Another Bullshit Attack on Obama that Offends Me Personally.

[Mike03]

So what if he claims he lived on $12,000 dollars a year during his years as an activist? The question I would ask, is when was that? Was that in the Seventies, Eighties, Nineties?

I lived on twelve grant or less for many years in the mid 80s, during the time I was in college and, more importantly (since my parents paid my tuition) just out of college. In fact, twelve grand was a lot of money to me in the years after I graduated. That paid for my rent, food, gas and clothing.

If anything, we should be praising Obama for his frugality and thrift during those difficult periods.

[Nitrogenica]

1. Yah, I remember in the 80's $1,000 per month was not too bad.

I made ends meet.

[Johnny__Motown]

14. What were your grades in Harvard Law School? What year did you graduate again?

Let's do math.. yes.. math


1000 am month is less than 250 a week but we can round up to 250 (more than 28 days in a month so more than 4 weeks in a month)


250 a week is 50 a day, if you work 5 days weeks


50 bucks a day for 8 hours a day is 6.25 an hour


SIX DOLLARS AND TWENTY FIVE CENTS AN HOUR FOR A HARVARD LAW SCHOOL GRADUATE

[Muttocracy]

19. what year is this about? between BS and JD or after JD?

I agree that isn't much money for a law school grad but someone replied to your same argument further down that he wasn't at Harvard yet.

[jab105]

24. Damn dude, read his book...he was a community activist BEFORE Harvard Law School...

a lot of people getting out of college make very little at first...the difference is that he chose to make little in order to help people...that's - ummm - a good thing...

[Nitrogenica]

29. Harvard Law School? What does that have to do with me?

You sound like you have the vapors or something.

[Cant trust em]

35. I know plenty of activists with private school degrees that make shit for money. nt

[Joe the Revelator]

36. He didn't graduate Harvard Law until the early 90's

Keep trying Einstein.

[Muttocracy]

2. Are they not believing him?

I lived on $9-15,000 when I was in grad school in the 1990s. It wasn't fun but it was doable.

[roguevalley]

34. I remember all the years my mom and dad, working like fools

made 3-6000 for a family of four kids. There wasn't a lot of money in those days and people weren't as stupefied with consumerisms and 'needs'. you could get by. I'm offended too. My family were maestros at getting by.

[Skidmore]

41. I did too and was raising 2 kids on my own.

No, it's not fun, and plenty of people have done it and survived.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

3. yes many people have had to live on less than $12,000

the other crowd are really desperate!

[SwampG8r]

54. many "real" people do anyways

in 1981 with 2 kids and an income of less than 10 k a year we started our upward mobility.
wife went to nursing school and we put money into pre paid college for our kids.
my wife went to school 4 different times until 1996 when she carried home a bsn degree and a ticket to the good life.

between 1981 and 1996 i doubt we, between us, made 20k in any year.
most years less than 12k.

we made our own bread and grew our own veggies
we rejected the materialistic bent the media has pushed upon us all.
it aint easy but it can be done

this post kind of has a backslap of elitism
almost a putdown of someone struggling to better themselves and their community

[VolcanoJen]

63. Homemade bread is one of life's sweetest pleasures.

So is having your own vegetable garden.

Materialism really blows, when you think about it. You lose touch with yourself, you know?

And to think, they call Obama supporters the "latte liberals."

[Rosa Luxemburg]

4. yes many people have had to live on less than $12,000

the other crowd are really desperate!

[Faygo Kid]

5. Don't know anything about this. Can you elaborate?

Haven't heard about this.

[MH1]

8. There was a thread earlier today.

Someone "posing a question". :eyes:

[depakid]

6. Why is that an attack?

I agree, so what?

Now, if it came out he made more and hid income or something, that would be an issue- but I don't see anyone alleging that...

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

that same poster has inferred that Obama is being supported by someone

some unseen person who perhaps "controls" Obama.

[depakid]

81. What I saw seemed like a valid question

Evenin the 80's it wasn't easy to live on $12,000 plus a car allowance. I suspect at some point, someone in the media will ask the same thing.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

26. that same poster has inferred that Obama is being supported by someone

some unseen person who perhaps "controls" Obama.

[SwampG8r]

56. oh is that what it is?

sounds like another case of Clinton Projection Syndrome

you know where you do something evil and then say your opponent is doing it to divert attention?

[VolcanoJen]

64. It's downright Rovian.

One of the tenets of Rovianism is: Find your opponent's greatest strength, and attack him where he's strongest. Think John Kerry:War Hero.

Expect a lot of this come the fall.

