10 things you should know about Obama’s plan (but probably don’t)

The plan:

1. Makes a $634 billion down payment on fixing health care that will go a long way toward paying for a more efficient, more affordable health care system that covers every single American.³
2. Reduces taxes for 95% of working Americans. And if your family makes less than $250,000, your taxes won’t go up one dime.⁴
3. Invests more than $100 billion in clean energy technology, creating millions of green jobs that can never be outsourced.⁵
4. Brings our troops home from Iraq on a firm timetable, finally bringing the war to a close—and freeing up almost ten billion dollars a month for domestic priorities.⁶
5. Reverses growing income inequality. The plan lets the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans expire and focuses on strengthening the middle class.⁷
6. Closes multi-billion-dollar tax loopholes for big oil companies. ⁸
7. Increases grants to help families pay for college—the largest increase ever.⁹
8. Halves the deficit by 2013. President Obama inherited a legacy of huge deficits and an economy in shambles, but his plan brings the deficit under control as soon as the economy begins to recover.¹⁰
9. Dramatically increases funding for the SEC and the CFTC—the agencies that police Wall Street.¹¹
10. Tells it straight. For years, budgets have used accounting tricks to hide the real costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush tax cuts, and too many other programs. Obama’s budget gets rid of the smokescreens and lays out what America’s priorities are, what they cost, and how we’re going to pay for them.¹²

This is the change we voted for. President Obama has done his part, now we need to do ours.

Can you pass this on to your personal network and then click here to let us know how many people you told, so we can track our impact together:

http://pol.moveon.org/budget10/?id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=1

Thanks for all you do.

–Daniel, Tanya, Peter, Justin and the rest of the team

P.S. Turns out there are way more than 10 amazing things in Obama’s budget and we couldn’t resist sharing just a few more.

1. Stops unnecessary government subsidies to big banks, health insurance companies and big agribusinesses.^13,14,15
2. Expands access to early childhood education and improves schools by investing in programs that make sure every child has a qualified, strong teacher.¹⁶
3. Negotiates for better prescription drug prices using Medicaid’s tremendous bargaining power.¹⁷
4. Expands access to family planning for low-income women.¹⁸
5. Caps the pollution that causes global warming, and makes polluters pay to support clean energy innovation.¹⁹

Sources:

1. “Climate of Change,” The New York Times, February 27, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/opinion/27krugman.html?em

2. “Obama Calls His Budget Sweeping, Needed Change,” The New York Times, February 28, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51201&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=2

3. “Obama Offers Broad Plan to Revamp Health Care,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51202&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=3

4. “Obama Expects Fight Over $3.55 Trillion Budget Plan,” Bloomberg News, February 28, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51203&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=4

5. “Energy Budget Is Sunlight After Eight Years of Darkness,” Center for American Progress, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51204&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=5

6. “The Economic Cost of War in Iraq and Afghanistan,” The New York Times, March 1, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/01/weekinreview/01glanz.html

7. “Tax Cuts,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/washington/27web-tax.html

8. “Energy Budget Is Sunlight After Eight Years of Darkness,” Center for American Progress, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51204&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=6

9. “Student Loans,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/washington/27web-edu.html

10. “Obama unveils budget blueprint,” CNN, February 26, 2009
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/26/budget/

11. “Obama budget would boost SEC, CFTC, FBI,” Reuters, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51205&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=7

12. “Obama’s budget,” Los Angeles Times, February 27, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51206&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=8

13. “Student Loans,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/washington/27web-edu.html

14. “Health Insurance Stocks Dive on Medicare Advantage Cuts,” The Wall Street Journal, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51207&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=9

15. “Agriculture,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/washington/27web-agri.html

16. “Investing Wisely in Our Children,” Center for American Progress, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51208&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=10

17. “Obama Offers Broad Plan to Revamp Health Care,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51202&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=11

18. “Obama Offers Broad Plan to Revamp Health Care,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51202&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=12

19. “Setting ‘Green’ Goals,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51209&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=13

President Obama will officially announce to day the withdrawl of American troops from Iraq by August 2010.  This is a little bit longer than his campaign pledge, but that’s fine by me.  Anything that gets our troops out of Iraq alive and safe is a plan that I support.

Speaking on the Senate floor on Friday before the president’s speech, Mr. McCain credited the opportunity to pull troops out to the surge of troops that President George W. Bush ordered two years ago with Mr. McCain’s support and he cautioned that Iraq remains fragile so Mr. Obama should stay flexible and listen to military commanders.

