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Lumifer comments on Open Thread, January 11-17, 2016 - Less Wrong Discussion

3 Post author: username2 12 January 2016 10:29AM

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Comment author: Lumifer 13 January 2016 06:24:34PM *  2 points [-]

What did Obama do wrong?

He created very high expectations (remember Hope & Change?) and massively underperformed.

Basically, he turned out to be a mediocre President, not horrible, but not particularly good either. He disappointed an awful lot of people.

As to claims that you mention, Presidents have little control over economy. Economic growth is just not a function of who currently lives in the White House. With respect to "weaker globally", it's a complicated discussion which should start with whether you want US to be a global SWAT team.

Comment author: Brillyant 13 January 2016 06:44:50PM *  1 point [-]

Thank you!

He created very high expectations (remember Hope & Change?) and massively underperformed.

And "Yes We Can!". :)

I guess all political slogans blend together for me. All of this year's nominees are making similar over-the-top type claims about what they will accomplish. I'm sincerely surprised anyone believes any of them.

One "change" that happened was the ACA. I know this is contentious depending on your politics, but it at least qualifies as the sort of "change" Obama's constituents likely had in mind when electing him.

Basically, he turned out to be a mediocre President, not awful but not particularly good either.

Do you have any metrics in mind to support this? Presidential rankings seem problematic to me. Especially trying to rank Obama so early on, since we haven't seen the long term impact of anything he has done.

As to claims that you mention, Presidents have little control over economy. Economic growth is just not a function of who currently lives in the White House.

This is also my sense, though I don't know much about economics.

My terribly over-simplified view is that the economy was horrible in 2008, and now it is much better. So that is good. And while I don't give Obama anything like full credit for that, I also don't accept criticism that he made the economy worse or didn't grow it "enough".

With respect to "weaker globally", it's a complicated discussion which should start with whether you want US to be a global SWAT team.

This is my view as well. I have no idea where critics of Obama get the evidence that the US is less safe now that 2008. I'm assuming it's just tribal politics, but would be open to arguments.

Comment author: Lumifer 13 January 2016 07:45:11PM 0 points [-]

Do you have any metrics in mind to support this?

I don't want to go into comparisons of "balance sheets" of good things he did versus bad things he did. That's prime minefield territory and LW isn't a good place for such discussions.