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Obama's Familiar Orbit
I keep thinking about that tool bag. You know -- the one that the astronaut accidentally let loose while she was repairing the International Space Station last month. Now it's in orbit, more than 200 miles above the Earth. There's even a Web site where you can track its exact location, if that's your idea of a good time. NASA figures the 30-pound bag of equipment will burn up harmlessly as it re-enters the Earth's atmosphere sometime next June.
For now, it's up there, floating silently and uselessly, which, if you think of government as a sort of national toolkit for protecting and improving the lives of its citizens, could be seen as a pretty good metaphor for the last eight years. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, nothing done -- except with the kind of blunt hammers that see everything as a nail and cause more harm than good.
It's probably not for nothing that both Newsweek and Time had the word "fix" on their covers this week. We're in need of major repairs in this country, at every level. That celestial tool bag orbiting above our heads might have come in handy. Its contents include two grease guns, a scraper and a trash bag -- all things that could be useful for an incoming president seeking big changes in Washington.
But, I hear you asking, where is the change? Despite all the campaign rhetoric, so far, President-Elect Obama's announced appointments haven't exactly rattled the cages of the Beltway establishment; no one has emerged from the left, for example, who would give DC politicos a good, healthy case of the vapors.
It's consensus building, say his supporters; he's putting together a team of people with experience and know-how who can insure continuity and stability in a time of crisis. This is a process of synthesis -- the new ideas will come from him. Obama's a smart guy, they say. Not to worry -- he's got this covered.
As he himself said at his December 1 press conference, "I will be setting policy as president. I will be responsible for the vision that this team carries out, and I expect them to implement that vision once decisions are made."
Maybe that's so, and it would be unfair to judge a presidency that doesn't even officially begin for another seven weeks. We all wish Barack Obama godspeed and good luck. But you'll forgive me for being a little nervous. You can call his appointments a "team of rivals," if you like -- that currently in vogue, nostalgic reference to Obama's hero Abraham Lincoln manning his cabinet with those who ran against him for the Republican nomination in 1860 -- but in truth, it seems more like a team of the same old, same old.
To work toward solving our economic crisis Obama has brought in many of the same old Clinton hands who helped us into this mess via deregulation and the wink of a blind eye to the big financial institutions -- the same ones that have either sunk beneath the waves or that we're bailing out now.
The Bush administration made the economic disaster worse, but both Barack Obama's designated Secretary of the Treasury -- Tim Geithner -- and his choice to direct the National Economic Council, Larry Summers (a former Treasury secretary), are pals of Bill Clinton's Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, who left Treasury to join Citigroup, where he's now a director and senior advisor. Yes, folks, Citigroup -- the bank the government now has agreed to insure against projected losses of $306 billion -- on top of bailouts totaling $45 billion.
Same old, same old in national security and foreign policy, too -- Bob Gates, Donald Rumsfeld's replacement, stays on at the Defense Department for at least for a year; General James Jones, seasoned military man and friend of John McCain's becomes national security advisor. And, of course, there's Senator Hillary Clinton, the next Secretary of State. At Monday's press conference, President-Elect Obama was asked pointedly about their past differences:
PETER BAKER, New York Times: ...Going back to the campaign, you were asked and talked about the qualifications of the -- your now -- your nominee for Secretary of State, and you belittled her travels around the world, equating it to having teas with foreign leaders; and your new White House counsel said that her resume was grossly exaggerated when it came to foreign policy. I'm wondering whether you could talk about the evolution of your views of her credentials since the spring.
PRESIDENT-ELECT OBAMA: Look, I'm in -- I think this is fun for the press, to try to stir up whatever quotes were generated during the course of the campaign.
BAKER: Your quotes, sir.
PRESIDENT-ELECT OBAMA: No, I understand. And I'm -- and you're having fun. (Laughs.)
BAKER: I'm asking a question.
PRESIDENT-ELECT OBAMA: But the -- and there's nothing wrong with that. I'm not -- I'm not faulting it. But look, I think if you look at the statements that Hillary Clinton and I have made outside of the -- the heat of a campaign, we share a view that America has to be safe and secure and in order to do that we have to combine military power with strengthened diplomacy.
So let me get this straight -- we weren't supposed to take seriously anything that was said during "the heat of a campaign?" Doesn't that invalidate the time and effort we spent evaluating the differences between the candidates before we cast our votes? I'm just asking.