“With these factors in mind, I believe the president’s withdrawal plan is a reasonable one,” Mr. McCain said. “Given the gains in Iraq and the requirements to send additional troops to Afghanistan, together with the significant number of troops that will remain in Iraq and the president’s willingness to reassess based on conditions on the ground, I am cautiously optimistic that the plan as laid out by the president can lead to success.”

via Obama Plans to End Combat Mission in Iraq by August 2010 – NYTimes.com.

From President Obama’s speech:

But let there be no doubt: Iraq is not yet secure, and there will be difficult days ahead. Violence will continue to be a part of life in Iraq. Too many fundamental political questions about Iraq’s future remain unresolved. Too many Iraqis are still displaced or destitute. Declining oil revenues will put an added strain on a government that has had difficulty delivering basic services. Not all of Iraq’s neighbors are contributing to its security. Some are working at times to undermine it. And even as Iraq’s government is on a surer footing, it is not yet a full partner – politically and economically – in the region, or with the international community.

I believe that Obama’s engagement with Republicans on this issue and their cautious support is also a victory of a sort, and I am hopeful that he continues to engage with them even as we move the country in a more leftward direction.

But ultimately it comes down to the idea that people should be allowed to govern themselves, and the Iraqi people, while having a very long difficult road ahead of them, are fully capable of doing that.

This reminds me of when the USS Enterprise stopped in Pataya Beach in Thailand and we were admonished to not show the soles of our shoes to the Thais because it was considered to be gravely insulting:

From the AKI

On Sunday, al-Zaydi threw his first shoe at Bush as he yelled “This is a gift from the Iraqis. This is the farewell kiss, you dog,”

As he threw his second shoe, he said: “This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq.” As Bush avoided the shoes, al-Zaydi was quickly wrestled to the ground by security guards.

Al-Zaydi was being held on Monday by Iraqi police and was reportedly interrogated about whether he was paid to throw his shoes at Bush. He was also being tested for alcohol and drug use.

In the Arab world, throwing your shoes or exposing the soles of your shoes is one of the worst signs of disrespect.

In a separate incident in the Iraqi city of Najaf, protesters threw their shoes at an American patrol as it passed by.

Where once we were the shining city on the hill to so much of the world, now we are dogs who get shoes thrown at them.   Heckuva job, Georgie.

s John McCain so aptly said yesterday morning on Meet the Press when asked by Tom Brokaw if he and George W. Bush share a common philosophy:

Do we share a common philosophy of the Republican Party? Of course.

John McCain voted with George W. Bush’s philosophy “90 percent of the time.”   He said so himself.  Isn’t a maverick supposed to go his own way?

Do we need more commonality with the last 8 years?

Laurence A. Toenjes over at OpEdNews writes about why Barack Obama needs to go more forcefully against John McCain and his role in selling the Iraq War to the American People.

But this point could be made much stronger by forcibly pointing out that McCain did not just vote in favor of the war, he actively helped sell the war to the American public beginning in the fall of 2002. McCain was promoting the war when he should have been asking hard questions of President Bush and the intelligence community as to its necessity and wisdom.

At the behest of the Bush Administration, the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq (CLI) was set up in the fall of 2002 to “press the case in the United States and Europe for ejecting Hussein from power (Peter Slevin, Washington Post, November 4, 2002). Slevin pointed out that at that time public support for the Iraq War was on the decline. The Administration was frantic to reverse this trend.

John McCain and Joseph Lieberman were appointed the honorary co-chairs of the CLI, thus lending their weight to its promotional activities.

Americans do not like being lied to, especially about matters affecting decisions to send young men and women into battle. I think the Obama campaign is seriously ignoring opportunities to tie McCain directly to doing just that.

John McCain isn’t a maverick at all.  Instead he’s Bush’s puppet, controlled by the neo-conservatives who have been manipulating and running this beautiful country into the ground for the past seven years.  It’s amazing that you don’t hear Bush’ fake Texas drawl when McCain opens his mouth.

]]> http://palinban.com/mccains-role-leading-up-to-iraq-war-was-important/feed/ 0 http://palinban.com/hello-world/ http://palinban.com/hello-world/#comments Tue, 09 Sep 2008 05:56:14 +0000 paul http://palinban.com/blog/?p=1

The right-wing extremist governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, is a liar, a woman out of step with the values held by the vast majority of Americans.  This blog is dedicated to demonstrating her breathtaking hypocrisy and extreme, dangerous views.

Sarah Palin thinks that the Iraq War is a “task from god.” That’s an extreme view that we cannot continue to further in this country or world. We simply cannot afford to carry out this “task from god” anymore. The loss of life and treasure is too dear a cost.