Current Events > Let's see what Obama is up to

(+) Yeah! (+)

ASithLord7 posted...

The firm and Obama have deemed that it's the amount they're willing to pay and accept, and it's their money to do what they want with. Not sure what the big controversy is.

Because he's basically selling the prestige of the presidency to the highest bidder. Just because he's not in office anymore doesn't make it any less wrong.

none of you pretend you wouldnt take that money for speaking to some rich dudes
---

YellowSUV posted...

LOL @ people who complain about speaker fees but love the free market.

Yeah it is weird how I see conservatives criticizing stuff like this.
---

I hold the view that Harry Truman did; it's unbecoming of a president to go right from office to sucking at Wall Street's teat. I have no illusions about where Obama sucked from in office, but maybe something like this will convince those who spent years feeling Obama was a progressive constrained by DC reality.

The presidency shouldn't be a stepping stone to corporate wealth.
---

Antifar posted...

The presidency shouldn't be a stepping stone to corporate wealth.

Why not? What's wrong with wealth?
---

Saloonist posted...

Antifar posted...

The presidency shouldn't be a stepping stone to corporate wealth.

Why not? What's wrong with wealth?

Why not just openly sell the office then? What's wrong with it? "This President is sponsored by Rondo - he's what plants CRAVE"

Wealth is fine, until it turns public officials into servants of corporate interests.
---

wah_wah_wah posted...

Saloonist posted...

Antifar posted...

The presidency shouldn't be a stepping stone to corporate wealth.

Why not? What's wrong with wealth?

Why not just openly sell the office then? What's wrong with it? "This President is sponsored by Rondo - he's what plants CRAVE"

Antifar posted...

Wealth is fine, until it turns public officials into servants of corporate interests.

He's not a public official.
---

Saloonist posted...

He's not a public official.

He was. It isn't good to have former public officials immediately going to accepting large payments from the financial firms that he formerly regulated. It doesn't look right at all.

Yes, but he was until three months ago, and he would not be the first to parlay pro[x] moves as an official into cushy private gigs.
---

wah_wah_wah posted...

Saloonist posted...

He's not a public official.

He was. It isn't good to have former public officials immediately going to accepting large payments from the financial firms that he formerly regulated. It doesn't look right at all.

So how long should he wait before it's right in your eyes?

Also regulating an industry, doesn't have anything to do with being friendly or not with that industry.

Every industry is regulated. The executive branch oversees regulations of non-profits. Would you blame Obama if he took some speaking fees to give a talk to an environmental advocacy group?
---

Antifar posted...

Yes, but he was until three months ago, and he would not be the first to parlay pro[x] moves as an official into cushy private gigs.

The problem being....?

He did his public service and is now a private citizen. When is he allowed to earn money in your opinion, since he can't use his experience to make a profit?
---

Saloonist posted...

So how long should he wait before it's right in your eyes?

He should just never do it. He has a pension that we the taxpayers give him along with his security expenses. If you go into public service you have to be careful to avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest, or you end up diminishing the office that you held in public trust. It's not really a leap to think that he may have ruled in favor or not in favor with those firms or given them special access in exchange for private financial favors later. The appearance doesn't look right.

Saloonist posted...

Every industry is regulated. The executive branch oversees regulations of non-profits. Would you blame Obama if he took some speaking fees to give a talk to an environmental advocacy group?

He shouldn't be taking fees period. Access to a public official, former or not, should have nothing to do with whether you have the ability to pay.

Saloonist posted...

When is he allowed to earn money in your opinion

He's earning a $200,000 a year pension, for starters. +ongoing book royalties
---

wah_wah_wah posted...

Access to a public official, former or not, should have nothing to do with whether you have the ability to pay.

Let's be clear, even if Obama wasn't giving $400k talks on Wall Street, that wouldn't mean that he would or should be doing the "high school charity speech" circuit.
---

he shoulda sued trump tbh
---

Anteaterking posted...

wah_wah_wah posted...

Access to a public official, former or not, should have nothing to do with whether you have the ability to pay.

Let's be clear, even if Obama wasn't giving $400k talks on Wall Street, that wouldn't mean that he would or should be doing the "high school charity speech" circuit.

lol what? Why wouldn't it be good for someone who the public is carrying for his salary still and owes much of what he did to the support of the public, to do good for the community without expecting a check in the mail?

wah_wah_wah posted...

