Compared to most politicians, Obama is an okay president

Hello :) This should be a fun and enlightening debate. I shall do my best, as a novice debater, to stay in line with the rules and on message. While I believe Obama does suck as a president, I would like to entertain the ideas that he does not do so that bad, while providing as many of the ways he does as I can :)

Many thanks to my opponent for allowing me to fairly make up for a lost round I missed, and to post my arguments.

To also clarify my position, I will concede with my opponent that Obama is, for my argument, NOT a compete failure, but to express points that show, through the loose definition of 'sucks' vs 'okay', that President Obama has dropped the ball on numerous occasions, performed hypocritically, acted counter to the constitution, and subsequently qualifies for the qualifier of 'suck' in contrast to 'okay'. As requested, I will do my best to not reference "Obama said.. " arguments (however many) merely to catch a 'lie', but rather to attempt to show the larger issue at hand.

Drones:
http://www.youtube.com...
This is Obama's weapon of choice; quick, quiet, cheap, and left under the C.I.A's command rather than his armed forces. However, the have shown to be reckless, crude, and the full details of their activities and locations used have been shrouded in the typical military classification system. What the drone program has allowed is for a president to use military force in another nation without boots on ground, while having a barrier of responsibility between him, that being the CIA. While the drone has the potential for being a great war utensil and deterrent, it has been used, just like Truman's A-bomb, inappropriately and regrettably. In Pakistan alone, where Obama takes credit for taking out Osama, a reports claim that drones may have killed over 900 civilians, with a good portion of those being children [1], aside from those numbers reportedly being fudged from higher command. As a vet myself, I know how easy this is and was to do by staff officers, such as labeling people assisting to provide medical aid (pick up dead/wounded) who would subsequently be 'militants' killed [2]. The numbers of civilian casualties will continues to leak in means outside of official reporting. Additionally, the line continues to shrink when it comes to the constitutionality of military killings of people, especially American citizens, such as Anwar al-Awlaki on Sept. 30, 2011 [3] As his right as a citizen to trial was trumped my military interpretation of 'threat', some could wonder could a stateside citizen be killed in a similar fashion with the same justification, or better yet, a leak document justifying such: see [4].

Complicit with NSA / CIA troubles
http://www.youtube.com...
I won't go too heavily into the position of whether or not our current (and now failing) spying/surveillance program used worldwide is beneficial to us/all, as I have a specific position outside of this debate, however, I will state that it is through Obama and his administration the has allowed something worse, something that I and everyone can/should disagree and react spuriously about, and that is reports that the program metastasized into the other branches of government for their own intrinsic purposes, outside of it's official justification of counter-terrorism. [see video, 5]. (FYI, I hate Fox 'News', but Napolitano is on point!) The problem with this that implicates president Obama, is that a president must explicitly sign-off on this such tyranny. Those who have the power to see, find, and even change intimate details and information about you can and are sharing that with those who have no authority outside of counter-terrorism; IRS, DoJ, Police Departments, etc. Basically, if you are a government alphabet group, the NSA/CIA/FBI can give you what your asking for. It would be one thing if the agencies who had this power were actually mandated and monitored to follow constitutional provisions regarding these activities, but Obama has not done this, and we even complicit. Even his peers in other countries are sick of either his inability to control his own military/spying, or his lying of such, as in the case of Germany, were despite denied reports last year of tapping Merkel's phone, Obama was caught with pants down AGAIN just this month with more spying [6]

Hypocritical 'FOR-WAR' stance
http://www.youtube.com...
http://www.youtube.com...
While the recipient of the Peace Prize claims to be fighting/bombing/droning for justified reasons, they are not consistent. Obama bombed Libya for reasons that Ghadafi was using air assets against his people and justified a forced no-fly zone (via bombing their air assets)[7]. If so, then how/why are Ukraine and Israel still allowed to use and do the same indiscriminate air strikes now on CIVILIAN targets? [videos] . If Obama is going to bomb one country for that justification, and then fund/supply others while they do the same thing, he is ethically and legally unjustified, and 'sucks' as a leader.

[1]http://www.huffingtonpost.com...
[2]
[3] http://alj.am...
[4] http://msnbcmedia.msn.com...
[5] http://www.forbes.com...
[6] http://rt.com...
[7] http://www.theguardian.com...

In an effort to maintain a fair and equal debate, I will forgo this round, and we will (should) move directly into rebuttals in the final round. See comments.

Misty, I am sad that you were unable to provide a response or defense to my argument, but I will pursue to respond, in short (very), to your argument for the sake of validating my own position.

In your argument, you brought three issues that you believe Obama has handled quite well, that removes him from the 'sucks' category: Civil rights, education, and environment. These issues are important, of course, and anyone willing to ignore or downplay these issues is not only deserving of a leadership position, but also damaging their own political success. But,, that is just the point. Anyone can (should) agree that all men are created equal, and thereby subject to the same birth rights as everyone else. Anyone can fight, or merely just appear to fight, for the advancement and improvement of our educational system. And anyone can agree that, aside from the debate of global warming, we as a people need to change the way we produce, consume, and live in order to manage resources and provide waste management. The difference is how a leader and/or his administration go about defining these issues and how best to address them, which is best contrasted in the difference between the political right and left. Ultimately, this is expected, and what one president/party achieve in their term, is easily reverted in the other. These issues will flip back and forth because of the majority's difference of opinion, and how their leaders defend their constituency.

However, the issues that are hard, the ones that leaders don't wish to address publicly with the people are the tough decisions and issues I mentioned above. The advent of global militarization via drones, privacy rights of the individual counter to constitutional provisions, and a flip-flop foreign policy justification for either taking direct action or providing indirect consent for action. Obama has avoided confronting these issues publicly because he believes (I believe) that he is and has been in the wrong on these and other issues, and cannot address these issues, until information on how they are being handled behind the scenes is leaked out. Obama had a chance to make a change, and to undo so many things from the previous Bush administration that he publicly stated were wrong, but sadly, he has not only allowed them, he has advanced them.

I'll give credit where credit is due, he has done, as you mentioned, many great things to better our nation and humanity, but in the end we have to remember that it is not the easy decisions that anyone can make, but how they react to the tough issues, pressures, and circumstances that make or break any leader. In this aspect, Obama has failed in my reasons provided, in addition to many others, both know now, and later to be declassified.