What Has Happened to the Huffington Post? -- Daily Kos Laments The "Gradual Decline In Huffington Post's Liberal Slant"

Except for Glenn Greenwald, he'll still be the greatest. (And I'm a Libertarian).

It's absolutely true that the Huffington Post has changed a lot for the worst. They put a lot of misinformation on their site and has relied of talking points from the right as facts even though often the rhetoric is misinformation. I think the Huffington Post is trying to get on the media band wagon as it pertains to don't worry about the facts if the story can cause controversy. Adrianna Huffington is running around screaming bloody murder as it pertains to the administration finance team. She's making a lot of false statements and is trying to incite a class war.

When Adrianna started the garbage about the VP resigning I then was certain that she has her own agenda that's not about the American people but in some sort of scurrilous way is an attempt to elevate herself for a reason that I am sure about. She has no real credibility to me now and it reminds me of how she use to talk like a nut before she so called switched hats.

Jivatman- Your right about Glenn, but you know it's bad when out of an entire index, I stop after reading one and a half columns today. BTW I very temporarily switched to Republican so I could have the right to vote "Ron Paul" in the last primary. Libertarian isnt a bad place to be, but when you are disabled from birth and cannot work to support yourself sufficiently, its a bit like sleeping with the enemy after a while. Have a bad feeling they would want me in a hospital bed within a roadside ditch somewhere.

Criticize all you want but don't make up lies and definitely any news outlet should definitely fact check what they put out.

I think you're confusing "fact checking" for "left checking".

"Just Say No!"

Hillary?

I am a bit of a Hillary fan, but not so much that I want her as President. She would be doing the same sorts of things Obama is. Unless she has had an epiphany and decided to give up on the politics of Clintonian style triangulation, that is.

The main reason Hillary lost to Obama was because she voted in favor of the Iraq war. It should now be clear that Obama would have voted exactly the same way if all eyes were upon him. Would Hillary be speaking truth to power and bad news to bankers and health insurance companes? I doubt it.

Who in the Democrat party would you like to see as President.

Hillary is a "political animal". By that I mean that she will say or do anything to get elected. She was even buddying up to Fox News when she was behind.

Obama made a lot of good speeches. But, he's not getting much done despite the super-majority the Democrat party enjoys:

• Health Care
• Finance Reform
• Afghanistan
• Iraq
• Iran/North Korea
• Cap & Trade
• Gitmo
• Rendition
• Patriot Act/warrant-less wire tapping

I believe those were areas he made mention or promises about during the campaign.

Do you think there is a Democrat that could move on the items I listed? I'm a Republican and I'm curious what you think.

You sound ridiculous because Obama has been one of the best President that I have ever seen. It took over 8 years to get us in this mess so who in their right mind think the President is a genie who can blink his eyes and change things over night. Don't worry he will get majority of his agenda accomplished in time not factoring in all the great things he's accomplished already. Go to the www.whitehouse.gov and look up the information. Obama will be re-elected if he runs but I don't know why he would want to since we have so many in grates.

You sound ridiculous because Obama has been one of the best President that I have ever seen.

You have to be fairly old to have seen a decent president. You could make a case that Nixon was our last liberal president, but that's because we had a liberal congress at the time. Johnson was a mixed bag with some serious domestic initiatives that remain with us to this day, but his stubborn pursuit of a bad war in Viet Nam rendered his legacy a painful memory.

Is Obama a good or bad president? I think he is a wolf in sheep's clothing doing the dirty work of the Right while people trust his good intentions. If he were a progressive he would have brought some progressives on board in his economic team. Instead he shut them out.

Do you think there is a Democrat that could move on the items I listed? I'm a Republican and I'm curious what you think.

Obama will have to implode first. Only if that happens will somebody be able to challenge him. It seems unlikely that he will implode before 2012 and with enough time for Dems to challenge him. At least that is how I read my fellow Democrats.

