Criticizing President Obama is difficult because the 'tea party' crowd has lower the bar so much when it comes to political discourse.

I'm one of those who suspects strongly that there is racism involved; that there is a 'lynch mob' mentality with the newest breed of right wingers and their attacks on the President.

It's impossible to then criticize the President without running the risk of being so tainted.

So I'm going to put it this way: I believe that President Obama has made some mistakes; maybe some bad mistakes.

The solution to America's problems though is NOT to return to hard-core 'Reaganomics', supply-side economics and laissez-faire capitalism.

I'd rather give President Obama a second chance over any of the Republican candidates in next year's elections.

As for Mr. Sullivan's comments:

The stimulus was already in place (as I understand it) before Bush left office. It's so pathetic that the Repubs attack Obama for it when they know that their man had already put it in place.

Sadly, President Obama and Congressman Frank, who co-piloted the effort to reform the financial sector, left too much Reagan-era shenanigans intact; such as 'derivative trading'. Untold damage to the economy has been done by this, and other examples of Reagan-Bush deregulations. Still, I'd rather give the President another chance to do better here.

There are problems with the attempts to reform our health care system: For one thing, President Obama's plan has major cuts to Medicare. We would have been better off with a plan that was more liberal and to have stood our ground to that effect.

By all means, let's give the President credit for rescinding "don't ask, don't tell" and removing the threat of Osama Bin Laden;-

and I say let's give him another chance to improve on everything else.

Let's not go backwards with the Neo-cons and the 'tea party'.

The best, and, imho, the most underrated initiative of the Obama administration is the Employee Free Choice Act, encouraging and giving protection to the formation of unions, to preserving collective bargaining; something that has been under attack from the Conservatives for the longest time.

The sad fact is though that President Obama has left a large loophole for the Republican establishment to get around it.

It's in his support of the heinous, 'Reaganomic'esque, CAFTA deal, which, like NAFTA before it, will allow wealthy corporations to export American jobs south of the border to exploit near slave labor conditions.

What's the point of having the freedom to form a union if the next day your jobs are exported with government support?

This is the best and worst of President Obama right there.

Add to that his sending an additional 34,000 to Afghanistan, prolonging the disaster President Bush got us into over there (I'm sorry, Mr. Sullivan, but we are not quite out of Iraq just yet).

In defense of President Obama though, he is only doing what all to many other Democratic leaderships have done: Bill Clinton, John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, many others, have spent their careers taking one step forward, while turning around and giving two steps back to the Neo-Cons.

The heinous, continuing specter of 'Reaganomics', which is the main reason why our country is faltering, even after over 20 years since Reagan, lingers on because the Democrats, for the most part, allowed it to continue unchecked and underchallenged; and in some cases, even actively supporting it's continuation.

We need the Democrats versus the Republicans, not 'Republican lite' vs. the Republicans.

And now is as good as time as any to change from this; to become proud of being liberal and progressive and in giving the American people a real choice from what the Repubs and the Neo-cons are trying to hand us.

And for whatever are his faults, President Obama is the only thing standing in the way of Michelle Bachmann.

Oy!

I have a couple of things Obama did that he doesn't brag about enough:

1. He got my partner's unemployment benefits extended. That put food on the table and paid for fuel to get to and from work.
2. He got COBRA premiums reduced from almost $700/month to under $300/month. That was an Obama idea.
3. He started the mortgage loan modification program. For 9 months I paid less than half my normal mortgage. That kept me in my house.

There are more but I read somewhere that listing three things gets attention and doesn't put the listener to sleep. I think these three things were crucial in saving my house from foreclosure.

I hate to say this, but President Obama really screwed up the other day:

He managed to pass the heinous, Reaganesque, 'free trade' bills with South Korea, Panama, and Columbia;-

the very same bills proposed by George Bush jr., and devised by Dick Cheney and Karl Rove.

And President Obama told the same lies in support this as they did originally when they came up with it.

Worse, all too many Democratic leaders went along with passing these bills.

Ms. Streisand, I've been good and haven't posted in awhile. I don't want you to think that I'm just out to be nudnik here (a troublemaker).

Who am I really to criticize the President, and former President Clinton, and Robert Reich, and Nancy Pelosi, etc?

Allow me then to refer to a woman like yourself, a source you can trust; a brilliant Jewish woman from New York and a brilliant scholar and liberal and progressive activist:

Naomi Klein, and her important book 'The Shock Doctrine'.

