Obama one point below Eisenhower in last pre-election Gallup poll

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Last Gallup approval before election, outgoing two-termers:
Dwight Eisenhower 58%
Ronald Reagan 51%
Bill Clinton 57%
George W Bush 25%
Barack Obama 57%

http://www.gallup.com/poll/113980/gallup-daily-obama-job-approval.aspx

Granted, it's a weak correlation to the eventual election - Nixon and Gore both lost their elections. But it's still better to be a Democrat following Obama than a Republican following Bush II.

[Anthony '58]

Too bad he can't run for a third term then! LOL

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(10-22-2016, 02:55 PM)Anthony 58 Wrote: Too bad he can't run for a third term then! LOL

Can't wait for your generation to be gone.

[Mikebert]

I wonder sometimes how much of a failure  Obama might feel as he leaves office.  Obama was at ground zero when the inequality bombs fell.  I read about it (after the fact) but he was there. As a community organizer he had zero power.  So he sought power. He became fucking president. And yet, he accomplished near bupkiss.  He couldn't know.  When he started out he embarked on a list of objectives that were remarkably similar to my own "stretch goals" and he accomplished most of them--rating an "A" grade. Yet he was a failure, because he did not do what needed to be done, but not for lack of effort or skill--but because of  the times.  In my opinion, no political figure could have accomplished was needed during the last term--not even Lincoln or Washington.

Roy is gone, none still live who remember the the origins of the last 4T.  We are truly in the Xenakis zone.

[pbrower2a]

Well, America is a better place because of him. He practically got re-elected on the slogan "General Motors is Alive and Osama bin Laden is Dead"... a 44th (one-term) and a 45th Presidency (also one term) by someone else might have General Motors dead and Osama bin Laden taunting us to this day. We might have an economic mess analogous to the Great Depression, perhaps having even less progress from it than Americans knew in the late 1930s. We could have cities looking as if they were bombed out even if there had been no war.

The President is not responsible for the times. Maybe we are doomed to weak leadership in a late 3T (just think of the awful governance of George III; the forgettable trio of Pierce, Fillmore and Buchanan before the Civil War; the two snoozers Harding and Coolidge followed by clueless Hoover; and of course the Dubya that we all love and admire -- irony intended). People want inattentive leadership that sees nothing wrong in corrupt booms, offer no significant reforms, and acquiesce to the idea that nothing is nobler than profit and those who grab it.

Barack Obama got to put an end to the most dangerous economic meltdown since the Great Depression, a meltdown effectively as severe as the one that began with the Great Stock Market Crash of 1929:




If you don't see a case for a Nobel Prize in economics, then you have some explaining to do.

Barack Obama wanted to be the new FDR, reshaping American institutions profoundly in the wake of obvious necessity. He got to rescue the financial system first, as FDR also had to do.... but the difference is that FDR got his way after 1934 because Republicans who had committed America to policies reminiscent of the Gilded Age were largely disgraced -- reduced to trying to survive at a lower level, and unable to buy the political system. In the 2010 election, the plutocrats whom President Obama and Democratic majorities in both Houses of Congress had rescued turned on their rescuers and funded the Tea Party "revolution". The plutocrats of our time are basically Gilded-Age plutocrats with none of the pioneering instincts or humility of Gilded plutocrats. America's economic elites reek of pathological narcissism and an ethos that holds that no human suffering is excessive so long as it turns, enforces, or indulges a profit.

Carly Simon's You're So Vain was clearly not written about Donald Trump -- but oh, does it fit.

I remember seeing the book The Culture of Narcissism that suggested that narcissism was becoming a part of the national character. That may have been so in the 1980s, but Corporate America was successful in repressing it among the proles. Boomers not in the elite are as humble as any generation now. Boomers in the economic elite could add to it all their lives with impunity

The economic elites entrenched their power seemingly beyond challenge for the indefinite future in 2010 by ensuring that their obedient stooges would control the House of Representatives and most state legislatures while winning several Governorships. A political order that elevates the likes of Paul LePage, Scott Walker, and Rick Scott is sick. Through gerrymandering, the Master Class of America has chosen the electorates for the US House of Representatives, conceding about 35% of the House seats and guaranteeing themselves a reliable majority. Except that the entrenched winners in the respective systems were or are Communists, that is how things worked for the Volkskammer in East Germany, and that's how the National People's Congress operates in China.

We no longer have a representative democracy. We have drifted into having a legislative system that in theory represents people but in fact represents economic interests capable of funding campaigns and the lobbyists who pull the strings on the majority of legislators. To paraphrase the Michigan state motto, "If you seek a pure plutocracy, look about you".

Maybe the elites didn't quite get to achieve their dream of an America in which Americans achieve German efficiency on Indian wages.... but if we elect Donald Trump, we will get to that plutocrat's paradise and worker's Hell that a few very rich people dream of.