What bothers me about Obama is that I don't think he is trustworthy. I think he ran one way and is governing another and hopes that nobody notices. An awful lot don't. An awful lot of people keep saying "change takes time." How long? Five years? Nine years? Twelve? Do we need to complete the Neocon's and Neoliberal's agendas before we start to risk upsetting the establishments?

It's turned out to be "change for suckers."

Who do I like? I like former Republican Jim Webb. He say's his guiding principle is justice. He asks his staff to debate the issues in front of him and he digs to find out "what is fair." He's also got a bit of scrappiness about him. Unfortunately, I don't think he is considering a run for the Presidency.

Gulliver, good conversation. Thank you for not getting in the gutter with this. It's never easy for any president. I don't like being lied to. I agree with you about Obama. I remember watching the campaigns thinking to myself "there's no way he's actually going to _______" after he would make a promise. I don't need to re-hash them as I've listed them in #7.3-I didn't mean that as a hammer, but those were the things he brought up himself. I'm curious, if you could wave your wand, top three?

Keeping it real, to say Obama's the best ever is mind-boggling. He hasn't done anything yet. He hadn't done anything to deserve the nomination but speak. He wants national health care but can't keep his own time table for swine flu vaccine.....

The last two truly great presidents that I feel are worthy of admiration are Kennedy and Eisenhower. Of the ones after that, Clinton was the only decent one.

In regard to your list, remember that anything to do with civil liberties, government transparency, the awarding of military contracts, or war, are all things that could easily be done unilaterally by the president without congress.

At this point though, it's obvious to me that Obama has no interest in these whatsoever.

At this point though, it's obvious to me that Obama has no interest in these whatsoever.

This does seem to sum up Obama.

Jivatman, good post. I am a Reagan fan. I served in the submarine force from Reagan through GW Bush and liked them all. As I stated earlier, it's never easy for any President so I don't like to criticise the small stuff. (I prefer to blame our enemies over our Presidents)

My quick summary: Kennedy was cool, but he was also instrumental in the start of the Viet Nam war-Johnson just picked up where he left off. Nixon was a dink. Ford was non-ewxistent. Carter was a flop. Reagan recovered the country from a decade long downward spiral and ended the USSR. GHW Bush was pretty much a non-issue (shouldn't have raised taxes.....). Clinton did a good job overall-needed to keep it in his pants. GW Bush was overcome by 9/11, Saddam and Katrina. Obama has some issues to work out. I just hope he picks the right solutions instead of the political solutions.

.....for what it's worth.....

.....for what it's worth.....

Bear with me for a sec, but I can draw a strong analogy between the tragic flaws that I perceive in both George W. Bush and Barack Obama.

They both suffer from forms of messiah complexes and and ideological straight jackets which immobilize them.

In the case of George W. Bush he had that infamously arrogant "moral clarity" which led him to believe that he could never be wrong. He coupled this was a strong notion that "the government that governs least governs best." This led to incompetence being perceived as a virtue. He almost certainly did believe that Brownie was "doing a heckuva job." Hell, it's not FEMA's job to worry about people's spoiling hamburger meat by distributing bags of ice, is it? Those people will be better off moving out ot that slum anyway. Etc.

Obama has a similarly narcissistic arrogance about him. He's smart and studied, which is a refreshing improvement from GWB's lack of curiosity, but he is the sort of guy "who made a mistake once and thought he was wrong." The biggest clue to this arrogance is his jokes when he is a guest at a roast. His jokes about his former rivals are really icy and cruel zingers. His jokes about himself are usually about how awesome he is. Obama has his own version of Messiah complex. It's different from George Bush in that he doesn't have the swagger of moral clarity. Rather, Obama sees himself as a conduit for change. He is going to show up and everyone will lock hands and sing Kumbaya. The problem with this political vision of his is that it leaves him unable to challenge entrenched power. We have institutions run amok and they don't care about what a great guy Obama is. They want to continue business as usual and preferably with Obama out of the way.

Obama is most comfortable stirring up vague evocations with magical words like "change, responsibility, reform, hard choices." He's most pained when he is asked to be specific.