[MH1]

7. Kinda makes you wonder

about anyone who thinks it would be incredibly difficult to live on 12K/year in the 80's. Evidently that person has never known what's it's like to live on minimum wage. I remember being thrilled to make 5 bucks an hour at one of my early jobs.

[Mooney]

20. I was earning less than $5.00 an hour as recently as 1993.

Some people don't make a lot of money. I'm surprised that there would be HRC supporters who don't know this --- I thought she was supposed to be the savior of the downtrodden?

[roguevalley]

40. I remember making $1.93 an hour in a box factory in the seventies.

that was good money. live on that. I am more interested in bill and hill's tainted money. obama has released his taxes. they haven't. makes you wonder what they are hiding.

[Ysabel]

50. i worked like crazy for $1.15 per hour in the 1970s...

- hey i worked in a bottle factory later on in the seventies if i recall correctly there i made a whopping $1.60 or so that place was awful there was a thing called "the slicer" that lopped off workers hands every once in a while...

p.s. screw apostrophes...

[grantcart]

58. burgers were 29 cents and you could buy gas with a handful of quarters

[VolcanoJen]

65. Exactly!

I used to pull up to the gas station, get $5.00 worth, and I was good-to-go back and forth from work for a week.

My first job was as a Salad Bar Girl at Rax Roast Beef in the early 80's, and I made $2.16 an hour. I'll never forget that. The money wasn't bad. The job sucked, though. :-)

[grantcart]

75. now see you blew it. From your radio appearances I pictured you in your

early thirties lol

[VolcanoJen]

77. Oh, no worries

I get mistaken for being in my early thirties all the time. ;-) Sometimes, I even get asked for ID! And, it doesn't hurt to be petite.

I thank my beautiful mother for her superior DNA. She has skin like porcelain.

OK, enough about me. I can't believe I'm not 19 anymore! :cry:

[Ysabel]

71. you know i remember back when gas was 12 cents! (n/t)...

[Ysabel]

53. aye there were a number of times that year i only made $5.25 per hour...

- i was on commission so i usually made a few more an hour but was only guaranteed that much on slow days...

[POAS]

9. When I get my Soc. Sec. statement

every year and see what I made some years I ask myself "how did I survive on that"?

There are plenty of people living on less than that today in America and I ask myself how can they do it!

Obama and I and lots of others have at least that much in common.

[Johnny__Motown]

10. EDIT, I thought this was after he went to Law School, but still

I was making double that in the 80s with only a high school diploma (I went back to school in 89) and I only worked about 9 months a year



He pretty much donated 3.5 years of his life to help people who lost their jobs

[POAS]

12. OK I thought about it

what point is it you want to make?

[Johnny__Motown]

18. .

.

[POAS]

22. Your against people donating their time

to helping the poor?

Is that your point?

By the way, is your timing even correct? I see another poster points out that the period in question is when he was between college and law school.

So I ask again, what is your point. What is it you are for or against, or are you just looking for anything at all that you can throw against the wall to see if it sticks?

[cali]

13. Actually, that was between college and law school

he worked for a year in NY and then went and worked as a community organizer for several years before going to Harvard Law.

[JayFredMuggs]

21. Please read before you respond

Obama's date of graduation for Harvard Law?

Obama's marital status when he first worked in Chicago?

You really need to find out some facts, before you write up all these fact-less posts!

[EmilyAnne]

74. Which is awesome! I think some people thought you were saying that you didn't believe that he was

living off that. People are really touchy right now in case you haven't noticed.

[featherman]

11. I didn't read the original post but I had no idea it was an attack

Why on earth would anybody attack such a thing? I boggles the mind. Do people think community organizers are pulling down big bucks? Bizarre. What planet are these people from?
They certainly don't know much about the real world or the inner cities. Saul Alinsky must be rolling over in his grave that such an attack could be made by a purported Democrat against a community organizer.

[flor de jasmim]

15. My husband and I were out of grad school before we ever earned $12K - early 80s

In 1979 our total income was under $4K. How did we live? We bought only food, rarely ate out, and would spend as much time at the university as possible, taking advantage of free electricity and heating/air-conditioning.

So the answer: You do what you have to do to survive.

[Catherina]

17. And survive people do! n/t

[roguevalley]

42. I graduated from college and got a teaching job in Alaska where

the pay was top of the heap over other states. I made ... $7,815 a year. LIVE ON THAT, OP!

[proud2BlibKansan]

48. $7600 my first year teaching

Those were the days. LOL

[Muttocracy]

51. I think Mike admires frugality; the problem was some other post

not believing Obama could be that frugal I guess. I either never clicked on it or have them on ignore!

[Catherina]

16. It's a bullshit attack made by stupid people

I'm not sure what he said but I know that's around the time he started moonlighting at University of Chicago teaching Constitutional Law to supplement his income.

