Welcome to media-driven representative democracy. And when I say "representative", I mean the media represents us, which it basically does. And when the media gets tired of a story, after a few days or weeks, they move onto something else, and so do we, and so do the politicians. That is their job, and that is what we expect from them, as voted by us through our support for the media, who represents us.
Democracy depends on scrutiny, accountability, long-term follow-up. It's a problem.
My hope is that the Internet will make the needed information available and that enough citizens will get and use the information to get the government we need to meet the challenges of our current world.
E.g., the OP points out some of Obama's superficial nonsense, and we discuss it here. Much more such activity, and Obama will have to think twice and talk once, and we might be on the way to better government.
http://www.amazon.com/Amusing-Ourselves-Death-Discourse-Busi...
With great strain I omitted my usual rants about the role of formula fiction -- e.g., a good guy, white hat, with a problem, and a bad guy, black hat -- and morality plays -- evil, sinful humans transgressing against the pure, pristine, precious, sensitive, delicate, snow white, 100% all-natural environment by wasteful, selfish use of filthy carbon, with retribution the destruction of the planet, and redemption through sacrifice of getting rid of cars and returning to bicycles and horses -- in journalism.
Journalism usually fails standard high school term paper writing standards, e.g., the role of primary references.
For nearly all important work in our society, original research in mathematics or physical science, professional engineering, medicine, finance, law, the standards of quality in journalism are laughable. An airplane designed with the techniques of journalism would never get off the ground, which would be a very good thing.
We could go on and on.
The book mentioned TV: My ISP gave me a cable TV set top box with their special deal for lower cost than service without TV, but I've never connected a TV to the box! I haven't watched TV in months and not much for years. The set top box has a good clock!
Unfortunately, I suspect the average American prefers a leader who always gives confident, reassuring statements in response to any crisis. It helps reinforce the illusion that intelligent, honest, and benevolent actors are leading the nation in a healthy direction.
I will give some examples of US presidents who actually did some things. This will take me into some very contentious history: My goal isn't to take sides in the history but just to illustrate that some presidents actually try to do things. For some of the items in history, you may believe that the presidents did well or poorly; that difference does not concern me here but only that they did do somethings along with, secondarily, to observe that we can differ on the quality of the results. If we do differ on the quality of the results, then we have to accept that presidents who do things can risk failure; one way to avoid both failure and success is not to do anything.
As far as I can tell, no one knows what was in the minds of W and Cheney at the start of Gulf War II -- not even still in the minds of W and Cheney.
But Gulf War II was a big effort and not just some "placating sound bites", platitudes, cliches, fantasy nonsense. I thought that the effort was foolish, but it wasn't small.
So, for Gulf War II, were W and Cheney just pushing out "placating sound bites"? No, I don't think so. Basically I wish all they had done was push out "placating sound bites". Instead, I have to believe that they believed that what they were doing was prudent, maybe even necessary, to "protect and defend" the US. And they had a point: At the time of Gulf War II, doing nothing seemed to risk a significant WMD attack on the US; I didn't really believe there was much risk, but, right, it was a small chance of a big loss and, thus, difficult to evaluate.
Of course, as we know now, what they did in Gulf War II cost the US a lot in blood and treasure. I'm sure there were some brilliant military operations, some grand heroism, and some astounding successes; there were also some major screw ups.
Maybe long term, history will record that the US dumping Saddam in Gulf War II and putting in place a democracy, fragile, a long way from perfect, was a grand turning point in the Mideast, US and world security, taming of radical Islam, and progress for world peace. Hopefully. And I can believe that such was some of what W and Cheney had in mind. I doubt we achieved such success, but maybe.
So, Gulf War II was an example of political leaders actually doing something, that they believed in, that was risky, and that they could get blamed for. I'd say they were high on courage, sense of responsibility, and patriotism but too low on simple, basic, pragmatic smarts.
Else? For Saddam, I'd have put in place one heck of an intelligence operation so I knew what the heck he was/was not doing. I'd turn as an intelligence asset everyone of importance in the place short of his cook and maybe also his cook. Then I'd "Make him a offer he couldn't refuse: 'Behave or you and your family, children, and grandchildren will all perish.'"
Or, for a small example, in Iraq US General "Mad Dog" Mattis told some Sheiks: "I come in peace. I didn't bring artillery. But I plead with you, with tears in my eyes, if you f&&k with me, I'll kill all of you.".
