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Progressives Pay the Price for Confusing a Party With a Movement
The difference between parties and movements is simple: Parties are loyal to their own power regardless of policy agenda; movements are loyal to their own policy agenda regardless of which party champions it. This is one of the few enduring political axioms, and it explains why the organizations purporting to lead an American progressive "movement" have yet to build a real movement, much less a successful one.
Though the 2006 and 2008 elections were billed as progressive movement successes, the story behind them highlights a longer-term failure. During those contests, most leaders of Washington's major labor, environmental, anti-war and anti-poverty groups spent millions of dollars on a party endeavor-specifically, on electing a Democratic president and Democratic Congress. In the process, many groups subverted their own movement agendas in the name of electoral unity.
The effort involved a sleight of hand. These groups begged their grass-roots members-janitors, soccer moms, veterans and other "regular folks"-to cough up small-dollar contributions in return for the promise of movement pressure on both parties' politicians. Simultaneously, these groups went to dot-com and Wall Street millionaires asking them to chip in big checks in exchange for advocacy that did not offend those fat cats' Democratic politician friends (or those millionaires' economic privilege).
This wasn't totally dishonest. Many groups sincerely believed that Democratic Party promotion was key to progressive movement causes. And anyway, during the Bush era, many of those causes automatically helped Democrats by indicting Republicans.
But after the 2008 election, the strategy's bankruptcy is undeniable.
As we now see, union dues underwrote Democratic leaders who today obstruct serious labor law reform and ignore past promises to fix NAFTA. Green groups' resources helped elect a government that pretends sham "cap and trade" bills represent environmental progress. Health care groups promising to push a single-payer system got a president not only dropping his own single-payer promises, but also backing off a "public option" to compete with private insurance. And anti-war funding delivered a Congress that refuses to stop financing the Iraq mess, and an administration preparing to escalate the Afghanistan conflict.
Of course, frustrated progressives might be able to forgive the groups that promised different results, had these postelection failures prompted course corrections.
For example, had the left's pre-eminent groups responded to Democrats' health care capitulations by immediately announcing campaigns against these Democrats, progressives could feel confident that these groups were back to prioritizing a movement agenda. Likewise, had the big anti-war organizations reacted to Obama's Afghanistan escalation plans with promises of electoral retribution, we would know those organizations were steadfastly loyal to their anti-war brand.
But that hasn't happened. Despite the president's health care retreat, most major progressive groups continue to cheer him on, afraid to lose their White House access and, thus, their Beltway status. Meanwhile, The New York Times reports that Moveon.org has "yet to take a clear position on Afghanistan" while VoteVets' leader all but genuflected to Obama, saying, "People [read: professional political operatives] do not want to take on the administration."
In this vacuum, movement building has been left to underfunded (but stunningly successful) projects like Firedoglake.com, Democracy for America, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and local organizations. And that's the lesson: True grass-roots movements that deliver concrete legislative results are not steered by marble-columned institutions, wealthy benefactors or celebrity politicians-and they are rarely ever run from Washington. They are almost always far-flung efforts by those organized around real-world results-those who don't care about party conventions, congressional cocktail parties or White House soirees they were never invited to in the first place.
Only when enough progressives realize that truism will any movement-and any change-finally commence.
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91 Comments so far
Show AllDavid Sirota mentions a vacuum that we progressives are in. I feel that I've been lost in a vacuum since Jan 20, 2009. Everyday Obama's first term is shaping up to becoming Bush's third term while being Cheney's whipping boy.
We've been lost in a vacuum since Jan 20 all right, but since Jan 20, 1977, not 2009. The first betrayer of the American worker "liberal" was Jimmy Carter, not Obama.
As long as the American worker keeps voting for Democrats and their siamese twins the Republicans, they'll keep getting stabbed in the back by both. Stop the insanity.
Wrong. It was Truman in 1947.
OK, come on guys. Have you liked *any* democrats? :-) Seriously... the only good president was FDR...? A bit myopic, I think.
Obama has accomplished one truly positive thing: he has, at last, proven beyond any reasonable doubt, that the Democrats are as great an enemy of ordinary people as the Republicans.
If people walk away with only one thought about what is happening, I hope it is that Ob has made it quite obvious that both parties are corporate owned and it is time to start working for other candidates who have our interests at heart.
