Launched recovery.gov to track spending from the Recovery Act, providing transparency and allowing the public to report fraud, waste, or abuse -1
Have you looked at this site at all? Its bullshit. The website itself cost 18 MILLION.I'll also use a source to back myself up.
http://techpresident...blic-engagement
Provided the Department of Veterans Affairs with more than $1.4 billion to improve services to America's Veterans + 1
I'll give it a plus one, even though the source shows nothing at all about this. He can have a plus 1. He will need it.
Signed the Children's Health Insurance Reauthorization Act, which provides health care to 11 million kids -- 4 million of whom were previously uninsured +- 0
This is a Reauthorization of a previous bill that had already been signed and enforced. All that this bill does is enable the bill again, since it reached the end of its lifetime. With 91% of children having insurance, there isn't a chance that it wouldn't have been signed back in by congress. All he did was put his signature on it.
Signed the Children's Health Insurance Reauthorization Act, which provides health care to 11 million kids -- 4 million of whom were previously uninsured +1
Of course. There will be millions against this, but whatever. Its not a debate over if we should research this or not. Let the courts decide if its legal or something.
Christopher and Dana Reeve Paralysis Act +1?
The bill sets up provisions to create funding for paralysis research. I failed to find anything on what its actually done, but we shall give it a plus one for a good cause.
Developed stimulus package, which includes approx. $18 billion for nondefense scientific research and development -1
In that same bill. The bill gives more then 18 billion to the Office of the Inspector General so he can oversee the spending. As well as million to pet projects and bullshit spending. Out of 800 millions, 2% of that went to non defense scientific research. 18 billion looks nice, but not when more then that number comes from a much larger number going to bullshit spending.
http://www.gpo.gov/f...S-111hr1enr.pdf
Go read the 800 pages of the bill. Spend an hour looking through what the money goes to. Realize how bullshit it really is.
Signed the Weapons Systems Acquisition Reform Act to stop fraud and wasteful spending in the defense procurement and contracting system -1
Despite costing us additional money every year. This bill is actually worse. Before this system was implemented the Office of Program Analysis and Evaluation (PA&E) handled the exact same job. Instead of removing or reforming that previous job, they simply ADDED the same job over again. Now there are two agency working on doing the same exact thing, which simply makes a mindfuck of paperwork and redtape to get anything done. The bill itself doesn't make any laws or guidelines or regulations for doing the purchasing, instead just hires someone to do that. This has done nothing to make a difference in spending if you take a look at our spending for military since 2009. This should have been voted and the current position should have been changed.
http://www.nationald...shHasBegun.aspx
Closed Guantanamo Bay +- 0
Its STILL FUCKING OPEN TODAY. Hes even issued orders himself to delay closing the prison. All that this executive order was is to satisfy the people who asked for it to be closed. After it was signed, everyone forgot, and so it remains open today.
http://en.wikipedia...._detention_camp
Ended Bush administration's CIA program of 'enhanced interrogation methods' by requiring that the Army field manual be used as the guide for terrorism interrogations +- 0
Only applies to actions inside of the United States, outside of the us (Aka, Guantanamo Bay) they can use whatever policy that they want to use.
Increased minority access to capital +- 0
Does anything actually have to be said about this? (The source posted doesn't even exist anymore anyways)
Established Credit Card Bill of Rights, preventing credit card companies from imposing arbitrary rate increases on customers +- 0This bill specifically prevents retarded people from having a credit card and going into debt. A policy that is already enacted by the major banks (I was denied a credit and a debit card at 17. Was only given an atm card). What it does not protect against is the banks making up their money in another way. My previously free checking now has a 12 dollar maintenance fee. Thanks Obama.
Health Care Reform Bill, preventing insurance companies from denying insurance because of a pre-existing condition +- 0
The inclusion of requiring health care of facing a penalty completely ruins the effectiveness of this bill. When that provision is removed, this will be a good bill.