This process of deciding what the heck to do with Afghanistan. Cheney almost has a point that Obama is dithering. Maybe the decision process does require further study. Maybe maintaining civilian control over the military requires managing the politics of the war and he feels it wise to not have the public stressed about health care reform and a change of course in Afghanistan at the same time. Or maybe Obama has a really hard time choosing between two courses of action. Maybe his magical charm of being all things to all people has a flip side that makes it difficult to be just one thing to everyone at once.

Anyway, I'm not a psychiatrist or a pundit on TV. I'm just a fellow citizen trying to figure out what Obama is up to and whether it is a good thing for America or not.

Well written Gulliver.

I think Bush knew that some of the things he did would rile his opposition but he wasn't going to let his detractors and polls guide his decisions. I think he made the conscious decision that he would choose on a course of action and stick with it regardless of political blow-back-sometimes to his detriment.

9/11 obvioulsy forced us all into a new world.

Katrina was a powder keg-we had not seen that type of natural disaster since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fires. Having a natural disaster that gives you a few days notice, and then brings massive floods and damage to the road system and electrical grid, significantly hampers the rescuer's ability to respond. Telling Brownie he was doing a great job was a mistake politically, but not as bad as putting him in the post to begin with.

That was one of Bush's greatest flaws-rewarding loyalty over provencapability (Rumsfeld too). He tried it again with one of his Supreme Court nominations and was fortunately talked out of it (Harriet Miers).

Obama seems to be, to me, the anti-Bush. Not just in the left-right thing, but Obama seems to be to easily persuaded to change his course when he senses opposition. It's as though he wants universal approval from the entire left side of the spectrum before making a decision. That is never going to happen. And when he finds entrenched opposition, rather than doing the right thing and ignoring it and moving on, he attacks it childishly, diminishing his credibility.

When Bush needed enhanced security measures following 9/11, the Justice Department (under his direction) drafted the Patriot Act and gave it to Congress, who approved it (with their input). When Obama wanted health care reform, he threw out some vague concepts and put the onus of actually creating it on Pelosi and Reid. Had he wrote his own legislation and given it to Congress, who knows? Maybe health care reform wouldn't have turned into such a fiasco. As long as Obama thinks great speeches make things happen, he will continue to have the same problems.

I think there is a disconnect between politics and governing. Pure politics seeks only to hold onto political power and at its worst is only concerned about maximizing campaign contributions and poll numbers to hang onto power to have access to more campaign contributions. It's an almost corporate single mindedness without conscience or soul and it's no coincidence that these pure politicians get into bed so quickly with corporate interests that are soullessly controlled by a prime directive to maximize profits.

Karl Rove was an example of a pure political mindset. His strategy of courting the base led to a slim majority that served to win elections but it led to roadblocks in trying to get major policy goals achieved.

Obama's got an opposite political strategy of thumbing his nose at the base of his own party. (Either way the Left loses, interestingly). It strikes me that this also leads to limited domestic policy successes.

That leaves the entrenched interests one card to play: disaster or crisis politics. The public doesn't ask too many questions while we are at war or saving the financial system from meltdown. We just load up the sandbags with dollar bills and fork them over. Yeah, some people are asking questions, but it hasn't stopped the corrupt flow of tax payer dollars to our military industrial complex, our health care industrial complex or our banksters.

It will end badly with the dismantling of entitlement programs that didn't need to destroyed. It will end with the complete destruction of our middle class. Unless people wake up, that is.

Agreed. Rove's job was to keep winning. Bush governed. Bush, with Ted Kennedy's help, passed his number one priority: The "No child left behind" act. When 9/11 hit, all bets were off.

Obama's problem is that he is acting like Rove instead of Bush. He should let Axelrod handle the mud slinging and work with Congress to get his priorities through. Obama needs to lead instead of complaining. I'm a recently retired submariner and seriously, if someone above me in the chain of command kept blaming failures on his predecessor, he wouldn't last too long....

I think we've beat this horse into the ground. I definitely enjoy a good debate with someone across the aisle. Friend request sent. See you on the vine.

Good point, Brent