I read some comments earlier about how Obama and Democrats are losing support, but that support isn't translating into boosts in Republican support.
So hopefully people know what the hell is up and perhaps there will be some pwoggie candidates to run in 12.
This is such unadulterated bullshit that I have to wonder whether you were awake at all during the Bush years or when the Republicans launched their Contract On America? Sure the Dems aren't a leftist party, but to place them in the same boat as the ultra-right neocons is to totally misunderstand the political situation. Language like that can only lead to a future right-wing victory, because if people come to believe that both are the same, the moneyed interests can easily push people back to the ultra-right Republicans.
The class struggle goes on and the working class has much more possibilities pushing against a Democratic administration than a Republican one. And that is political reality.
hey struggle,
i've got your political reality for you. a dem prez, a dem majority in both house of congress, and all the pushing of the working class can't make them pass efca, much less single payer.
piss off, troll.
"liberal dupe". Haha, that's a good one sonny. You obviously know nothing about me or my political history/involvement.
I've never stated that I support the Democrats. In fact, I've seen through bourgeois parliamentary politics many years ago. It's a farce established to protect the class interests of the capitalist class. I very much believe in Lenin's concept of the dictatorship of the proletariat. BUT, I also look at the political reality of where the USA is at at the moment. Knowing that REAL CHANGE can only come about through the struggles of the working class to do away with capitalism, I have to access the stage of the class struggle at any given historical time. Today, is there a third-party alternative that can assume political power in the US? Of course not, nowhere close. In the class struggle that presently exists, I believe that one has to look at where the working class has any opportunity to advance its immediate interests. When I look at the Democratic Party I see a coalition of forces that span a fairly wide range in the left-right spectrum. The predominant forces within that party are the corporate forces. But, there are still fairly large elements within that party that are more liberal and some actually fairly left. (Black Caucus, Kucinich, etc.) When I look at the Republicans, it's a whole other story. They truly encompass the right-wing and the ultra-right wing. Now, you tell me, when it comes to the daily grind of the class struggle, where the working class has some ability to push each party to somewhat more progressive reforms in our class interests? Any sane analysis would have to conclude that the Democrats are more pushable than the Republicans.
That is all that I was suggesting. It is unwise to simply lump the Democrats and the Republicans in the same boat and not take into consideration which is better for the working class, at this particular historical time, as it strives for at the very least some immediate gains. It is through this striving that the working class eventually learns that it needs its own political party if it is to really elevate its class interests. But, the American working class is not yet at that realization. That isn't yet the level of its class development. To say there is no difference between between the two parties and only a new working class party is the answer is indeed correct, it just isn't on today's agenda. The coalition of forces that came together to elect the Democrats and throw out the Bushites is where today's American working class are at in terms of the class struggle. Our job as leftists is to work within that coalition of forces, pushing it to make immediate gains for the working class, while at the same time pushing the class struggle to go further and beyond. To simply shit on this broad coalition, call them stupid and appear gleeful that they are being abused by the capitalist class because they were just too damn stupid to vote for Nader, isn't going to move the class struggle forward.
"You must not sink to the level of the masses, to the level of the backward strata of the class. That is incontestable. You must tell them the bitter truth. You are in duty bound to call their bourgeois-democratic and parliamentary prejudices what they are—prejudices. But at the same time you must soberly follow the actual state of the class-consciousness and preparedness of the entire class (not only of its communist vanguard), and of all the working people (not only of their advanced elements)."
V.I. Lenin ... http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/lwc/ch07.htm
Took the words right out of my mouth, bravissimo. Democrats are in fact worse than Republicans, because millions of weak-minded fools buy into their bs of being pro-labor and peace when they're in fact Republican clones. At least real Republicans are easier to spot.
More preaching to the choir. But a good sermon, I guess.
Preaching to the choir is not a futile effort. Progressives need to feed off each others energies to unleash a movement.
I know this author well and I haven't forgotten that year in 2008 when he put party over principle but for once I like this article. But more on what we individuals can do. Not everyone can go out and campaign but the least we can do is open our hearts and minds to the issues and get into the graceful art of identifying one's candidate based on the issues and principle rather than party affiliation.