Equally disconcerting are the paeans of praise for the appointments coming from those who so bitterly opposed Obama's election just a month ago. "Reassuring," said Karl Rove. Karl Rove! "The new administration is off to a good start" -- so sayeth Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. "This will be a valedictocracy," conservative David Brooks gushed in The New York Times. "Rule by those who graduate first in their high school classes."
O brave new world, that hath such people in it. Maybe it's true, as Republican campaign consultant Mark McKinnon wrote Monday, that, "The political classes have briefly sobered up and decided to act responsibly, selflessly and -- dare we say it -- in the best interest of the country. The times are simply so serious, so dangerous, so calamitous that we can't afford politics as usual."
I truly hope so, but a healthy dose of skepticism dictates that I'll believe it when I see it. Look out for tool bags, falling from the sky. And possibly a flying pig or two.
- Posted in
33 Comments so far
Show AllWinship's quotation of the questioning of Obama about Clinton was, I'm very sorry to say, far too typical of the whole Q and A session that followed the "national security team" introductions. Obama was simply embarrassingly inarticulate and self-defensive whenever he was challenged by reporters (which it is their job to do, and not for the reason of having "fun" by doing it) and his body language as he left the room was anything but that of the man who would provide the "vision" that will command this "team of rivals" to do his bidding. I'm not making this up, and it hit me unexpectedly, he seemed to slink from the room, and almost seemed to be clinging to H. Clinton to keep from falling. It was the worst moment for me of the whole campaign-and-transition season. It HAS to get better after this. I hope, I hope, I hope.
"I hope, I hope, I hope."
You will be better off watching for them flying pigs.
Rickster
Right on, rickster469! Every American should listen to Pink Floyd's album "Animals". They would see the world a little more clearly.
I think any of the Pink Floyd records would help, even uma guma. I may not have spelled that right. There's one I've never heard. Think it was their first one, not even sure what the title is but I understand their first album didn't go over very well.
Rickster
Dave, if "American politics politics is a farce from the get-go" (an assessment with which, sadly, I agree), I have to wonder why so many many Americans participate in this farce: not only voting, but donating money, campaigning for and against candidates, etc. I reflected on that question on election day in an article on my blog "I voted...I, there's the rub" which started from the observation of a demented woman in Jacksonville having voted when she thought LBJ was still in the White House. http://sunstateactivist.org/ssablog/?p=50 I didn't give myself a very satisfactory answer to that question, but maybe you or other readers can help satisfy this inquiring mind that wants to know.
Jerry -- I certainly don't know the answer, but it may be related to "milieu" (in the words of Richard Hofstadter.) Voters don't support and vote for candidates primarily to advance their interests but use politics (again in Hofstadter's words) as "a sounding board for identities, values, fears, and aspirations". Big, amorphous concepts like "hope" in such a milieu carry more symbolic meaning than "there is no basis for impeachment". The latter specific and prosaic statement should be a huge red flag and, therefore, hugely meaningful; but it is difficult to fit into a resonating symbol which is the main concern of political campaigns.
If you want to understand citizen participation in the "farce" possibly the methods of consumer marketing would be useful to explore because they are nearly identical with those of political marketing in the use of symbols, branding, manipulation of values, identities, and, mostly, how the results are obtained.
There is no way to tackle this situation other than getting at the root which is corporate culture and a sad and generally accepted lack of empowerment.
Sioux Rose
ARRY: Good points.
You may remember the joke Woody Allen uses in "Annie Hall"-- which, as comedians used to say, goes something like this:
A man mentions to his psychiatrist that his brother thinks he's a chicken.
"Oh?" the psychiatrist replies. "Then why don't you bring him in for treatment?"
"Well, I would," the man says, "but we need the eggs."
That's my guess for why so many Amerikans participate in this farce: they need the eggs.
· Yr Obd't Servant
Well yeah, that's a funny one but doesn't quite answer my question of why we participate. So we "need the eggs," but what are the "eggs" that are needed by our national psyche (psychosis?) Sigmund Freud, where are ya buddy when we need ya?
Where else can you get "hope" or "patriotism" at such a discount? Heck, they're giving it away free. It's like a rush to a Wal-Mart sale. Besides, it feeds the ego (who wants to, at least, give the appearance of being in control) through the id (which sensually loves the symbols of power and group-think.)