The final question of how good a President Barack Obama is is who succeeds him. If Donald Trump should succeed him, then he suddenly becomes one of the worst Presidents ever. At the least, James Buchanan had Abraham Lincoln following him. But if Hillary Clinton succeeds him he is clearly above average.

[Anthony '58]

Between where stock prices have gone - up - and where gas prices and unemployment have gone - down, with unemployment being lower in the last 13 consecutive months than it was in every single month of Ronald Reagan's Presidency, one could make the case for Obama being one of the great "boom" - in the economic sense, not the generational sense (!) - Presidents of all time.

Yet the right-wing media has largely succeeded in painting this picture of the economy being "terrible" under this President - the worst it has been since the Depression in fact.

[pbrower2a]

(10-23-2016, 02:46 PM)Anthony Wrote: Between where stock prices have gone - up - and where gas prices and unemployment have gone - down, with unemployment being lower in the last 13 consecutive months than it was in every single month of Ronald Reagan's Presidency, one could make the case for Obama being one of the great "boom" - in the economic sense, not the generational sense (!) - Presidents of all time.

Yet the right-wing media has largely succeeded in painting this picture of the economy being "terrible" under this President - the worst it has been since the Depression in fact.

But the economic elites want falling wages, falling taxes, and relaxed regulation of the environment and workplace safety. Because President Obama brings none of that he is horrible to those economic elitists.

[Odin]

(10-23-2016, 02:46 PM)Anthony Wrote: Between where stock prices have gone - up - and where gas prices and unemployment have gone - down, with unemployment being lower in the last 13 consecutive months than it was in every single month of Ronald Reagan's Presidency, one could make the case for Obama being one of the great "boom" - in the economic sense, not the generational sense (!) - Presidents of all time.

Yet the right-wing media has largely succeeded in painting this picture of the economy being "terrible" under this President - the worst it has been since the Depression in fact.

This is because the objective numbers hide more nuanced issues and clash with people's subjective experience. Technological unemployment is making a lot of blue collar manufacturing jobs redundant and an increasing number of people lacking the intelligence or income to go to college and being forced into low pay service industry jobs. Unless you live in the great mega-cities fueled by the Finance, Medical, or Tech industries or in boom towns like Fargo many people's job prospects are increasingly bleak. A lot of the support for Trump comes from small towns in the Lower Midwest and the Rust Belt, where the main employers have closed up and left and people have lost all hope, using opiates, legal and illegal, to numb the pain they live in.

[pbrower2a]

(10-22-2016, 08:10 PM)Here I go with one of my favorite posts. Do you want to compare Eisenhower and Obama? Wrote: When all is said and done, I think that the Obama and Eisenhower Presidencies are going to look like good analogues because the two Presidents are similar in temperament and to their position in the generational order. Both Presidents are chilly rationalists. Both respect legal precedents more than they trust legislation and the transitory will of the people in states. Both had practically scandal-free administrations. Both started with a troublesome war that both found their way out of. Neither did much to 'grow' the strength of their Parties in either House of Congress. In the 2008 election, Barack Obama won only one state that Eisenhower lost in either 1952 or 1956 (North Carolina); in 2012 he did not win any state that Dwight Eisenhower ever lost. This is amazing in view of the partisan identities of the two Presidents.

It may be premature, but I expect historians to hold Eisenhower and Obama similar in quality.

Barack Obama is not a military man... but I can imagine what sort he would be as a senior officer -- the sort who has a spit-and-polish culture that relaxes only as needed under fire. The best way to deal with an army under the command of such a general is to get out of the tanks and fox-holes and put both arms up high. He would surely insist that terms of the Geneva Convention be followed to the letter.

Despite the great differences in curricula vitae, Eisenhower and Obama seem to have something very much in common: both are members of Reactive generations. 60-ish Reactives (George Washington, John Adams, Grover Cleveland, Harry Truman, and Dwight Eisenhower) may be the best sorts of leaders that Reactive leaders can be: cautious, mellow, respectful of precedent, and more trusting in legality than in the contemporary passion. Even if Barack Obama is one of the youngest Presidents ever elected and won't reach or surpass 60 as President (barring an amendment to undo the 22nd Amendment) he seems to act like someone in his sixties.

(The worst Reactive leaders are amoral, angry, cynical, bigoted leaders with an agenda of seeking revenge against real and imagined personal enemies -- like Adolf Hitler and Mao Zedong, puppets of tyrannical leaders such as Vidkun Quisling and Mátyás Rákosi, and such brutal functionaries of tyrants as Heinrich Himmler, Arthur Seyss-Inquart, Andrei Vishinsky and  Lavrenti Beria). When all is said and done, I think that the Obama and Eisenhower Presidencies will themselves look like good analogues reflecting their chilly rationalism, rigid adherence to legal precedent, cozy relationships with the intelligence services, and starting with a troublesome war that both found their way out of. Neither did much to 'grow' the strength of their Parties in either House of Congress.

