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Obama Gave a Very Liberal Inauguration Speech

Pundits on the left and right agree. What do you think?

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by Mary Noble

Senior Editor t +

Image: AP

Everyone agrees: Obama gave an extremely liberal inauguration speech. He sounded all the major progressive notes: gay rights, gun control, climate change, fairness, immigration reform, and voting rights. Gay rights and climate change were mentioned for the first time in an inauguration address.

"So: To sum up: Our journey is not complete until we enact the entire Democratic platform from 2012 convention. How unifying," tweeted the National Review's Jonah Goldberg.

"Unapologetically liberal inauguration speech by Obama calling for equality for gays and women, for fairness immigrants, gun control," remarks the Guardian's Ewen McAskill.

"I think that Obama fellow might be a liberal," tweeted the Daily Caller's Jim Antle.

"This is a surprisingly liberal speech," comments MSNBC's Chris Hayes.

"So Obama basically trolling the Right right now. 'Oh yeah! I AM as liberal as you've been saying all along!'" tweeted Forbes writer Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry.

Via YouTube and Twitter.
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Did you like Obama's inauguration speech?

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158 Comments (view in Forum)

  • hankf68
    !
    I fear it's all rhetoric, as I think he serves only "big money interest", as do the majority in power here, but we'll see, let's hope :)
  • methinks
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    No, let's hope not and let's just hope it's a continuation of the rhetoric from the last 4 years. The REAL Obama spoke today...for the FIRST time.
  • PNWest
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    @methinks He struck a combative tone. I don't think he will waste much time trying to compromise with the baggers this time out.
  • methinks
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    @PNWest I agree about the combative tone. What happened to his spirit of compromise...which we now know never existed! The 'my way or the highway' approach will just keep us right where we are. He's an ideologue and never intended on compromise. My God, he blamed Bush for his entire first term!
  • Neo_NtheMatrix
    !
    Today is a very sick day in more ways than one. On every channel there is nothing but perversion on. The whole household is depressed. Maybe tomorrow I'll feel better, but I doubt it. Now today, Neo is truly sad. Today marks the fall of the world's greatest nation.

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  • Neo_NtheMatrix
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    Equality? I'm all for everyone pulling an equal share of the work. If liberals really believed in equality they could never stand for someone sitting at home on their butt doing nothing but cashing a welfare check every month. If liberals were really soldiers of fairness they'd see nothing fair in one person doing all the work while many more benefit. I suggest it is liberals that really don't believe in fairness and equality and they know it. The greatest trick liberals every played on America was convincing voters that the deficit does not exist.
  • Neo_NtheMatrix
    !
    @woodtick57 - Welfare isn't a liberal policy? Paying someone to sit at home on their butts and do nothing is as liberal as it gets. When liberals start demanding everyone pitch in their share of the responsibility then I will believe liberals believe in fairness. If I have to work to feed some lazy indigent bum then I don't consider that fair at all.

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  • Knightkore
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    @NormalFlora Hmm....what do you think it's Bush's fault for everything still? Come on....no conspiracy....he's never been forthcoming....

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  • Neo_NtheMatrix
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    I believe in fairness when everyone pays federal income taxes. While 50% of the nation is allowed to be exempt from the duty to pay taxes yet gripes about how they are downtrodden and walked on, I will ignore those faux cries. Those that love America will roll up their sleeves and work hard to make her great again. Those who don't love America will duck paying fed income taxes, collect government benefits, while crying that America is not fair and not diverse enough. True fairness is everyone having an equal stake in the success of this country and an equal requirement to be responsible for America's success.
  • Neo_NtheMatrix
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    @harold_lloyd - I've already posted many of my solutions to the nation's problems. It doesn't help if the president has already decided to drive the nation over a cliff.