It deals with in large part with a right wing ideologue (Milton Friedman), under whose influence we not only have the current group of rabid right wing activists running the Republican party (Herman Cain and his insane '999' plan, and the other 'tea party' lunatics), but-

we have also completely screwed up our foreign trade policies; bad for America, bad for the rest of the world, and worst of all the most painful for those already suffering the most.

The sad fact is that all too many of the 'mainstream' Democratic leaders have allowed this to happen; letting hard core right wingers control international trade with disasterous effects.

This book should be required reading for all liberals and progressives.

All of them,-

including you, Ms. Streisand.

I hope you are still listening.

OMG,... Wait, first I want to say, I'm new and happy to be a part of this community. I am a craazzyy Babs fan, and have been since I was a young girl. I wish you and your family all the best Barbara. Regarding President O, I'm so glad somebody's speaking about this. The media, republicans, die-hart racists (who won't let it go) and others for what-ever reason, are just killing this guy. When he took out the Lybian dictator Gaddafi, this was a MAJOR accomplishment, however, it was just barely mentioned in the media. Had this been done by a republican president or Bush, it would've been on every channel, for days, non-stop until we choked on it. He took out the real target from the 911 bombings in NY, and they just won't stop assaulting his character. Is there any hope for re-election?

President Obama's State Of The Union address the other evening was superb; perhaps one of the best of all times. From whatever mistakes he may have made in his administration so far, he regrouped very well right there; and showed himself to be beyond the current Republican field.

Though politicians promise this and that, and have speechwriters who make them sound better then they are, President Obama's address was full of substance, and he clearly had a hand in it's crafting; and-

leading with a pledge to fix the discrepancies with our trade with China is a major plus; also in challenging the Republican establishment concerning tax breaks and the outsourcing of American jobs (one of the more heinous aspects of 'Reaganomics').

Oh, how I wish he had started his administration with it; but I think he's for real with what he pledge to us the other evening, and it's clearly in the best interest of the nation if he defeats the Republican candidate handily on these points next fall.

Notice that he also made a big point about expanded oil drilling, and downplayed the issues of health care reform and 'climate change'. There maybe some Liberals and progressives who feel at least somewhat disappointed with that; but I would like to ask them here and now (you too, Ms. Streisand) to consider that this is a wise move on the part of our President.

It is right for a President who is a Liberal Democrat to lead with a direct challenge to the lingering effects of 'Reagonomics', and those who want to impose more of it on us next fall. Overall, Democrats are overdue in making this their lead issue.

And btw, Nancy Pelosi is finally absolutely right when she said recently that she would do all that she could to keep Newt Gingrich out of the White House.

You know, keeping Newt Gingrich out of the White House would make up for a lot of mistakes amongst the Democrats.

I was reading Elizabeth Rosenthal's New York Times article here on 'global warming'.

There are questions amongst liberals and progressives about 'Obama's accomplishments' concerning the crusade against 'global warming', and the view that he backed off too much in the pursuit of such.

I believe this to be wrong. I believe President Obama deserves credit for backing off on the crusade against 'global warming'.

Where he really needed to stand up to the Republicans concerns foreign trade: He should have vetoed the current 'free trade' deals with Korea, Panama, and Columbia, and not voted for them.

This needs to be the number one issue amongst liberals and progressives, and in truth, 'global warming' should be a somewhat far second to it.

There are so many things wrong with this issue, it's hard to know where to start; but here goes (two examples, right here):

What's more important environmentally: That a hundred years or so from now, 'global warming' may melt the polar ice caps and harm the polar bears, or-

to take on the environmental disasters RIGHT NOW (not a hundred years from now) left behind by our 'free trade' deals, signed by Clinton without a word of complaint from Al Gore?

Because of NAFTA (devised by Reagan, signed by Clinton, supported by Gore), our border with Mexico is one long toxic waste dump.

Because of the 'free trade' deal Clinton fostered with the Chinese (and supported by the Republicans), China now has some of the most environmentally toxic areas on earth, RIGHT NOW; not a hundred years from now, and not on some polar ice cap, but in the middle of civilization.

And for number two: Ms. Streisand, Ms. Rosenthal, President Clinton took 25 million dollars from the Saudis, the number one exporters of 'fossil fuels', purported to be the leading cause of 'global warming', for his Presidential library.

Does this sound like a man sincere about fighting 'climate change'; that he really believes in it himself?

And then there is the Saudis' record on their attitudes towards Jews and women.

I'm sorry, ladies, but we liberals and progressives can do much better than this 'global warming' campaign,-

and some of the people who led us into it.

President Obama got that much right: Back up on it.

And Ms. Streisand, you should want your million dollars back!

Happy Days are here again!