It also wouldn't hurt to do some clarifying of statements and defining of the issues. Obama said at one point that he wanted to get past Viet Nam and the associated divisions in this country. But we never asked what he had learned from and about the conflicts, there and here. I think, now, the answer would be nothing. It was the same when Bush ran in 2000 and said his favorite political philosopher was Jesus. No one ever asked him to clarify exactly what Jesus said about politics that he found so admirable.
Clarifying would help. Unfortunately, it appears that vague candidates get the most votes while genuine candidates who are honest and clear are persecuted and called "boring". That's another factor that angered me a lot and drove my blood pressure high during last year's election. I would love to see someone or some people devise a way to make the genuine candidates tougher to beat anyday or at least share us the strategies so that we the people can experiment.
yes we do seem to have the worst of all possible worlds - with obama in the role of the turncoat assassin
first the banks raid the treasury and now the hmo/insurance/pharmas are lining up to clean out the few remaining pennies - thanks to a closed door sweetheart deal with brother obama
oh - the irony of obama slitting our throats...now that was a surprise we can believe in
what a psyop obama has been - his biggest supporter is his mentor henry kissinger who hopes that obama will seize this moment of crisis to ram the nwo down not only oir throats but of the whole world as well
in doing so he has crashed the hopes of millions
your doin' a heck of a job baraky
all the while getting bitch slapped by everyone from the nutbar palin to the lizard cheney
he can't even put the birth certificate thing behind him
he tries again and again to work with racist gopers who probably think of him as an uppity nigger while he sells us, the ones who voted for him, repsected him and hoped for him down the toilet
you hit when that happens as letterman says
at the end of the day sirota re-enforces what we should have all known all along:
politicians are whores lacking in the most basics of decency
just ask senator blowjob er... i mean senator larry i am not queer craig
we should have all known better
and - what do we do now...
Just a little over the top, don't you think? Obama as our assassin? Slitting our throats? Geez. Talk about melodramatic. Change in this Country is and always has been done in an incremental fashion. Get used to it. Now we have some people in here who are at least turning the boat in the right direction, but it's an super-sized tanker, not a tugboat, and it takes some time to turn it.
Obama has been incredibly proactive in his short time in office, and if he has had to put some issues on the back burner for a while, so be it. I'm sick of the incessant whining by those on the left, who criticize the Obama Administration as much as the whackos on the right. Keep it up and we'll have some more neocons to deal with next election and you can really ramp up your whining. Why not give Obama a couple years before you completely decide that he's a corporate "assassin", out to slit our collective throats?
Sioux Rose
RICH M: I see my summoning (LOL) worked!
Sorry pal, Obama is a center left politician and always has been. He's governing for the American people, not for fringe elements on the Right or on the Left. I know that must sting, but enjoy the moderate push towards liberalism that is occurring and encourage them to always do more, but tearing down Obama will do nothing for your cause but get another neocon elected to the Presidency. And that is simply shortsighted. It's easier to get your far left agenda taken seriously when the Country is operating in a center left environment than it is when the Right is in charge. Vote for Kucinich all you want, but guys like him will simply NEVER be elected to the Presidency in this Country.
Surely you joking Mr. Boogs? Are you paying attention, or snorting nutmeg? "Obama is a center left politician....he's governing for the American people, not for fringe elements on the Right or on the Left." You're a funny one Mr. Boogers.
Obama as assissin is 100% correct, as is confirmed by the troll itself. Myself and others warned this would be the outcome of his election (or HRC's).
Stale and brittle moderate liberal talking points drizzled in rancor towards "whiners" make be good eatin' in your parts, but I'll leave it for the flies, thanks.
Your patience, and reliance upon the clock and calendar in evaluating Obama is simply misplaced. Obama is not a drooping sapling that may harden over winter and recover the following spring. Police officers discovering a rape in progress don't say, "Hey, let's give him another ten minutes! Maybe he'll stop!"
And I might buy into that tired metaphor of Amerika as tanker, if it weren't painfully clear that we've become the "Titanic"-- and the captain has done nothing but order that all lifeboats be reserved for wealthy and distinguished first-class passengers, and devil take the rest.