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  • PoliticalSpice
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    Just watched it. Nothing particulary liberal unless protecting social security, medicare and allowing immigrants to assimilate are liberal causes. In which case the repubs on here meed to start attackimg Reagan...
  • PoliticalSpice
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    Lets hope he spends liberally as FDR and starts a wpa jobs program to build national high speed rail and put solar on federal buildings in every sunny area.
  • Zazziness
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    I keep hearing that from the fringe rightwingers but it seems to me it is not Mr. Obama who is "driving this country into civil war" but the extremists throwing tantrums because they live in a democracy where things don't go all their way. It's very immature.
  • NormalFlora
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    IF the teabag rednecks (who refuse to live in a Democracy when they are in the minority) decide to start a civil war, they will have their asses handed to them and their gun toys melted.
  • Zazziness
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    @NormalFlora I think there are a lot less Tea Party members after the inauguration. When that pastor repeated a blessing in Spanish, I assume quite a few of them expired on the spot from indignation.
  • PoliticalSpice
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    If protecting social security, medicare and allowing immigrants to become citizens does that mean reagan is a liberal too. I mean, it was an ol speech, but what was so liberal about it?
  • DARSB
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    @PoliticalSpice He didn't advocate hurting ordinary people in order to advance an extremist political agenda.

    Listen to the nativists when they talk about immigration, the Randians when they talk about entitlement programs, the Teapartistas when they talk about just about anything: they all suspect everyone of somehow taking advantage of something or other, and they want those "other" people to stop it! If a few (hundred thousand) people get hurt in the process, why, let's talk about something else.

    I listened to the speech today. Earlier a posting called it "very liberal." It wasn't. This was fairly centrist thinking. But the tone was diametrically opposed to the negativity and grumbling from the other side these past few years.

    I think an optimistic message is startling today because of its rarity. The President didn't say much of anything new today, but compared to the doom-and-gloom mutterings of the GOP and its dysfunctional kin, his message can't help but stand out.
  • PoliticalSpice
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    @DARSB Yea, but where did I say or imply he did? Or that it in any way contrasted to the modern republican crowd? I compared it to a speech that could have been made by a moderate republican, and in this post to reagan, whom, as much as I detested him, was a flaming liberal compared to todays republican party. Reagans action in Grenada, nicaragua and el salvador were murderous and unforgivable, still as a speaker he never said the types of things these giys do. I was commenting on the speech, not the policies.
  • RoyFloyd
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    Liberal indeed, with all that talk of love of America and duty to the country and fellow citizens rather than being guided exclusively by greedy self-interest. He also mentioned competition and fairness as being necessary components of free-market capitalism. To top it off he called on politicians to put America's well-being before partisan interests. Easy to see why Republicans are upset.
  • PoliticalSpice
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    @Knightmare Obama did much of what he said 2008.Troops out of iraq, health care reform, get bin laden without pakistani permission. I think you're afriad he do what he says again.
  • harold_lloyd
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    I didn't think it was decidedly liberal.

    Pretty much down the middle.

    It's about what Eisenhower would have said, I think.

    Look forward, not back.
    See reality clearly and deal with it effectively.
    Get the deficit under control without totally screwing the old and poor.
    (I would have preferred 'debt' rather than 'deficit')

    Remember, we don't lead the world because we have the strongest military, but because we are the smartest and most pragmatic. That's our power.
    Let's not give that advantage away.
  • AceLuby
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    @methinks Past ingenuity, sure, but I was asking for what measurement you're using TODAY to determine that we are still the 'smartest and most pragmatic' people?
  • methinks
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    @AceLuby If you can't see it, I feel sad for you.

    Ingenuity is the quality of being clever, original, and inventive, often in the process of applying ideas to solve problems or meet challenges.

    To be smart, you need ingenuity. Just look at Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Their products are used across the planet.
  • PoliticalSpice
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    I don't know tge u.s. is the smartest and most pragmatic, but agree it was a pretty down the middle speech, not particulary liberal. Any moderate republican could have made the same speech...

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  • RobertJHarsh
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    I did not hear since I was surfing some hard core pron at the time, but it was probably a standard issue liberal, conservatives must die speech. Hated by Fox news...loved by everyone else. Obama's speech = America is screwed.
  • Zazziness
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    You keep building this sad, dark world around you and the saddest part is you are deliberately refusing to build it on reality. You confess that you skip the facts; therefore the fantasy you create in its place is your own responsibility.
  • RobertJHarsh
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    @Zazziness I just watched the speech. Whoa I was correct!