The definitive moderate Republican may have been Dwight Eisenhower, and I have heard plenty of Democrats praise the Eisenhower Presidency. He went along with Supreme Court rulings that outlawed segregationist practices, stayed clear of the McCarthy bandwagon, and let McCarthy implode.





gray -- did not vote in 1952 or 1956
white -- Eisenhower twice, Obama twice
deep blue -- Republican all four elections
light blue -- Republican all but 2008 (I assume that greater Omaha went for Ike twice)
light green -- Eisenhower once, Stevenson once, Obama never
dark green -- Stevenson twice, Obama never
pink -- Stevenson twice, Obama once

No state voted Democratic all four times, so no state is in deep red.

(This site uses the very old red for Democrats and blue for Republicans... I do not make waves about that in that website).

To be sure, one would expect any winning President to win almost entirely states that FDR won in 1936 (all then voting except Vermont and Maine), that Nixon won in 1972 (all but Massachusetts), or Reagan won in 1980 (all but Minnesota).  But the overlay between Obama and Eisenhower fits far better includes all four such states that FDR, Nixon, and Reagan won in nearly-complete wins of the entire USA. As another coincidence, Eisenhower was the first Republican to win Virginia since 1928 (24 years) and Obama was the first Democrat to win the Old Dominion since 1964 (44 years) -- and both won the state twice.

...I see Obama winning just about everything that Ike won except those parts of America in which ranching is the predominant agriculture , basically Texas, Arizona, and a bunch of states with few electoral votes. I'm guessing that ranchers typically have stormy relationships with the federal government especially if it is rather liberal.

[Cynic Hero '86]

I don't see how those polls can be correct; they must be asking only long-time democrats. The administration as well as congress and the establishment in general have record low approval ratings that have persisted for the last couple of years. As for the supposed popularity of Obama's policies in his second term in particular Obamacare and his foreign policy, one can simply visit any political forum or comments thread on news articles such as yahoo or on foreign policy sites such as nationalinterest and the vast majority of the posters are overwhelmingly opposed to the current policies. Almost anytime Obamacare is mentioned the majority demand its repeal, the majority of the posters are particularly adamant against the current foreign policy and how it can lead to war with Russia or china or Both. Numerous posters openly point how Hillary supports radical free trade and globalism and support trumps moniker of "Crooked Hillary" the majority of posters state their support for trump and call for Hillary to be locked up. On Facebook and Twitter the majority of trumps statements in the debates received a large amount of likes, the majority of Hillary's received a large amount of frowns on the official debates threads.

[Bob Butler 54]

(10-25-2016, 02:58 PM)Cynic Hero Wrote: I don't see how those polls can be correct; they must be asking only long-time democrats. The administration as well as congress and the establishment in general have record low approval ratings that have persisted for the last couple of years. As for the supposed popularity of Obama's policies in his second term in particular Obamacare and his foreign policy, one can simply visit any political forum or comments thread on news articles such as yahoo or on foreign policy sites such as nationalinterest and the vast majority of the posters are overwhelmingly opposed to the current policies. Almost anytime Obamacare is mentioned the majority demand its repeal, the majority of the posters are particularly adamant against the current foreign policy and how it can lead to war with Russia or china or Both. Numerous posters openly point how Hillary supports radical free trade and globalism and support trumps moniker of "Crooked Hillary" the majority of posters state their support for trump and call for Hillary to be locked up. On Facebook and Twitter the majority of trumps statements in the debates received a large amount of likes, the majority of Hillary's received a large amount of frowns on the official debates threads.

There are many sources of news and ways of exchanging opinions.  For some reason, political talk radio has long been a dwelling place for conservatives, while during the recent Clinton - Trump campaign late night TV has been going wild attacking Trump.  There are internet forums where no matter what your beliefs are, you can find a bunch of folk that will tell you what you want to hear.  Folks with similar world views and values will gather together, build a reality that reinforces what they want to believe, and create enough noise to drown out the rest of the world.

I'm not saying the Republicans or Trump supporters are unique in their ability to live in a political cocoon.  I've been having fun watching Eric's clips from the late night TV programs, but if that's his only source of news, his cocoon is as biased and one sided as yours seems to be.

The effect of both sides confidently predicting victory was common on the old forum too.  People with different belief systems gather information from different sources and confidently predict that their own way of looking at things will triumph.  It happens every four years.