I know; I know; international relations are not supposed to do that. So, adjust the message a little. But, net, I'd have left the thug in power and saved US blood and treasure. If the Iraqi people didn't like their thug, then that was their problem; the role of US policy was mostly just to make sure he was not our problem.
Ike? He pushed the interstate highway system.
Reagan? The Soviets were terrified of Star Wars (I doubt that they should have been), and Reagan used it, along with Poland, etc., to help break up the USSR.
LBJ? He was just determined, beyond belief, to 'fight for freedom' in Viet Nam. He allocated huge US blood and treasure. My view is that the US is fully happy with Viet Nam now (my Brother laser printer was made in Viet Nam and is better than my old HP laser printer), and my view is that the US could have had essentially the same result in 1947, 1956, ..., by doing essentially nothing. Yes, Ho Chi Minh liked to appear on parade reviewing stands in Moscow and Peking -- nothing's perfect -- but actually that meant next to nothing.
Net, lots of US presidents actually try to do big things; mostly I don't like the results; but they don't all just mouth platitudes.
If ObamaCare is a good design for the US health care system or can be morphed into such a design, then Obama, Pelosi, Reid, the Senator Kennedy staffers who wrote an early version, etc. will deserve credit.
My guess (from reading some of an earlier bill) is that as passed it was a steaming pile of sewage, to mess up the US health care system and kill people and waste money, but eventually it may get turned into something good as implemented in the Executive Branch.
I do fear the influence of Dr. Karen Davis and her academic, economic, health care systems research nonsense -- I've been too close to such nonsense.
There are major suggestions, e.g., from Barney Frank, that ObamaCare is just a step to 'single payer' and, with the power of the Commissioner, really just nationalization of the US health care industry, a huge fraction of the US economy. I'm very afraid of the consequences in health care quality, cost, and abuses of government power.
I know; I know; the US health care system is a very long way from free enterprise now. NIH pays for a huge fraction of the medical research. Likely, as elsewhere in Federal Government research grants, the research supports the 'research-teaching' hospitals that do so much for patients, and poor patients, training physicians, and doing medical research. The FDA is right on top of each new product. The CDC plays a major role in US health care. The Hill Burton hospitals admit anyone regardless of ability to pay. Many hospitals are funded by city taxes. Etc.
Improvement: Needed? Yes. Possible? Maybe. Easy? No. A mess? Easy!
Yes, Obama has supported ObamaCare, but actually he showed that he knows next to nothing about the issue, e.g., during the summer of the big debate made some uninformed town hall statements and got slapped down hard by the US College of Surgeons and then mostly just shut up about the details.
I suspect that ObamaCare will be put on a back burner, maybe become just a subsidized insurance plan, and otherwise junked, a little after Obama leaves office.
Huh? Got any kind of evidence for this extremely doubtful statement? Or is it just an idle fantasy of yours?
I am sure Putin respects Obama just fine; they're both consummate politicians playing their parts to the T.
Which pains me greatly, I used to quite like and respect both.
This is Obama's first time as an executive of anything substantial, and I don't think he's ever been a bureaucrat. The US faces some significant threats, and there's plenty more that can be made to look significant. He could sincerely believe that he's striking the right balance between security and liberty. And the political situation, which does not encourage democrats to do anything that increases the risk of terrorist action.
I'm deeply disappointed with this, but personally I'm inclined to apply Hanlon's Razor here. Of course, I also tend to apply it to Bush, who I still think was well-meaning and generally sincere, but incurious and somewhat hapless. Trying to run a country with 3 pounds of meat is an impossible task, so "disappointed" is basically the top end of my scale.
I think what the average person may not grasp about Snowden is that he is a true patriot, who truly loves his country, in a way far beyond the average American. I mean, he basically risked spend the rest of his life in some prison to publicize what he viewed as the government invading privacy in gross violation of the 4th amendment to the constitution. Would any of us risk spending the rest of our life in prison to bring that to light if we were in his position? Not likely, and it is because we don't have the same level of love for our country as he has.
Snowden needs to really focus his PR people and efforts on that simple message, that he acted out of love for his country. It is a simple message. Otherwise, he risks being painted as an out of control punk, or whatever.
For OBL, you are looking at the bigger picture, starting with 9/11, and not just with the Navy Seals and their raid, and your view is fully appropriate: OBL and a few guys with airline tickets and box cutters got the US to do a lot of harm to itself as you listed. We were sucker punched. We've done it to ourselves.