He should just never do it. He has a pension that we the taxpayers give him along with his security expenses. If you go into public service you have to be careful to avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest, or you end up diminishing the office that you held in public trust. It's not really a leap to think that he may have ruled in favor or not in favor with those firms or given them special access in exchange for private financial favors later. The appearance doesn't look right.

So essentially the president should spend the rest of his life doing literally nothing then? You can make the claim that there is an appearance of a conflict of interest for any position he takes after he leaves office.

He shouldn't be taking fees period. Access to a public official, former or not, should have nothing to do with whether you have the ability to pay.

This is a bad argument. Obama taking fees to talk to a specific firm has no correlation with whether he sells access to himself. I am sure he will give talks to many groups in the future for no cost at all. I sincerely doubt he will only talk if he receives massive payments. But if he does, what's the issue?

No one has a right to access to a President nor a former President. And I fail to see any evidence of a conflict of interest, except that the group paying him has a presence on Wall Street, your bogeyman of choice. While in office, Obama was certainly not very popular on Wall Street, so if there was favoritism, they didn't seem to notice.
---

Antifar posted...

Saloonist posted...

When is he allowed to earn money in your opinion

He's earning a $200,000 a year pension, for starters. +ongoing book royalties

Your point being....?

He should not be allowed to have gainful employment merely because he already has a source of income?

Also $200k a year is really not all that much money. First year lawyers out of top law schools make that money. First years. Obama could easily make millions as a partner at a firm because an ex-President is that valuable.
---

Antifar posted...

Saloonist posted...

When is he allowed to earn money in your opinion

He's earning a $200,000 a year pension, for starters. +ongoing book royalties

Why are you butt sore?

#45 literally promoted marlago in the state dept web page. LITERALLY. He makes dignitaries stay at his hotels. His wife stays at his tower in NYC and he makes the secret service pay rent for protecting her there.

Oh but #44 spoke and got a speaking fee! This is the end of the world!

Folks like you whined about hilldawg's emails but ignore the Russia stuff.

Y U so partisan ?
---

Saloonist posted...

So essentially the president should spend the rest of his life doing literally nothing then?

No I mean there's quite a bit of other things, good things, a former president can do than take the bag from Wall Street. Writing a book and getting an advance from that is OK, since that's money that's mostly earned based on how much the public is going to buy his words, not simply a bank that might have other reasons for showing "hey this is how much money we'll pay you after office if you do us a solid"

He could even run for office again if he wanted to, a lower office. Quincy did it. But I don't particularly care that much for the need of someone to be able to find "things to do" as much as protecting the integrity of public offices. That's a poorly chosen priority to be like, "Well he needs to accept possible graft or he won't have anything to do!"

Saloonist posted...

Also $200k a year is really not all that much money. First year lawyers out of top law schools make that money. First years. Obama could easily make millions as a partner at a firm because an ex-President is that valuable.

Wikipedia could easily make hundreds of millions a year if they accepted advertising. What's your point? That public offices should be funnels for money?

GoatHunter posted...

Antifar posted...

Saloonist posted...

When is he allowed to earn money in your opinion

He's earning a $200,000 a year pension, for starters. +ongoing book royalties

Why are you butt sore?

#45 literally promoted marlago in the state dept web page. LITERALLY.

I already made that topic.
https://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/400-current-events/75273888

I am not a Trump supporter.
---

wah_wah_wah posted...

No I mean there's quite a bit of other things, good things, a former president can do than take the bag from Wall Street. Writing a book and getting an advance from that is OK, since that's money that's mostly earned based on how much the public is going to buy his words, not simply a bank that might have other reasons for showing "hey this is how much money we'll pay you after office if you do us a solid"

He could even run for office again if he wanted to, a lower office. Quincy did it. But I don't particularly care that much for the need of someone to be able to find "things to do" as much as protecting the integrity of public offices. That's a poorly chosen priority to be like, "Well he needs to accept possible graft or he won't have anything to do!"

It's not graft at all. There is no conflict of interest and no damage was done to the integrity of public offices. Elected officials can do whatever they want after they leave office and their time is their own.

