Obama Kicks GOP Ass

Here’s why we voted for Barack Obama. Above is a clip of Obama discussing health care at the GOP House Issues Conference. Obama took on and demolished every GOP argument. Whether its Kerry debating Bush, Obama debating McCain, or Obama debating the GOP House delegation, Republican views just cannot stand up to fact-based rational arguments.

Barack Obama vs. 140 Republicans just isn’t a fair fight. The Republicans didn’t stand a chance.

Obama repeatedly took loaded questions packed with all the usual Republican talking points and turned them against them.

The full transcript is available here. It was shown on C-SPAN and MSNBC is also replaying the event in prime time tonight. Marc Ambinder described the event:

Accepting the invitation to speak at the House GOP retreat may turn out to be the smartest decision the White House has made in months. Debating a law professor is kind of foolish: the Republican House Caucus has managed to turn Obama’s weakness — his penchant for nuance — into a strength. Plenty of Republicans asked good and probing questions, but Mike Pence, among others, found their arguments simply demolished by the president. (By the way: can we stop with the Obama needs a teleprompter jokes?)

More than the State of the Union — or on top of the State of the Union — this may be a pivotal moment for the future of the presidential agenda on Capitol Hill. (Democrats are loving this. Chris Hayes, The Nation‘s Washington bureau chief, tweeted that he hadn’t liked Obama more since the inauguration.)

During the presidential campaign, it was John McCain who proposed a form of the British Prime Ministers’ questions for the president. It was derided as a gimmick. This is no gimmick. I have not seen a better and perhaps more productive political discussion in this country in…a long time. 90 minutes worth!

Maybe since Al Gore debated Ross Perot on NAFTA. Republicans may have wished they had spoken to John McCain about what happened to him in the presidential debates before they decided to broadcast this session. The president looked genuinely engaged, willing to discuss things. Democrats believe that he tossed away the GOP talking points and lack of real plans into a bludgeon against them. “The whole question was structured by a talking point,” he told Jeb Hensarling. Obama took the blame for not living up to some of his promises on transparency in health care negotiations. He displayed a familiarity with Republican proposals that seemed to astonish those who asked questions of him. And at the end, Republicans rushed up to him, pens and photo cameras in hands, wanting autographs and pictures.

Mused one mid-level White House official: “This really is the best thing we’ve done in a long, long time”

Massachusetts was an eternity ago. The momentum is now in Obama’s direction as he gives the GOP the choice of joining in or walking away, with their decision being televised.

More video:

Tea Party Members Upset About Deficit And Unemployment Are Blaming The Wrong Party

Those in the Tea Party Movement claim to oppose Barack Obama and the Democrats out of an opposition to the rising deficit. If they were really consistent in their views they would be backing the Democrats over the Republicans who are actually responsible for the deficit. Here’s a chart to make this simple for them:


Another comparison of spending under recent presidents was posted here.

They fall for Republican claims that Obama is responsible for record deficits due to the stimulus spending but most of the deficit came from George Bush, not Obama’s stimulus plan. Here is a pie chart breaking this down:

We are also seeing benefits from the stimulus spending, such as the news today that the GNP rose by 5.7 percent–the highest increase since 2003. While this might be exaggerated by a bounce from companies replacing inventory, this remains a sign of greater confidence in the economy. Christina Romer, chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers explained:

This inventory bounce, though likely to be transitory, is a normal part of healthy recoveries.  As firms’ confidence in the future increases, their desire to run down inventories wanes.  This change in behavior is often a powerful force for growth early in a recovery.  Other components of GDP also rose strongly:   business investment in equipment and software rose at an annual rate of 13 percent and residential investment rose at a 6 percent rate.  And consumer spending rose at a rate of 2 percent.  This broad-based rise in GDP was surely fueled in part by the tax cuts and investment spending in the Recovery Act and other rescue actions, but some appears to be the result of private sector demand returning.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson believes that if not for the stimulus unemployment could have hit 25 percent. Those who are angry about lack of jobs and the size of the deficit are definitely channeling their rage against the wrong source.

Tea Party Fundraising Email Shows Obama As Stereotypical African-American Pimp

Chris Matthews may or may not be thinking about whether Barack Obama is black this hour but there is one group packed with people who are constantly thinking about this–the tea-baggers. TPM Muckracker found the picture below in one of their emails:

A Tea Party group whose founder already has been in hot water for holding a sign that referred to taxpayers as “niggars” has doubled down on racist appeals.

TeaParty.org, a Houston-based group founded by Dale Robertson, yesterday sent an email fund-raising solicitation, obtained by TPMmuckraker, headlined “Obama Pimping Obama-Care, One Last Time!”

The photograph below — showing the president as a stereotypical African-American pimp, sporting a pencil-thin mustache and a zebra-striped, fur-brimmed fedora, complete with a feather — illustrated the theme:

Sure we believe the denials that the tea-baggers are motivated largely by racism.