S. Freud
FWIW, Jerry, I wasn't trying to be merely flippant. One of the ways the joke can be analyzed is as a demonstration of "cognitive dissonance".
As I've followed politics, and especially when immersing myself in Internet comments boards, it becomes inescapably clear that in general, citizens have a powerful need to organize reality by believing that the political system works, and that the rituals and routines of mundane politics are meaningful and efficacious as advertised. And I DO mean "advertised".
That's the root of the putative virtues of "pragmatism" and "realism" upon which so many commenters claim to base their philosophy and perspective.
Without Googling to get the specifics of this Psychology 101 lesson, I'll move from the egg to the chicken: I vaguely recall a subset of cognitive dissonance theory illustrated by a description of a chicken who is faced with two simultaneous threats-- say, the silhouette of a chicken hawk above, and the bark of a fox nearby. The chicken's brain, short-circuited by simultaneously powerful "flight or fight" stimuli, will cause the chicken to perform a third behavior unrelated to the threat, e.g. pecking the ground as it normally does when feeding.
I don't know if reducing human activity to such a behavioristic paradigm comes across as merely snide, which is not my intention. But I'm not sure if the predilection for citizens to continue to participate, with varying degrees of compulsion or enthusisam, in an absurd and malevolent political process is anything more complicated than that pecking chicken writ large.
· Yr Obd't Servant
YOS, you're in my ballpark now with "cognitive dissonance." As a sociologist I never got all that far beyond Psych 101, but always thought of cd as a powerful if "behavioristic" explanation of some elements of human behavior. Where you lose me a little bit is your chicken story (if I hear one more of those...) and his fight or flight dilemma and resolution by following his routine and doing neither; this seems a better explanation of non-voting (because of "cross-pressures" which is another whole theory in political psychology) than of voting in a "farcical" situation. If fight/flight is a subset of cd theory, I don't know about it (which doesn't mean it doesn't exist.)
The way I think cd theory would formulate the problem is from this overall schema for inner psychological conflict. I'm doing or finding myself in a situation (eating something, being involved with a certain person) BUT I don't like this food I'm eating or I'm being hurt by the person with whom I am involved (there's the dissonance). So what to do (the resolution)? Obviously, I could stop eating the distasteful food or get out of the harmful relationship. But let's say I have nothing else to eat or have no date for the prom unless I go with this person. So instead of changing the behavior (eating, dating), I "resolve the dissonance" by changing my perception of the undesirability of the behavior: hey, this food ain't so bad, this old lady ain't so mean or ugly. In the case of voting, it is cognitively dissonant to be voting when you think that voting is a meaningless farce. However, the peer and societal pressures to do the citizenship thing and vote (haven't generations of Americans fought and died to give you this right?) and proudly wear your "I voted" sticker after you did will make you vote and you thus willingly acquiesce in the media hoopla about an election as the most "fateful" and "important" election of all time and join the parade and turn out as a good citizen to do the good citizens' duty. Or something like that.
Yes, I think your explanation fits better than my analogy of the chicken. (I never was much of a fan of behaviorism or Skinnerism, incidentally.) I thought of the chicken analogy because our politics is mired in a pathological duopoly-- thus, the idea of two seemingly-opposing stimuli.
But the analogy fails because in the experiment, the two stimuli are negative. As your reply suggests, in the case of politics it's people being exposed to a weak positive stimulus, and willfully cancelling or nullifying the negative stimulus to-- well, accentuate the positive.
Isn't there a song about that? ;)
· Yr Obd't Servant
"You Gotta Have Hope." (all right, so it's heart.) I've found our "Psych 101" exchange profitable. Wanna "take it outside?" I'm at jerrydrose11@yahoo.com
Sioux Rose
OBEDIENT: Love your analogy! Quite a deft mind you got working there, friend, to put together these otherwise seemingly unrelated types of behavioral events. I think you are definitely onto something big. Recall, too, and correct my memory but isn't it stated as "Phylogeny recapitulates ontology" or the other way around... to suggest that our human brains during the fetal period move up through the animal phyla. Mystics certainly find reasons to lend credence to a belief in cellular (or genetic) memory. Thus the behavior OF the chicken does lie as a remote latent response inside of our brains... I see the brain like a computer. Many files are never used, some were once used and go into a kind of sleep-state. It's been said by researchers that we use less than 10% of our brain's capacity. So you see, the chicken IS lurking there as has been made evident by the general lack of response on the part of our citizenry to being symbolically raped, robbed, and given the status of "target" by that chicken leader himself, who in the name of fighting terrorism, made sure there was lots more of it to go round, to support his favorite sponsor, the oh, so Christian Eric Prince and his boy-soldier army, aided and abetted by all the nifty killer toys produced 24/7 by our favored industry: the MIC war makers club.