Let's take a businessman who wins the Presidency (assume it's a completely pure of heart, conflict-of-interest-free President Trump). You are essentially saying that even if President put his entire business empire into a blind trust, detached himself from all concerns about its success, and followed the letter of the law down to the minutest detail, he would not be able to resume the business empire he built because that's somehow a "conflict of interest" since he would have headed the executive branch which regulated business. Moreover, Trump could not use his experience to start a new business for the exact same reasons. That would be absurd, and would deprive the public of one of the best social goods which a businessman can contribute to the country.

Creating wealth is not a bad thing. Quite the opposite, creating wealth is a social good and we all benefit from it. Just because Wall Street is your bogeyman doesn't mean that there is a conflict of interest when an ex-public official decides to be productive.
---

Saloonist posted...

It's not graft at all. There is no conflict of interest and no damage was done to the integrity of public offices. Elected officials can do whatever they want after they leave office and their time is their own.

Not everything that is legally permitted is necessarily the right thing to do. Just because you are legally permitted to lie doesn't mean it is right to lie.

Saloonist posted...

Let's take a businessman who wins the Presidency (assume it's a completely pure of heart, conflict-of-interest-free President Trump). You are essentially saying that even if President put his entire business empire into a blind trust, detached himself from all concerns about its success, and followed the letter of the law down to the minutest detail, he would not be able to resume the business empire he built because that's somehow a "conflict of interest" since he would have headed the executive branch which regulated business

I don't think you understand what a blind trust is, or if you do you're not thinking about what a blind trust does fully. If it is in a blind trust there's no actual worry of him making decisions that will favor certain businesses because he will not know how his investments are being handled nor have any awareness of which businesses to favor or not favor to collect on the reward later. So yes in this scenario it is perfectly acceptable to do this.

Saloonist posted...

Just because Wall Street is your bogeyman doesn't mean that there is a conflict of interest when an ex-public official decides to be productive.

I never said Wall Street was my bogeyman. And "deciding to be productive" is certainly not how Harry Truman and others would have put it.

Not everything that is legally permitted is necessarily the right thing to do. Just because you are legally permitted to lie doesn't mean it is right to lie.

I'll take this as an admission that you know there isn't graft, because there isn't.

I don't think you understand what a blind trust is, or if you do you're not thinking about what a blind trust does fully. If it is in a blind trust there's no actual worry of him making decisions that will favor certain businesses because he will not know how his investments are being handled nor have any awareness of which businesses to favor or not favor to collect on the reward later. So yes in this scenario it is perfectly acceptable to do this.

He still has authority over regulations over the real estate industry as the head of the executive branch and its agencies. Therefore according to your arguments, he automatically has a conflict of interest merely by holding the office, and would immediately gain further conflicts by trying to resume his business and make a profit because he would have overseen the very regulations under which he would conduct business after leaving office. That is an even worse conflict of interest than your imagined one of Obama accepting money from the firms he regulated. No businessman should ever be president under this argumentation.

I never said Wall Street was my bogeyman.

Context is everything.
---

Delirious_Beard posted...

ASithLord7 posted...

Ex-Kefiroth posted...

It's the exact same shit that turned people away from Hillary.

Stupid people.

what a vintage rebel post

i have literally never seen you post anything else besides these types of posts.

Saloonist posted...

I'll take this as an admission that you know there isn't graft, because there isn't.

Well that's a nice way of proving your point, just jump on the circular reasoning bandwagon because hey, it's only an INFORMAL fallacy! Your point is wrong. Why? Because it's wrong!

Saloonist posted...

He still has authority over regulations over the real estate industry as the head of the executive branch and its agencies. Therefore according to your arguments, he automatically has a conflict of interest merely by holding the office, and would immediately gain further conflicts by trying to resume his business and make a profit because he would have overseen the very regulations under which he would conduct business after leaving office.

He wouldn't actually know any of what his businesses are or are not invested in so this scenario is absurd on its face. That's what a blind trust is. I'm not saying he needs to literally be divorced from the entire economic system and be a celestine monk. There's a difference between "I'm going to make decisions involving the real estate market in a general way without knowing my financial investments" and "I'm going to audit Best Western fully knowing I just made heavy investments in a series of rival hotel chains"... the latter is what a blind trust is designed to prevent. What, are you going to argue against the ideas of blind trusts now? Like where are you going with this?

Saloonist posted...

Context is everything.

Yeah and the context says I didn't say Wall Street was a bogeyman, but now you've switched to the strawman portion of your ramblings so I will tune out. Goodnight.