Health Care Reform Bill, allowing children to remain covered by their parents' insurance until the age of 26 + 1
Despite the inclusion of the requirement for having health care, this is a nice benefit because it allows college students to have health care while in college.
Tax cuts for up to 3.5 million small businesses to help pay for employee health care coverage +- 0
The included source does not cover any of this. So yeah. K. I'll just take your word for this (will rewrite this if someone finds me a credible source for the tax cuts)
Tax credits for up to 29 million individuals to help pay for health insurance +- 0
Seriously? The same source that again doesn't mention these tax cuts. *sigh*. This one cant be rewritten, because there are still millions being fined for not having health care. Helping people pay for something your forcing them to have, is just stupid.
Expansion of Medicaid to all individuals under age 65 with incomes up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level +- 0
I'm not giving him -20 for his 800 billion dollar pile of waste, he can't have +20 for every single thing under the health care reform act.
Require health insurance plans to disclose how much of the premium actually goes to patient care +- 0
Same as above
Added 4.6 billion USD to the Veterans Administration budget to recruit and retain more mental health professionals +- 0
You already added to the veterans budget. And again the source is a page that doesn't even talk about it. Fuck this shit. (Plus. 4.6 BILLION. for mental health professionals? Seriously?)
Significantly increased funding for the Violence Against Women Act +- 0
I strongly support the violence against women act's ideas and movements. But I do not agree that 28,000 is a "significantly increased funding". When you spent 1.8 million on ATV vehicles. Violence Again Women Act could at least get a million from you.... To me that feels like a middle find to woman "Hahaha, your not worth as much as our atv vehicles!"
Lifted restrictions granting Cuban Americans unrestricted rights to visit family and send remittances to the island +- 0
This really isn't a giant policy or change. There will be arguments its a good thing. There will be arguments that its a bad thing. Supporting illegal aliens, supporting dictatorship, whatever. Glad that they can visit their family. But this is an extremely tiny amount of people affected. In a nation that suffered an economic crash, this has little significance.
Eliminated subsidies to private lender middlemen of student loans and protect student borrowers +- 0
Student Loans are still the worst thing imaginable. I wish I could find this image someone had posted before that outlines a student loan as a contract that screws you over. Including increased payments, and direct wage garnishing without the need for a judges approval. It screws the student over 120% percent. When he does something to address this, this I'll give him a +1. Until then, he can go fuck himself.
Increased funding for national parks and forests by 10% +- 0
130 million dollars while we are trillions of dollars into debt. If funding had went from somewhere else to here, or even if this was part of the 800 billion dollars we already spend. Then it would not be so bad. But we already spent 800 billion on increasing our government spending. Lets tack on 130 million more to that as if it was nothing. I'm not giving a -1 for this because National Parks are a good thing, but its not a +1 because he didn't do anything to make up for the 130 million hes giving away. When you are in debt, you cant just spend more money. terrible practice.
Significantly expanded Pell grants, which help low-income students pay for college +- 0
which should raise the maximum grant to $5,975 from $5,550 by 2017. Not even fucking significant. Even worse though, is that the Pell Grant program still fails to cover a very important part of a shortcoming. It uses your parents income to determine what you can get. This means middle class people who earn above the threshold, but do not get babied by the parents and their entire college funding paid for, don't get anything from the Pell Grant. That means millions of middle class children get screwed over.
Expanded hate crime law in the US to include sexual orientation through the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act +- 0
How misleading. Sexual Orientation has been recognized as a hate crime a long time before this. The Hate Crime Statistics Act of 1990 allows sexual orientation to be considered a hate crime. Despite not being legally names as one, the punishments where exactly the same as if it where, using that act as a precident for it being a hate crime. This law simply makes it official, although judicial precedent had already accomplished that.
Provided stimulus funding to boost private sector spaceflight programs -1
He slashes funding from our public sector programs to move it to the private sector, which is years behind where our public sector programs are at. Basically, he sent spaceflight several years into the pass. This is BAD. The stimulus money that went to private sector spaceflight should have gone to NASA, which is far ahead of the private sector.
