now permanently gridlocked, the Guantanamo prisoners should get comfortable.
In the aftermath of the Obama and Trump Presidencies will we ever see a healing of the political fractures?
Oh I think so. Obama, by his actions, did nothing to increase the fractionating that has occurred. Right now the Republicans are the refuge of a group of people who tend to be bigots and racists. That does not mean that all Republicans are like that but the fact remains that most of the people of that ilk, those referred to by Hillary as “deplorables” are Republicans and find refuge there. I am a Democrat and a liberal and where I had my greatest disagreement with Obama is in the fact that it seemed like he kept on trying to be bipartisan, even when it was extremely obvious that it was not going to work. The one fact about Obama that most Republicans seemed to take issue with was his skin color. You can’t blame the Democrats for racial bias since we are the ones that nominated and helped elect him to the office of POTUS.I won’t go into a rehash of the history of the retreat of the Republican party into what it is today but they are in the distinct minority nowadays as view the fact that in the midterm elections of 2018, the Democrats outvoted the Republicans by over 10 million votes nationally and that is unheard of. The reason the Republicans held on to what little they did hold onto in that election is due to voter suppression and gerrymandering which the Republicans have developed to an art, especially nowadays with the use of computers. When they lose those advantages they are really in trouble. The Republicans right now seem to have a monopoly on deceit, spinning (strategic lying) immorality and other negative issues and the Democrats, while not perfect in their own right, are responding to that by often taking the low road also. I feel that the backlash against this kind of politicking is going to purge the Republicans of the negative element, the Newt Gingrichs, the Mitch McConnells, the Paul Ryans, the Devin Nuneses, and others of that low quality and will return to being the party that it once was. For our Democracy to work as designed we need both parties to be honest and strong and once we are able to reachieve that I am sure that bipartisanship will return as it should. I doubt if I will be alive to see that however as I a 76 years of age so it won’t take place in my lifetime.
Do you think Obama's legacy will be completely destroyed by Trump?
Yes.The very bitter irony, which Dems are too stupid to get, is that it’s Obama’s own fault because he abused the mechanisms of power available to him. Some constitutional scholar.Had he properly developed Health Care and Immigration Reform legislation, worked honestly with Congress on reforming entitlements and tort reform to pay for these things, and not been such an arrogant fellow, he might have left a legacy worthy of praise. Probably compromises, but standing and functional.Virtually everyone agrees (and still agrees) that these things needed reforming.History will remember Obama as the first black president. Guess what? No one cares that he was (and I imagine remains) black. They care that he wasted 8 years of our time with his stupid ideology.
Did Bush erode the Constitution so Obama could side step it to destroy the dollar?
I'm afraid you have to go back a whole lot further than Bush. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Senate Report 93-549 was a document issued by the "Special Committee on the Termination of the National Emergency" of the 93rd Congress (Hence the "93" in the name) (1973 to 1975). Its purpose was to discuss and address the 40 year long state of emergency that had been in effect in the United States since 1933. During the continued state of emergency, Congress voted to transfer powers from Congress to the President. The debate to end long-running states of National Emergency was ended in 1976 with the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1601-1651), which limits any such declared emergencies to two years. And from another source: "These proclamations give force to 470 provisions of Federal law. These hundreds of statutes delegate to the President extraordinary powers, ordinarily exercised by the Congress, which affect the lives of American citizens in a host of all-encompassing manners. This vast range of powers, taken together, confer enough authority to rule the country without reference to normal Constitutional processes. Under the powers delegated by these statutes, the President may: seize property; organize and control the means of production; seize commodities; assign military forces abroad; institute martial law; seize and control all transportation and communication; regulate the operation of private enterprise; restrict travel; and, in a plethora of particular ways, control the lives of all American citizens." Every President since 1976 has declared a State of National Emergency within the two year limit, so we are still under that rule and not the Constitution.
Why do Obama and many other Democrats blame Russia for election hacking when Obama himself interfered with Israel's election using taxpayer money?
Well for one thing, many Republicans are also upset about Russian interference, but it goes beyond the election. It has more to do with the alarming subterfuge going on between Trump’s advisors and Russian contacts. You know, the fact that they keep lying to us about talking to Russian officials in order to avoid being asked about what was said in these secret meetings.When asked about Trump’s ties to Russia, here’s what John McCain had to say:"There’s a lot of aspects with this whole relationship with Russia and Vladimir Putin that requires further scrutiny, and so far I don’t think the American people have gotten all the answers. In fact, I think there’s a lot of shoes to drop from this centipede."This is a far cry from the U.S. endorsing an election overseas, which you can simultaneously condemn while still finding this Russian business to be even worse. It’s not a fair comparison.Putin didn’t just endorse Trump. He authorized illegal hacking of American citizens in order to sway public perception of the DNC and Hillary Clinton. This has already been proven by our government agencies, but the talking point from the conservatives who should condemn this is: Trump won. Get over it. Hillary Clinton is bad so she deserves this.It doesn’t matter what you think of Hillary Clinton. We are doomed as a country if we wave away a clear violation of our democracy when it’s politically convenient to do so. That’s not patriotism. That’s partisan exploitation. If you’re a conservative who thinks the left is just as guilty of this, then own up to it and admit your side is being complacent. Don’t fixate on whether or not 100% of liberals are being perfectly consistent with your corner of politics. We can go all day debating which side has been more hypocritical than the other at some point, and it won’t get us anywhere.
Why did Democrats only blame Bush for the Katrina disaster?
Bush by law could not send help. The gov of LA had to ask for it. The federal government is prohibited from sending anything without a request. Also despite what the media like to rant, FEMA was set up as an organizational group to help relief efforts. It did not have a mission or funds to be a disaster relief organization. That happened because of Katrina. Kanye was wrong about Bush when he said Bush hated Blacks. It was Democrat Gov. Landreau who Kanye should have attacked. The mayor was just a ******** that wanted to blame everyone else.