I haven't been chasing individual polls or building my own maps like others here have, but lately I've been following Nate Silver's efforts at 538.  As far as I can tell he's more concerned with his reputation as a statistical guru than he is a partisan advocating a particular candidate or partisan perspective.  He looks at every source he can get and uses the best statistical techniques rather than seeking out the method of polling that tells him what he wants to hear.  Too many of the individual polls are as partisan as the people who sponsor them.

But if you can't understand why people don't like Trump's personality and values, let alone his proposed policies, you've been spending way too much time in your cocoon.

[Bob Butler 54]

(10-25-2016, 06:28 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: He's a freakin' cocoon builder. Specifically, the so called "Restorationism" cocoon. But I somewhat resent that term. I consider myself a bit of a Restorationist, but I can damn well tell anyone who'll listen - Trump ain't it! Of course, my own Restorationism draws a bit from Hart's "Restoration of the Republic" aka PhD thesis.

I have my own streak of restorationism.  In my youth, when America saw a problem, there was generally a massive commitment to solving it.  To some degree this was an outgrowth of FDR's twin crises.  We faced problems that we just couldn't ignore and walk away from.  From there, if big government solved those problems, why shouldn't big government solve the smaller and simpler problems we confronted in the 1950s and 1960s?  America was great then, but full of hubris.  Not even the United States had enough resources and drive to do everything that needed to be done all at once.

But these days, a lot of folks are so much in love with tax breaks that they pretend problems don't exist, or pretend attempts to solve problems always make things worse.  I don't want to go back to the tax and spend without question or pause of the JFK and LBJ era,  The population of the US is not ready today to bear any burden, pay any price, support any friend, etc...   Still, a few healthy steps in that direction seem necessary.

I bet a lot of us can look into the past, find values no longer valued that ought to be, and advocate a return to some aspect of yesterday.

But ultimately I'm a Neo Whig.  We are facing new problems.  Technology is changing the jobs mix, and thus the entire economy.  Energy is getting limited and expensive.  The world is getting crowded and warmer.  I won't say there aren't values that can be found in the past that are worth restoring and expanding, but we've got brand new problems to solve too.  Eyes forward.  Not all answers will be in the past.

But I definitely disagree with Cynic's desire to restore Agricultural Age militaristic values.

[pbrower2a]

(10-25-2016, 02:58 PM)Cynic Hero Wrote: I don't see how those polls can be correct; they must be asking only long-time democrats. The administration as well as congress and the establishment in general have record low approval ratings that have persisted for the last couple of years. As for the supposed popularity of Obama's policies in his second term in particular Obamacare and his foreign policy, one can simply visit any political forum or comments thread on news articles such as yahoo or on foreign policy sites such as nationalinterest and the vast majority of the posters are overwhelmingly opposed to the current policies. Almost anytime Obamacare is mentioned the majority demand its repeal, the majority of the posters are particularly adamant against the current foreign policy and how it can lead to war with Russia or china or Both. Numerous posters openly point how Hillary supports radical free trade and globalism and support trumps moniker of "Crooked Hillary" the majority of posters state their support for trump and call for Hillary to be locked up. On Facebook and Twitter the majority of trumps statements in the debates received a large amount of likes, the majority of Hillary's received a large amount of frowns on the official debates threads.

These are mostly the same pollsters of 2012, and those pollsters generally got the election right. What matters is that they can establish which states will be close and which will not.  They are using much the same methodology then as now, so if the polls are worng this year, then something fundamental has changed in the validity of polling.

Do you really want to deny the validity of the laws of statistics? Do you really believe that the polls are being fabricated in some basement in East Omaha, Nebraska?

I look at the polls, and I see polls largely confirming what I believe true -- that Donald Trump is an unusually-awful nominee for President, and that he is running an inept campaign.

[Eric the Green]

(10-25-2016, 02:58 PM)Cynic Hero Wrote: I don't see how those polls can be correct; they must be asking only long-time democrats. The administration as well as congress and the establishment in general have record low approval ratings that have persisted for the last couple of years. As for the supposed popularity of Obama's policies in his second term in particular Obamacare and his foreign policy, one can simply visit any political forum or comments thread on news articles such as yahoo or on foreign policy sites such as nationalinterest and the vast majority of the posters are overwhelmingly opposed to the current policies. Almost anytime Obamacare is mentioned the majority demand its repeal, the majority of the posters are particularly adamant against the current foreign policy and how it can lead to war with Russia or china or Both. Numerous posters openly point how Hillary supports radical free trade and globalism and support trumps moniker of "Crooked Hillary" the majority of posters state their support for trump and call for Hillary to be locked up. On Facebook and Twitter the majority of trumps statements in the debates received a large amount of likes, the majority of Hillary's received a large amount of frowns on the official debates threads.

With that logic, you could propose that the country's views are reflected by the majority of posters here!