Former President Barack Obama told Zohran Mamdani “your campaign has been impressive to watch,” and suggested that he was invested in Mr. Mamdani’s success beyond the election.
Former President Barack Obama called New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani on Saturday, praising his campaign and offering to be a “sounding board” into the future.
The private, roughly 30-minute phone call, which has not previously been reported, was described by two people who participated or were briefed immediately on what had been said. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the private conversation.
Mr. Obama said that he was invested in Mr. Mamdani’s success beyond the election on Tuesday. They talked about the challenges of staffing a new administration and building an apparatus capable of delivering on Mr. Mamdani’s agenda of affordability in the city, the people said.
I don’t think I’ll ever really get over Obama letting the banks off with zero repercussions in causing the 2008 meltdown. He proved himself a true corporate Democrat at that point and even though he did many other good things, it’s a truth that sticks in the back of my mind forevermore.
Bush bailed out the banks. Obama handled the auto industry, who had to give up some control of their companies and pay us back with interest, and they did so.
I couldn’t find the one in the rose garden (that is burned into my brain), but this is how they sold it at the time. I understands they were “worried about making things worse,” but those banks got away with complete bullshit. It wasn’t Bush.
He’s a war criminal
Obama had the kind of mandate Trump thinks he has and he did nothing with it because he didn’t want to ruffle feathers.
And they still called him an anti Christ money.
So, he did absolutely nothing radical, and he energized the moron redneck as though he was Satan himself.
Leaving is us with the worst of both worlds. No change, and Magats foaming at the mouth.
similar thing with the Canadian Liberals and electoral reform
honestly the cons and liberals are virtually the exact same party of corpo teet suckers with a few slight personality differences.
they both use identity politics to mask their corporate agendas.
Im tremendously disappointed in carney for his anti privacy bills, and expansion of a surveillance/ police state in canada. while also sharing our private data with the US.
the liberals and cons are corporate sellouts, they dont give a shit about our rights or well being. just the “economy”.
edit: for those who cant see this, and are disturbed about me making this comparison. do what i did for the last twenty years. pour over voting records, policy changes, proposed policy changes, and foreign investment trends between cabinets. economic trends in general around housing, oil and gas, grocery chains, telecom, vehicles, lack of proper funding to public healthcare, deliberate underfunding, proposed private alternatives, lack of action to undo damage caused by these antics. why the overwhelming majority of representatives on both sides are landlords, or are invested in realestate funds.
the reason parliment is so crazy and fun to watch is because it is political THEATER. its meant to distract and entertain. both parties are constantly auditioning for corporations, to see who would better keep us docile and productive.
the cons and the libs are pepsi and coke. both distinct in flavour, yet both owned by the same company who manufactures their rivalry, and they make a profit no matter which side you pick. because they will always support the status quo, and protect investment. doing the bare minimum to improve our lives. they wouldnt be allowed to get to that level of government if they werent groomed and prepped for their positions. virtually guaranteed to not rock the boat.
neo liberalism loves consistent returns on investment. regardless of the drawbacks to the public.
They’re pretty different still
Today they are. Back then? Not so much. In the primary where Obama beat Hillary, Hillary’s campaign did some pretty horrendous race baiting - as did Biden. Obama in turn voted for the defense of marriage act. Bill Clinton shredded federal safety net programs, exported jobs, betrayed unions, and deregulated Wall Street. He was getting ready to go after Social Security with Newt Gingrich too, before they fell out over the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
The Democratic establishment is exactly as progressive as the base is able to force them to be. Everything else is gaslighting.
That is a very selective list. You can argue that they’re neoliberals with this, and that’s true, but you can’t argue they’re the same as GWB, lmao, the dumbest president we had had at the point. Anyone who tells you they were the same as Dubya has memory issues or is lying.
You let me know where they defunded the schools or got us into trillion dollar wars, just unbelievable that people think they’re the same and forget ol’ fucking Dubya and his mission accomplished, “God told me” bullshit.
Well no, I can’t say any Democrat can compete with W on pure IQ deficit, but I’ll put Bill Clinton toe to toe with almost any Republican on spending cuts. “The era of big government is over” was Clinton, not a Republican.
I think he disenchanted an entire generation. People have lowered expectations from government here because of him and it sucks.
I’m not trying to defend Obama, especially I abhor his drone warfare, but politics is known to be cut throat, and politicians are beholden to campaign donations. Election campaigning is an expensive endeavour, and those who could throw more money have increased likelihood of winning. There are exceptions to the rule of course, and sometimes those who spent less still wins, but the candidate increases his/her chances of winning by having more campaign funds.
With all that said, this means playing ball with the campaign donors and their lackeys, or else they will gang up on you. Obama is all too aware of this. Consider that Lena Khan’s aggressive FTC investigations under Biden on tech giants pissed off the oligarchs. Musk, Zuckerberg and Bezos threw their weights on supporting Trump and now we are here. Apparently, Obama told Bernie in 2016 that he “can’t be the president and be the good guy”.
What is required is someone who is not afraid dip their hands into the mud and throw some, without being in the mud pit itself. People villainise Machiavellianism for good reasons, but evil don’t play by the rules and evil never sleeps. Why still be nice if they already stabbed you? You definitely need to be Machiavellian when the situation requires it. We had that with the Roosevelts, and the fact that they were already wealthy insulated them from being beholden to the whims of campaign donations of the oligarchs and their attack dogs, made them have more free reign to pursue actually more progressive policies. Some people say JB Pritzker has those qualities-- an already wealthy politician willing to be Machiavellian to pursue progressive policies, although I don’t know much about the man to warrant the observation.
Edit: JB not Joseph Pritzker
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Iceland didn’t. But Bush put us on the bailout path, and Obama reversing course would have cause serious economic turmoil.
I think we should have regardless, but that’s neither here nor there.
Iceland has the luxury of not being able to eliminate the global economic landscape with one big mistake. No one here is happy with the bank bailout, but it was the only realistic option available.
There were many different ways that it could have been implemented, though. Giving the banks that fucked the economy free money with no strings was not it.