No one can seriously pretend that we really spend time and effort "evaluating the differences between the candidates before we cast our votes."
Oh yes we do. We spend plenty of time figuring out the lessor of two evils that the main street media tells us has the best chance of winning.
Corporate America told us who our choices were most were just too lazy to look beyond that.
Rickster
Sioux Rose
DAVE B: The "shot heard round the world" is being replaced with the similar sound of a giant balloon (of all the inflated hopes & expectations) popping. I agree that at least the reporter DID point a question, too bad they waited for a president who's at least remotely CAPABLE of decency. I suppose that's what viewers noted, a glimmer of the HUMAN BEING and a SOUL in a presidential candidate put forth by the pre-selection committees "for democracy." The world breathed in a collective sigh of relief that serial killers given fancy credentials were at last to be taken from office, if not in handcuffs or rushed to the gallows (They so richly deserve), at least giving humanity a chance to collect itself and look down at the ground and marvel that LIFE still goes on... I would not want to be Obama. Does every child with an intellect consider the dream of becoming the great leader? If so, who would in such a vision take office at a moment when so much is crumbling, rumbling under their feet as if the solid had turned to a complete collapse of the integrity of its molecular structure, that so many sins against life taken in sum, can no longer hold these things we rely upon together. Collapse is upon us... and either Obama becomes the wave of possibility, or will be run over by it. History cannot afford too many more "mistakes" to further disaster capitalism at the risk/cost of EVERYTHING else, including THE sacred.
The United States has degenerated into a cesspool of scams, Ponzi schemes, flim-flams and snake oil distributorships. It has been making the rounds of every dive bar in the world with a broken beer bottle in each hand, looking for a fight. The only way out is to demolish all of it and replace it with something that has a semblance of honesty. Either Obama begins the process or he doesn't. If he doesn't, all we've done is buy a box of Hope brand band-aids to try to keep from bleeding to death from the thousands of wounds the Republicans and their Democratic co-conspirators have cut into Uncle Sam's body for the last forty years. Obama will have to bypass the vampires in Warshington and take his case to the people. He will have to risk defamation by the MSM and their Republican masters, defeat in 2012 and possibly even death. In other words, he will have to be a great man. The alternative is to watch the bullet train of history run us over.
Obama has the 'seal of approval' from the Likud Party. No change there.
Israel 'has faith in team Obama'
Fri, 05 Dec 2008 16:18:57 GMT
An Israeli official says Tel Aviv is familiar with and has full confidence in the people nominated to run the Obama administration.
"Obama is surrounding himself with people who we know - from Hillary Clinton, to Rahm Emanuel, to James Jones. There is no reason to panic," the Israeli official told the Jerusalem Post.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=77528§ionid=351020101
Mordechai, you nailed it. Is Obama strong enough and principled enough to actually ram through change that benefits ordinary people? There is an object lesson in Venezuela and Bolivia where populist leaders, who are trying to improve life for the little people, have to risk great upheaval and even insurrection because the ruling plutocracy will not willingly relinquish any power or wealth for the betterment of the citizenry as a whole.
That's it, isn't it. Those with power never relinquish it without a battle. If history teaches us anything, it's that. We need to elect a revolutionary leader. Do you really think the American voter is capable of doing that? They are out there, and even run for election as third party candidates. So we, as an electorate, have no excuse. I hate to say it, but America gets the leadership it deserves.
Is Obama strong enough and principled enough to actually ram through change that benefits ordinary people?
It is instructive to look at 1993. How much money did Clinton get for the programs he campaigned for? 16 billion. Obama isn't going to get that much. It is more of a question of how deep the cuts will be in programs that benefit ordinary people.
Sioux Rose
PITT: Well said! I've lived in Latin America and the education is appalling. It's an almost overt way to maintain control of the masses, by NOT allowing their children to rise on the wings of a higher education.
Hey, Jerry D. Rose, I happened to walk into the room just in time to see Obama exit after that press conference and noticed that slumped shoulder posture I'd never observed before. That moment made an impression on me also. If that moment is any indication, it is hard to imagine Obama overcoming the inclinations of his advisors and staff.(Assuming he had the inclination to begin with.)
