Comments on: Obama has Become a Japanese Verb

By: JeffersonDavis

JeffersonDavis — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 07:28:29 +0000

Not a big fan of Bush and I couldn't stand Cheney.

But lets not forget what it means when we “Reaganed” the USSR, “Cartered the economy”, “Clintoned the deficit” (or Clintoned the intern – lol).

The Japanese term appears to have the “ostrich with his head in the sand” connotation to it. That isn't a good thing, as was stated above.

By: Silhouette

Silhouette — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 23:12:23 +0000

Keith Olbermann already coined “Bushed” as a verb. “To Bush” means to transparently hornswaggle, or to bask in narcissitic glory as everything you touch turns to crap.

We could use “Cheney” to describe roughly “to be ruthlessly conned”. To Cheney: manipulating with forceful coercion to buy a rotten product.

By: JSpencer

JSpencer — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 20:25:21 +0000

CS – Agreed, there are probably as many with unrealistic expectations as there are those who wish for failure. Neither is a productive attitude. I expect most of the TMV people are in that middle ground somewhere… or so I would hope. (whoops, there's that word again

By: nthomas00

nthomas00 — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 19:36:17 +0000

Obama can continue on with his optimism “Yes We Can” rhetorical talk all he wants, but it doesn't mean anything unless some action is put behind it.

By: CStanley

CStanley — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 18:44:19 +0000

J, I guess that's one way of looking at it but virtually all of the 'seemingly insurmountable challenges' you mention didn't require ignoring facts and realities…rather, they involved decisions to commit resources to solving the seemingly insurmountable challenges. About the only one that you mentioned that could fit the category would be the moon launch, since we really did lack the technological know how at the time that JFK issued the challenge- but that's still not exactly the same as ignoring facts, it was still about committing resources.

Today though, with many of the 'seemingly insurmountable challenges', those who chant 'yes we can' actually ARE in many cases ignoring facts and feeling that if they wish it hard enough, it will all work out.

By: JSpencer

JSpencer — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 18:28:04 +0000

Well let's see… putting a man on the moon in the 60s? Ridiculous! Winning WWII? Ridiculous! Pulling the US out of the great depression? Ridiculous! Building a worldclass interstate highway system back in mid-century? Ridiculous! Here's the deal, if the naysayers hold sway, and the “yes we can” attitude (a non-partisan thing no?) is heckled out of the room, then seemingly insurmountable challenges will never be undertaken in the first place. What kind of wusses do we want to be?

By: CStanley

CStanley — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 18:21:48 +0000

“To ignore inexpedient and inconvenient facts or realities, think ‘Yes we can, Yes we can,’ and proceed with optimism …”

I don't know if that definition of how it's being used is accurate or not, but I'm struggling to understand how that would be 'mostly positive'. You're the leader of the free world and you make decisions based on 'ignoring inexpedient and inconvenient facts and realities', using blinded optimism to proceed in spite of those realities, and that's supposed to be a good thing?