Well that's a nice way of proving your point, just jump on the circular reasoning bandwagon because hey, it's only an INFORMAL fallacy! Your point is wrong. Why? Because it's wrong!

It's just not graft. You don't know what graft means:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graft_(politics)

He wouldn't actually know any of what his businesses are or are not invested in so this scenario is absurd on its face. That's what a blind trust is. I'm not saying he needs to literally be divorced from the entire economic system and be a celestine monk. There's a difference between "I'm going to make decisions involving the real estate market in a general way without knowing my financial investments" and "I'm going to audit Best Western fully knowing I just made heavy investments in a series of rival hotel chains"... the latter is what a blind trust is designed to prevent. What, are you going to argue against the ideas of blind trusts now? Like where are you going with this?

You seem to be under the mistaken notion that regulations can't favor an industry as a whole, and consequently Trump's real estate empire, even if he does not have direct control (for example, he could oversee the weakening of environmental protections which favor his particular industry as a whole). Furthemore, most of his assets are not going to be liquidated. They are not going to do away with Trump Tower or Mar-a-Lago even in a blind trust. Even if they did, Trump would know about it. Given that a real estate mogul knows that many of their holdings will still be there in the 4-8 year term, you don't avoid the alleged conflict of interest in a businessman setting the regulations under which they will operate in a few years, even with a blind trust. You can say the same for essentially any highly successful businessperson who becomes president.

Yeah and the context says I didn't say Wall Street was a bogeyman, but now you've switched to the strawman portion of your ramblings so I will tune out. Goodnight.

No your general hostility to productivity says it all. Yes, run along. That's wise.
---

QuantumScript posted...

Delirious_Beard posted...

ASithLord7 posted...

Ex-Kefiroth posted...

It's the exact same shit that turned people away from Hillary.

Stupid people.

what a vintage rebel post

i have literally never seen you post anything else besides these types of posts.

and i have never seen you post anything besides these type of posts

ie shit ones
---

Asherlee10 posted...

GoatHunter posted...

Antifar posted...

Saloonist posted...

When is he allowed to earn money in your opinion

He's earning a $200,000 a year pension, for starters. +ongoing book royalties

Why are you butt sore?

#45 literally promoted marlago in the state dept web page. LITERALLY. He makes dignitaries stay at his hotels. His wife stays at his tower in NYC and he makes the secret service pay rent for protecting her there.

Oh but #44 spoke and got a speaking fee! This is the end of the world!

Folks like you whined about hilldawg's emails but ignore the Russia stuff.

Y U so partisan ?

On this rare occasion, I agree with @Saloonist. I see no issue with Obama taking a speaking fee from this company. I literally cannot think of a viable reason why this is somehow "wrong."

I do speaking engagements a few times a year for a fee, does this mean I'm some soulless schmuck like Obama?

I don't think he did anything wrong by getting paid that speaking fee either :)
---

FrisbeeDude posted...

Doom_Art posted...

100 days out of office and still triggering conservatives

Miss ya, Barry

---

The appearance of a conflict is a conflict; it does Obama no good to be giving his critics and opponents such fodder
http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/4/25/15419740/obama-speaking-fee

The fundamental concept of Donald Trump's ethnonationalist demagoguery is that white middle-class Americans are locked in a zero-sum conflict with foreigners and ethnic minority groups. That's Marine Le Pen's message in France and Geert Wilders's message in the Netherlands, and it is ugly and false.

A counterproposal on the left is to reframe the populist theme and argue that middle-class Americans more generally are locked in a zero-sum conflict with rich people.

Obama and other center-left leaders around the world do not espouse that view primarily, I think, because they believe it is simplistic and wrong. But a crucial vulnerability of center-left politics around the world is that their sincere conviction — a faith in the positive-sum nature of cosmopolitan values and appropriately regulated forms of global capitalism, tempered by a welfare state — is easily mistaken for corruption. The political right is supposed to be pro-business as a matter of ideological commitment. The progressive center is supposed to be empirically minded, challenging business interests where appropriate but granting them free rein at other times.

This approach has a lot of political and substantive merits. But it is invariably subject to the objection: really?

Did you really avoid breaking up the big banks because you thought it would undermine financial stability, or were you on the take? Did you really think a fracking ban would be bad for the environment, or were you on the take? One man's sophisticated and pragmatic approach to public policy can be the other man's grab bag of corrupt opportunism.