The conversation went like this.
"Mr. Obama. You have a choice. The US is deeply in debt to China, Russia and Saudi Arabia. Those countries want the US military to secure resources for their industries as collateral for the debt.
You can choose to ignore that debt and the requested collateral and use your time helping US citizens, or you can work the the military.
If you choose to help the citizens of this country, you will then have to decide how long you want those body guards staying close to you."
"Same old, same old." As an old 'flower child' permit me to remain disillusioned.
Notice that in the interview excerpt, Obama says, "...we have to combine military power with strengthened diplomacy." He always mentions the military FIRST when he talks about foreign policy. The order one chooses for one's words can be very revealing. Apparently, we will only send diplomats to talk to you AFTER we've knocked your block off.
Kill them. Ask questions later.
In the meantime, steal their oil.
Reaganomics, Bush Doctrine, Clinton prosperity, and now Obama Bin Lyin.
Huh? All of a sudden criticism of Obama is permissable on Common Dreams?
Gee, before election day, I read very little of it. What has changed?
I am tired of this and other "progressive" websites that do nothing but implicitly support Democratic candidates that do NOTHING to advance the causes that the websites claim to believe in.
Isn't time for a balls out rejection of the 2 party system already???
This is the only chance for change. Not a guarantee, but at least a chance.
Just because usrcjp read very little of it doesnt mean the writing wasnt on the wall...
Honestly, CommonDreams was one of the few websites that I could read criticism of Obomba in the comment sections, even if there was a possible restriction of articles that challenged the rhetoric by mentioning details like voting record...
I get tired of folks who assume that a newswire that posts articles from writers from all over the world and all walks of life has some sort of common agenda to advance our collective cause... and if only we could all throw our support into one major political party, then all our problems would be solved by our new leaders...
Commondreams often posts articles that I would consider Liberal, Conservative, Progressive, and Regressive... A relatively free forum such as the comments section on Commondreams contains comments by folks who demonstrate the full range of consciousness and conscience, even the bottomfeeders play their role...
Criticizing "progressive" posters for not marching lockstep with the website's editors' preference for Democratic canditates is like shouting at the ocean...
And thinking that criticizing folks who post here for not doing anything to support the Democrats (who are more centrist than liberal, and a far cry from progressive)
is like pissing into the wind...
Gore Vidal summed it all up when he said, "America doesn't have a two party system. It has a one party system with two right wings."
Americans live in an effective one party state - no wonder nothing is done about the primitive electoral system.
You now have Obama sub contracting administrative services to the ruling class instead of Bush.
There hasn't been a change of 'government' since 1783.
I'm not that thrilled at the people he's surrounding himself with but it's still too early to render judgment on the man. Let's watch what he does after Jan 20th. If he does nothing then he'll be judged accordingly. If he does more of the same old shit and expects something different to happen then we'll know he's nutz. BV$H did everything with two things in mind. 1. too enrich his backers the wealthy. ( mission Accomplished on that score) 2. Too expand the power of Presidency @ the expense of democracy and the republic. ( Mission Accomplished on that goal as well) I think BV$h and his backers probably feel pretty good about his 8 yrs. I happen too know some of these people and they think BV$H did a stand up job. The rest of us mean nothing too them. Our concerns and our problems in their view are just that ours, not theirs. They have gotten much wealthier under Mr. BV$H and they can go back too their gated community in the knowledge that nobody will do much too change anything now. The games over folks and THEY ( the rich) have for all practical purposes won BIG, real BIG. Therefore, I've already lowered my personal expectations for Obama. Here they are. 1.If he keeps the SCOTUS from turning even further too the right that will be a victory. 2. If he manages to extract us from Iraq with the next 18 mos. that will be another huge victory. 3. If manages too stay alive. ( this will be a miracle if he really tries too change anything radically.) Beyond these three goals I don't see him getting much else done. The $$ is for the most part gone as is large parts of our Nat'l economy now. No man and no President can be expected to change what has taken place over the last 40 yrs. We didn't get into our present mess in one President's term, as bad as this guy's was. It's going too take more then one President too get us back too a better place. If Obama get's us going in the right direction that will be a HUGE victory in of itself. I'm not holding my breath, this after all 'Merica isn't it?