Barack Obama, campaigning for president in 2008:
"After decades of steady work across the aisle, I know he'll be able to help me turn the page on the ugly partisanship in Washington so we can bring Democrats and Republicans together to pass an agenda that works for the American people."
Barack Obama, delivering his first Inaugural Address in 2009:
On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics. We remain a young nation. But in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history."
Barack Obama, last July:
"Sometimes when you're on the outside [of DC], you look and it just sounds like a bunch of noise and you don't know what's going on between Democrats and Republicans. And my attitude is that we're all Americans first and no party has a monopoly on good ideas."
Barack Obama, last November:
"I’m not a particularly ideological person,” Obama said Sunday during a fundraiser in Seattle...The president added that he’s “pretty pragmatic" as to [how he accomplishes things].
Barack Obama, earlier today:
President Obama compared the Republican budget plan to a "stinkburger" or "meanwich" during a speech here Wednesday, using a series of zingers in an attempt to strike a contrast with the GOP on economic issues in an election year. In a speech to an enthusiastic crowd of 1,400 at the University of Michigan, Obama repeatedly mocked Republican ideas about how to improve the economy, as he touted his own proposal to raise the minimum wage.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office recently determined that his proposal to raise the minimum wage could cost the US economy 500,000 jobs -- and that Obamacare is slowing growth, impeding hiring, and will reduce the US workforce by the equivalent of 2.5 million full-time workers in the coming years. But by all means, keep "mocking Republican ideas about how to improve the economy," champ. Playground insults are an added bonus, and entirely worthy of the office you hold. Obama was also referring to Paul Ryan's budget proposal, which compares quite favorably to his own unbalanced, tax hake-riddled, debt-driving binge-fest. Oh, and Senate Democrats' alternative is quite literally a nothingburger. Meanwhile, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal is getting pretty tired of Obama lying about the supposed lack of Republican alternatives to the harmful, unpopular healthcare law:
"President Obama has to stop saying there isn't an alternative," said Jindal, the two-term Republican, on a conference call with bloggers Wednesday afternoon. Jindal's plan, developed within his America Next organization, is a 22-page proposal that seeks to be the "replace part of repeal and replace," as he explains. Jindal outlines the "problem" of America's health care system and then expounds on three "principles" around which a conservative health care reform agenda should be based: lowering health care costs, protecting the most vulnerable, and portability and choice. On the big points of health-care reform, Jindal's proposal mostly tracks with other conservative alternatives to Obamacare.
To which Obama responded, "shut up, ass face."* If the president is interested in exploring "stinkburger" policies, I'd recommend starting his search right here.
*Disclosure: This is a made up quote.
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