Leaders who sincerely care about the fate of the progressive center as a nationally and globally viable political movement need to push back against this perception by behaving with a higher degree of personal integrity than their rivals — not by accepting the logic that what's good for the goose is good for the gander.
...
Beyond politicians' speaking fees, people are, of course, troubled by larger questions of revolving doors between the private and public sectors. What would be nice would be to devise some convenient bright-line rule presidents could propose that would prevent the government from being suborned by special interest.

Realistically, it can't be done. "Nobody can ever work in the private sector before or after joining the government" isn't a viable rule. What's troubling isn't any one specific case. It's the sheer accumulation of them, leading to the perception that service in Democratic Party politics was viewed in general as just a stepping stone to a higher-paid gig in New York or Silicon Valley.

But the difficulty of drawing a clear, overarching ethical line is exactly why an ex-president, who is uniquely high-profile and uniquely insulated from financial pressures, ought to set a high standard. Obama doesn't need a next job. As a former president, he is entitled to lifelong health care and a pension worth more than $200,000 a year. He's already written two best-selling books and could easily write a third or fourth. (A recent deal between the Obamas and Penguin Random House will reportedly earn the former first couple at least $65 million.)

Obama has already raised millions for his library and presidential foundation. He, more than any of his former subordinates, can safely say no, that Harry Truman was right and this is an unseemly thing for a former president to be doing, and that it was a mistake of American society to normalize that form of conduct from his immediate few predecessors.

---

What's that? A leftist who promised free and affordable shit has just lined his own pockets instead?!

Obama is no fucking leftist, come on.
---

Asherlee10 posted...

What's the TL;DR Antifar?

This shit gives credence to critics on the left and (more pressingly) the right who say that Obama and the establishment politics he represents have sold out to corporate interests. Even if you assume pure intentions on the part of Obama, Clinton, etc., their willingness to hobknob with these sorts of people is bad optics that undermines their agenda and efforts to implement it.
---

Obama proving once again he's a crook. 400k to give a shitty speech? fuck him.

Asherlee10 posted...

On this rare occasion, I agree with @Saloonist. I see no issue with Obama taking a speaking fee from this company. I literally cannot think of a viable reason why this is somehow "wrong."

I do speaking engagements a few times a year for a fee, does this mean I'm some soulless schmuck like Obama?

Yes.

Antifar posted...

Obama is no fucking leftist, come on.

Obama isn't a leftist, Venezuela's government isn't a leftist government, etc. Damn bro, who IS a leftist?

Good for him. Nothing wrong with this, obviously.
---

QuantumScript posted...

Venezuela's government isn't a leftist government, etc.

I haven't said this.
---

Antifar posted...

QuantumScript posted...

Venezuela's government isn't a leftist government, etc.

I haven't said this.

my god

did you just admit that venezuela's government is a leftist government?

Antifar posted...

Former President Barack Obama has agreed to speak at a Wall Street conference for $400,000,

Jesus Christ
---

Yes, and the fact that in your mind Barack Obama falls into the same category is very, very funny.
---

Asherlee10 posted...

k darkfire posted...

Obama proving once again he's a crook. 400k to give a shitty speech? fuck him.

Asherlee10 posted...

On this rare occasion, I agree with @Saloonist. I see no issue with Obama taking a speaking fee from this company. I literally cannot think of a viable reason why this is somehow "wrong."

I do speaking engagements a few times a year for a fee, does this mean I'm some soulless schmuck like Obama?

Yes.

lol - please elaborate. I'm all ears to learn how I'm a soulless schmuck for providing a social media for small businesses seminar to SBDCs around Texas.

Because people are starving and you're being paid to do a speech! It's not fair!

You should give your home over to refugees and slip in a trash can.


No I'm with you. I don't get the hate.

If someone offered me $400,000 for it I'd do a speech about how much I love the taste of urine at the national we love peeing in each other's mouths convention.

It's $400,000. You think Obama's going to go "Nah, not interested"
---

Antifar posted...

Yes, and the fact that in your mind Barack Obama falls into the same category is very, very funny.

how has the Venezuelan government changed your opinions on what leftism is really like?

shockthemonkey posted...

lmao at people being upset by this

what the fuck else did you think Obama was going to do next? Go into porn?

I'm actually surprised and impressed how much Obama has stayed out of politics since he left
---