I think now we understand why HRC's campaign is in debt up to its ears and Obama's campaign finances are still healthy. He knows what those donations mean to the little people funding his race and isn't frivolously squandering it.

[JayFredMuggs]

23. Very true!

Very good point!

[POAS]

25. People just throwing shit

against the wall to see if something sticks!

[LiberalAndProud]

30. That is what we are seeing.

[Cant trust em]

37. The sad and sorry state of GD:P these days. NT

[BumRushDaShow]

27. Couple years out of college, made 14K in 1985.

Bought used car (a '78 Colt), paid student loans. Decent money then.

[DevonRex]

28. Lived on less with 2 babies...

After my husband and I got out of the military in 1985, we both went back to college. We had 2 babies, 1 born in 1983 and the other in the spring of 1985. We had GI benefits for college tuition and we had saved quite a bit of money while in the military. We worked part time for minimum wage at the college, went to school full time. We lived in married student housing and budgeted $50.00 per week for groceries and stuck to it. We didn't buy clothes for ourselves. Our children's clothes were from discount stores or bought by relatives as presents, or hand-me-downs from friends and relatives. We had paid our 1 car off while still in the army and drove very little. We did not have health insurance but we had the school's health insurance plan for our kids.

Let me tell you, $12,000 a year would have been luxury for us.

I kind of feel sorry for anyone who has not had to go through times like that. We learned how strong we could be. We learned how creative we could be.

I also feel sorry for anyone who could make insinuations about the character of people who sacrifice much in order to make the lives of other people better, or even just to make hte lives of their own children better like my husband and I did.
Jennifer

[SwampG8r]

57. yes

i believe our early struggles are what have given us the strength and confidence to face anything now.

[DevonRex]

59. Amazing, isn't it?

It puts a completely different perspective on life. If we're not tested, we don't know how we'd do in a crisis.

[me b zola]

61. Wonderful post and great points that I agree with

It's a pleasure to welcome you to DU. :toast:

[DevonRex]

80. Thank you for the welcome. :)

[apocalypsehow]

31. I know I lived on about $12,000 a year during my first four years of college. My parents

paid most of my tuition (I had a partial scholarship that covered some of it), but I supported myself with a night-stocking job as far as living expenses went, since I was a ways from home and only lived on campus my freshman year.

I know I probably never cleared more than $8,000-$12,000 any given year, if that, and didn't live too bad, actually.

It's just another HRC booster smear tactic, IMO. They are quite good at it.

[RazBerryBeret]

32. heck yeah....

I am one year younger than Obama. I graduated from Ohio State University and my first "real job" was in a local Advertising Agency. and I made $12,000 a year...and I was happy as shit....

[Alexander]

33. The people attacking him on this are just idiots trying to keep the "drug dealer" BS afloat.

They could not care less what the truth is. They just want people to associate Obama with drugs in the hope that it will somehow sink his candidacy.

[nichomachus]

39. If that's true, they're idiots

One on hand, they're telling us that he has been groomed since college (supposedly by some sinister forces) to run for president. Then, they want us to believe that the way he did that was to sell drugs.

That's a lot like the numbskulls who claim that illegal immigrants are (a) just freeloaders who want everything given them for nothing and (b) are stealing our jobs.

[nichomachus]

38. This shit is what's killing Hillary

I started out this campaign unattached to any candidate, but willing to listen to them all. I like Dennis, but we know what happened to him.

Following that, I was leaning toward Hillary because I knew about her, admired her for some of her positions, and I truly didn't know much about Obama.

As time has gone by, however, while still uncommitted, I'm drifting further and further away from Hillary -- and crap like this is the reason why. It's not only nasty, but distracting, and total bullshit -- like the stuff about his minister.

I know a few die-hard Hillary supporters in my neighborhood, and in the last few months, I haven't heard one thing from them that's positive about Hillary. All they've done is give me whisper-smears against Obama.

This utter crap about how much money he made in whatever year is just garbage -- and it's making Hillary look very very bad. If this is all she has to win the nomination, she's not a very good candidate.

If the Hillary folks would give me some reasons to vote for Hillary, instead of trying to give me reasons to vote against Obama, I'd be very willing to listen. Otherwise, STFU. You're only damaging your candidate.

(Of course, there's also the possibility that people spreading this nonsense are really Republican trolls, trying to sow dissent and make Hillary look bad. If that's the case, they're really succeeding and Hillary's stable of top-dollar advisers better do what they can to distance her from the effort.)