Appointed nation's first Chief Technology Officer +- 0
Big. Deal.
Signed financial reform law establishing a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to look out for the interests of everyday Americans + 1
Not for this Bureau. I'm sure it will end up bullshit. But there are several good things in the bill, and the money comes from the largest corporations (Aka, the ones who fucked us over). I can stand behind that one.
Signed financial reform law requiring lenders to verify applicants' credit history, income, and employment status +- 0
Same bill as above. Stop double dipping.
Signed financial reform law prohibiting banks from engaging in proprietary trading (trading the bank's own money to turn a profit, often in conflict with their customers' interests) +- 0
Same as above
Signed financial reform law allowing shareholders of publicly traded companies to vote on executive pay +- 0
Same as above
Cut prescription drug cost for medicare recipients by 50% +- 0
Under the healthcare reform act. As I said before. Each bill can have a + or a Minus. You cant have multiples from one bill (otherwise there would be a huge chunk from the stimulus package)
Provided $12.2 Billion in new funding for Individuals With Disabilities Education Act +- 0
Already been covered under the Recovery Act
Extended Benefits to same-sex partners of federal employees + 1
Kudos
Appointed more openly gay officials than any other president in US history +- 0
Should be elected on their merits, not because they are gay. I don't give a shit about that.
The American Recovery & Reinvestment Act of 2009: a $789 billion economic stimulus plan
Already been discussed (Fuck does this site double dip or what?)
Created more private sector jobs in 2010 than during entire Bush years +- 0
At the cost of government jobs as well. Its a trade off, not a huge increase. Its also hard to determine how many of those jobs were created by him, or buy others. Thousands of the employers who created jobs did not take money from the government.
Voluntary disclosure of White House visitors for the first time in US history +- 0
Yeah. That fixes up our economy real nice.
Appointed first Latina to the US Supreme Court +- 0
Like I said before. Fuck race/gender/sexual orientation. Elect them on their merits ONLY (Maybe I should mark these as a negative if hes doing it just for diversity)
Promoted social responsibility through creation of serve.gov, a national database of volunteer opportunities +- 0
Has anyone heard of this site before? I certainly haven't. I wish I could have the budget for creating it. If its 18 million like recovery.gov, since volunteermatch already exists, this would be a negative 1. Oh well.
Reversed 'global gag rule', allowing US aid to go to organizations regardless of whether they provide abortions +1
Kudos
Signed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, giving the FDA the authority to regulate the manufacturing, marketing, and sale of tobacco for the first time - 1
A regulation that doesn't actually do any regulation. The major change in this bill is that it eliminates the competition for Phillip Morris. Kudos to you!
http://online.wsj.co...0666987226.html
http://blogs.reuters...-philip-morris/
Signed New START Treaty - nuclear arms reduction pact with Russia + 1
Debatable
Increased average fuel economy standards from 27.5mpg to 35.5mpg, starting in 2016 +- 0
Legislation that wont even take place until 2016, and will most likely be pushed back or changed by that point. Its a feel good law that has no actual hold until it goes into effect.
Signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, restoring basic protections against pay discrimination for women and other workers +- 0
Keeps an act that was already established in effect
Provided travel expenses to families of fallen soldiers to be on hand when the body arrives at Dover AFB +- 0
I think its a nice gesture, but its not really a large policy that needs to be considered as a plus one. Its not like they get to see the bodies, or have a memorial service or anything. They just get to see the coffins before they are shipped back to their home town to be buried.
Reversed the policy of barring media coverage during the return of fallen soldiers to Dover Air Force Base +- 0
Falls into the same category as below.
And we are done.
That's + 3 recorded from the sites huge list of all of the awesome things hes done.
Feel free to debate and argue points and such, but provide research and points so I can see where you are coming from. I'm open to changing the list as you thing it should be changed as long as you can provide points as to why its good.
