President Obama, already one of the best Presidents ever.

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137. Welcome to DU, Oakenshield!

Glad you're here. I agree. President Obama for the most part makes me VERY proud. YEEEEEEESSSSSSS I KNOW I KNOW I KNOW...

He isn't perfect. Lots of stuff I would have done differently, but I would have been a white female president and different dynamics would be at play both for me and against me. I read somewhere - probably here - that what may be governing his mindset at least from the start was the painfully keen awareness and sensitivity toward who and what he was as he stepped into the Presidency: the First Black President. Or, let's go farther - the First Mixed-Race President. The First Non-Anglo President. I'm wondering if some of his longtime advisors recommended he not go too strong or push too hard or too far - because of what would be said and printed and blathered about him. Oooooh - another scaaaaaaaaaary black man - ooooooohhh - gnash teeth-gnash teeth, ring hands-ring-hands, clutch pearls-clutch pearls!!!!!! Or the moldy, moth-eaten stereotype of the angry black man that would just be laminated to him. Perhaps he felt the need to go a little easier to help disabuse (at least) some people of that mentality.

Granted, some people in America simply can't be helped in this regard. Some people in America, mostly from the angry, resentful, bitter, aging, white male demographic, just are beyond help, and beyond reach. They're going to have to carry that bitterness and anger with them to their graves. They're the ones who Pox Noise and limbaugh & clones try to appeal to, and to stir up. Some of them are beyond redemption. They're the ones with the stupid-ass three-cornered hats and the "don't tread on me" flags and the teabags, who vote for anti-New Dealers in the GOP who will try to erode all their benefits, while clinging desperately to their "Don't Touch My Medicare" protest signs. They're angry, fearful, and perfect targets for the psy-ops of the CONs. Thank goodness there are fewer of them than there are of us.

And I support him because, overall, I think he's better than anybody else who had a realistic chance of being elected. And on his worst day he's LIGHTYEARS better than anything the other party tries to force upon us. And I don't want to damage the brand. I want a DEMOCRAT in the position of picking the next SEVERAL Supreme Court Justices. I want a DEMOCRAT in charge of the nominations and appointments. I want a DEMOCRAT in the White House - to hold off the assholes who'd send him all kinds of revisionist and regressive legislation that he (or she) can stop it in its tracks with a veto rather than a rubber-stamper as the GOP hoped they'd have in mitt romney ("don't even bother your pretty little self reading the bills we'll send you. Just be able to hold a pen so you can sign what we put in front of you" - a quote from grover norquist last year, I believe).

What I think I'm most concerned about is how this ongoing debate here and elsewhere might be contributing to tearing us apart here on OUR side, and dividing us and our interests, thus clearing the way for one of the bad guys to get in.

I GUARANTEE YOU, if you don't like what's going on with one of our guys in the Oval Office - please just think back to when bush/cheney stole their way in there and the havoc and devastation and utter piracy and mass death which that led to. Imagine where we'd be now, with ANY of the issues people care about here, if romney had gotten in. Or rick perry. Or newt gingrich. Or looking ahead - ted cruz or rand paul or steve king or rick santorum. At his worst, President Obama is INFINITELY preferable to ANYTHING the bad guys run, in the past, in the now, AND in the future. And if people want to start being Medea Benjamins and send valentines to rand paul or somebody else because on one part of one issue they're fooled into thinking he "might" be on their side or "might" present a viable alternative, then just continue dancing on down Delusion Drive. But don't expect me to come with you.