    Let's review the speech:

    gay marriage....ummm ok.
    climate change....land grabs and shutting down businesses
    compromise....my way or the highway
    immigration...everyone allowed in

    I am not building this sad dark world...the Democrats are.
  • Zazziness
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    @RobertJHarsh Notice that *you* are the one who translated what was said into some dark. He did not, for instance, say anything about "land grabs." Nor did he say "everyone allowed in."
    Conservatives do this a lot. They make things up then wail like it was reality. It is not.
  • talkenhed
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    @Zazziness Poor Mr. Harsh reacted by indulging in mental masturbation, the inability to connect with or relate to reality. This appears to be a typical right wing reaction to a "very liberal" speech, which was basically a repetition of all the issues the county voted forum favor of.
    I guess they, conservatives, anticipated a speech highlighting Tea Part Concepts, support for tax loop holes for corps. more voter suppression, cuts in SS and Medicare, denial of women's Heath rights, etc. I figure surfing the Internet for hard core porn is productive way for conservatives to fulfill their fantasy
  • Grubby
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    @talkenhed Spoken as another clueless Liberal. The only people who can SAVE Social Security and Medicare are the Republicans, and they will do it if given the chance. The Liberals are set on riding the horse full bore until it is dead, then leave nothing for the future . Liberals obviously could care less about their children and grandchildren still having programs like these around, they just want to milk them until they die. So...caring about babies is denying women's rights. Okay. And...you obviously don't care about the health of companies, because the government will employ everyone in the future, we don't need those dang companies around anymore. They aren't really good for anything that government can't provide. I don't think you even get the points I am making. That clueless electorate signifies everything wrong with the direction of our country right now.

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  • falco_alba
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    How horribly liberal, to speak of treating people with fairness, dignity, and respect. Oh yes, the concept of helping the poor and needy, to love one another and to put the interests of America over the interests of the politics. Protecting children and ensuring that all people are given the opportunity to overcome difficult circumstances without being callously tossed aside like trash.

    If those are liberal ideas, then the GOP really is a sad floundering representation of bitter old white men.
  • ErnestPayne
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    "Liberal" for the US. Conservative in the civilised world. Nonetheless a step forward assuming republicans don't stonewall everything. Every day of delay is a day the US falls behind the rest of the world.
  • methinks
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    I'm in no hurry to join the rest of the world going down in economic flames. I suppose you want to follow in Greece's footsteps? I don't!
  • ErnestPayne
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    @methinks Well, thanks to republicans, you are. The US is going the route of Greece not "the rest of the world". Simply printing money for decades to devalue its currency and keep it competitive. America has not funded any of its wars. It has run a guns AND butter economy and when you toss in the idiot bush's tax cuts you torpedoed yourselves.
  • cat2009
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    Let's see he's been on the journey about immigration reform the last four years nothing done,gay rights the states are taking care of that climate control mother nature is doing that because it's winter and the places that normally get snow and freezing temps are getting them, the economy he's steadily adding to that so that's done. I don't see his speech as liberal I just haven't seen a damn thing he's done.
  • AlexMIA
    !
    I thought it was great! I hope he pushes through all of the liberal agendas. Not just the ones I agree with but all the unconstitutional ones and the ones that will break us financially too. That ought to wake some of the moderates that voted for him and the left up. I hope he succeeds!
  • DARSB
    !
    Funniest reaction so far, from the Borowitz Report.

    "WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Congressional Republicans heaped fulsome praise on President Obama’s second Inaugural Address today, saying that it had given them a detailed list of things to thwart over the next four years.

    “My big fear was that the speech would be full of vague platitudes that wouldn’t be helpful to us in plotting against him,” said House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio).“Once he started offering details of what he actually hoped to accomplish, though, I realized we had hit the mother lode.”

    Read more: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowit...
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