And apparently OBL was not completely nuts but understood well enough to say that his objective was not to defeat the US but just to watch it bankrupt itself! We need to wise up.
What we do to ourselves if there was a really serious threat and attack?
There is one view that the US went from The Great Depression to a hot economy, with 2-3 jobs for everyone who could work, in just 90 days after people started shooting at us. We spent huge bucks, and nearly everything that the bucks bought was junk on a battlefield in a few weeks or sold for war surplus. Still, the spending, even on stuff that was just junk, got us out of The Great Depression.
My view is that mostly the extra spending was just wasted, but, as for the WWII example, have to believe that even wasted such spending can get us out of a great depression. So, I'm not totally against the spending. But the waste was still a black mark. We didn't have just to waste so much of the money.
OBL? Fine. But bringing in Hollywood to make a movie and letting out secret information on Navy Seal tactics was not good. I credit the Navy Seals and the DoD. Even if a president doesn't do anything, there still is the rest of the government, and sometimes it does things. So, can credit Obama for not messing up a good effort across the Potomac River in that five sided funny farm.
US out of Iraq? Another post in this thread says that that was just the schedule anyway.
I can't claim that Obama never does anything. Still, I see a difference: It appears to me that he has the strategy I tried to describe, on a lot of headline issues, pass out a lot of platitudes but actually do something on only a small fraction of those. Otherwise do relatively little and, thus, don't get blamed for failures.
It's all on a continuum and not 0 or 1. It just looks to me like he talks the talk without walking the walk, or some such, more than other presidents since, say, FDR.
Maybe it's good pragmatic leadership, and if so most of the blame is on the mainstream media and the voters. US voters are awash in power, can shake DC just by pulling some levers behind a curtain, and with the Internet are awash in information. If Obama gets away with what the OP described, then the voters get what they deserve.
The U.S. was the only major country with cities and factories left standing, that weren't hit by wave after wave of bombers, so rebuilding your country necessitated buying U.S. goods.
The U.S. also suffered relatively fewer casualties than the other major players. The Nazi scientists didn't hurt either.
You are correct in that spending money on otherwise useless military items / people, is indeed useless[0], though those receiving military contracts argue the opposite, called "Military Keynesianism".
[0]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window#Th...
Some voters are (relatively speaking) "awash in power". But these tend to be while, male, older, and rural.
Except for the fantasy statements, Obama is careful about actually doing anything. He's good at making sure that whatever happens, he is not held to blame.
But he does actually do some things: He pushed 'clean, green, pure, pristine, 100% all-natural energy' and got a lot of campaign contributions. He has pushed ObamaCare but seems to want to 'push' its implementation out past the end of his second term (fine with me). So, he wants ObamaCare as fantasy but not as actual implementation. He does some little things in Syria, e.g., supposedly trained about 20 rebels in how to use some Russian missiles; so, he gets to claim to support 'fighting for freedom' or some such in Syria without actually doing much or much he could get blamed for. He asks the DoD to give him options for doing more in Syria, no doubt already knowing that all the options would be high on cost and low on effectiveness and that he won't approve any of the options; but just by making public that he asked for the options he will please some voters. After one of the high school shootings, he visited the site and said he was going to 'get the guns' or some such. Of course the Second Amendment and the NRA are still there, along with a lot of gun owners in rural and Western states. But the high school shootings are out of the headlines now. We could go on and on this way.
For the NSA leak issue, he sees right away that a lot of voters are concerned about the Fourth Amendment and so makes statements, like the one to Leno, that he is against 'over reaching government' or some such. But as the Salon article explained in detail, what Obama said to Leno was just nonsense. But such nonsense is about all Obama needs because only a tiny fraction of the voters will get as deep as the Salon article, and the MSM mostly won't go there. So, superficial nonsense is enough.
Maybe it's a smart strategy. There is a danger that once people catch on that mostly he's just passing out fantasy nonsense no one should take seriously, too many voters will get pissed. Maybe. Maybe not.
At least he's not actually doing much, and money he doesn't spend isn't wasted and projects he doesn't do aren't failures. We've got plenty of government and in total don't really need more. So in a major sense, Obama can get by without doing very much. Actually I wish that at times W had done less.
There is a risk if the country actually needs a president; in the meanwhile it's okay for him to spout fantasy nonsense on Leno and work on his golf game and jump shot.