[LiberalAndProud]

44. They haven't helped their candidate today.

[proud2BlibKansan]

49. When have they ever helped their candidate?

[jwirr]

43. I am living on $7884 right now - I would have been rich on that back then. nt

[VolcanoJen]

45. Hear, hear!!!!!

Hey... pssst... check your PM. :-)

[pompano]

46. In the 80's....

$1000.00 per month was about $3.00 per hr. above minimum wage.

The Republicans, someone in the Raygun Admin. said anyone that couldn't live on that wage, and raise a family, didn't know how to manage their money.

No...No, I'm not kidding.

[hfojvt]

47. Is that supposed to be impossible?

My income last year was $11,035. Of course that does not include the $2700 I spent on health insurance or the $600 or so taken for my retirement. I lived on, and saved money, about $6,500 a year in 1988-90 when I went to graduate.

[cliffordu]

52. I live on under $12,000 a year now.

Social Security and my wife cleans houses part time.

[myrna minx]

55. I recently found a box that had some old wage stubs form 1990-1992.

I made about 100-125/week for three years. I also remember having to maintain a dry toothed grin when I received a, I kid you not, seven cent raise. It brought back the memories of living off of Raman, beans and rice and tomato soup that I would gussie up with some dried oregano. It also reminded me of the psycho roommate that I has to put up with out of dire necessity. I remember when I started making 6 an hour I felt like a wealthy woman because I could pay my rent, eat and go out to see the occasional band that I liked. I was also able to save up for a new security deposit to escape the aforementioned psyco roommate. Many people had to live off of that pay and still do. The insinuation that becasue you're poor, that you must be "shifty" as well is sickening.

[VolcanoJen]

67. Memories!!

I swear, for a few years I lived on Ramen, plain white rice with butter, melba toast, and my rare splurge.... gouda cheese!!

KUDOS to the OP for this uplifting and enlightening thread. It's fascinating to read. It's cheering me up. :-)

[myrna minx]

73. I really appreciate this thread too.

It's interesting to read everyone's personal experiences, but it's painful to know just how many of us are trying to get by on that salary today!

I still recoil at the thought of ramen. :scared: I think I received a lifetime worth of sodium during those lean years.

edit: corrected the same typo. :silly:

[Swamp Rat]

60. "we should be praising Obama for his frugality"

Yes indeed!!! :applause:

[VolcanoJen]

62. My first job out of school in the mid-80's, I made $5 an hour.

And seriously, I thought that was pretty good money. I worked as a receptionist at an office, and thought I was so fancy. :-)

You really could live on $12K in the eighties, when Barack was a community activist. In his book "Dreams From My Father," he talks about his frugality, his living conditions, his beat-up old junker of a car that he was always freezing in because the windows were leaky and the heat never worked.

I think it's something we should all admire about him. It's such a shame, how material this country has become. It's really no wonder that we seem to have been "dumbed down" by money and possessions, that's the whole reason shows like "American Idol" are even watched by anybody at all.

Depressing, that some not-rich-guy is being ridiculed for putting community above consumerism, huh?

[ampad]

66. Stupid bullshit attacks

They should be asking why their candidate is stiffing working folks out of their hard earned money. They should be asking why their candidate cannot seem to manage her money; they should be worried about their candidate. What we have instead is people projecting their well known fears about their candidates money management onto Obama. No matter how much they try to push this bullshit story that Obama was getting money from other means or that he is lying about how much he made it doesn't' erase the fact that their candidate owes working people money. In this economy that we have today with people trying to make ends meet she should be fucking ashamed of herself. I guess it hurts knowing you donated money to a deadbeat. They now find the need to project that onto to someone who knows how to handle money, but hey that it a diehard Hillary supporter for ya.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

68. It's about what I was living on in the 80s. nt

[JerseygirlCT]

69. Yup. My first job out of college - one that was VERY hard to

find, mind you - paid $9700 a year. Add to that a one hour each way commute. On a stinky bus, because on $9700 you're not going to afford the train, lol. Take out NYC and NJ taxes... I was damn lucky to be able to live with my parents!

$12,000 then would have seemed like a very cool salary, indeed.

[DrFunkenstein]

70. I Lived on My $11,000 Stipend For Grad School Until 2001

Just enough for beer and groceries. In that order.

[Life Long Dem]

72. ssshhhh....sounds like Hillbots are on a fishing expedition.

Throw something out there and see what they come up with.

[VolcanoJen]

76. Another KICK for the most enlightening, uplifting, educational thread of the day.

:dem:

[UALRBSofL]

78. You need to grow think skin, get over it

and move on. Who knows if he lived on $12,000 a year, the way he changes his stories like he changes his underwear.

[tabasco]

79. That's all the bottom feeding cowards have: lies, innuendos, smears.

They can't build up Hillary so they have to continue the filthy "kitchen sink" scum campaign.