· Yr Obd't Servant
hey boogish,
i'm betting you were one of those dlc plants screaming at us not to vote 3rd party, but to "elect dems & hold their feet to the fire."
isn't that what we're doing now? isn't this how you "hold feet to fire?"
so why are you screaming at us now to stop doing what you previously screamed at us to do? (never mind, i know the answer.)
and if the "incessant whining" of the left makes you sick, why do you visit this site and read our posts? (never mind, i know the answer to that one too.)
Sioux Rose
I summon RICH M to dissect your naive comments and serve them back to you on a platter, sliced, diced, dissected, and raw. I am not UP to the occasion of debating what anyone paying attention to real POLICIES realizes is no longer debatable!
Imagine someone up in a tower with a rifle, shooting at passers-by. You would be the idiot, criminally unclear on the concept, telling the increasingly hysterical crowd to calm down and "give the shooter more time! He's only wounded 3 people so far and hasn't killed anyone."
boognish1
One of the many problems with your suggestion to give Obama "a couple of years" is that innocent people - predominantly children - suffer today. By remaining in Obama's miasma of hope and change, thousands more will suffer and many will die. Do you have children who are terrified to go to bed alone for fear that their home will be struck in the night during a US bombing raid, their brothers and sisters, parents possibly killed, their home destroyed? What if you did have, would you accept your own cruel logic - "Although thousands of innocents may suffer and die, we will not complain about our president for TWO YEARS!" Do you listen to yourself?
Anyone who is willing to take the lives of so many innocents, so many children, just in order to steal their resources and control their politics, will not "turn the ship around." Obama has already shown he is with them, not against them.
Progressive groups, just like those much-maligned "special interest" ones, want to get a "seat at the table" where policy decisions are being made, so of course they play ball with whichever of the two parties they figure will give them the best seat. If in doubt, they play (give money and endorsements) to both parties. I empathize with Sirota's point about how these ambitions subvert movement members' disdain for the marble-columned institutions as their Mr. Smiths go to Washington and learn to buddy up with Senator Blowhard. With all due respect to Sirota, I think it's going to take more than progressives simply learning the "truism" that their best interests do not lie with those marble-columns. It's going to take a hell of a lot of structural adjustment in our electoral "system" before these epiphanies of realization are going to effect their behavior. How structual changes come in systems that are devoted to maintaining themselves: aye, there's the rub. Maybe I need to read his book.
If we could begin such a people's movement devoted to social/economic justice and fairness, which are the prime prerequisites of true peace, the decent candidates and party will follow. One possibility: US Social Forum 2010: Vision and Goals (http://www.ussf2010.org/vision-and-goals). In our history, great progressive social movements such as abolition, suffrage, workers’ rights, civil rights, and anti-war have always paved the way for eventual changes in legislation and even the creation of political parties.
But the truly sociopathic (conscience-less) ruling corporate elite and their current Corporate Tools in Congress and the White House have all the wealth and the citizen-suppressing weapons, and control the Fawning Corporate Media, so, short of a nation-wide General Strike to bring everything to a standstill, I don’t see any way out for us ordinary people any time soon. Hope is not enough. Organization and perseverance for a long-term, multi-generational struggle are now necessary.
The US Social Forum, unfortunately, excludes participation by political parties. They follow the rules of the WSF. So the power of parties, even that of the Green Party, is excluded. That was true at Atlanta. I asked. Our state progressive caucus and the Green Party could not participate. Thus the Social Forum rules prevent the development of a progressive-movement/progressive-party alliance from forming at their own forum. I hope they change that, for, the world over, political parties are often powerful entities. It is sure true in the US.
This is a good analysis by David Sirota....progressives take note!
The only answer is an American "revolution" in the form of peaceful non-violent civil disobedience....then radical campaign finance reform.
I posted the following paragraphs under another article:
Maybe determined activists can prepare for the next "revolution" to be in orange Nascar jumpsuits with corporate logos splashed all over them. It would make for great T.V. coverage. Surely some young smart entrepreneur could market a cheap "Halloween version" well in advance for the next "revolution".
To me, peaceful and hilarious non-violent civil disobedience is the only way to begin a new national conversation about the insanity of war and the greed of corporate Healthcare. The stranglehold corporate capitalism has over the U.S. Congress and the American imagination must end. First revolution, then major election reform.
Marx expected first revolutions to happen in the countries of advanced capitalism: the more advanced it is, the stronger its conflicts inexorably leading to revolutions. He was wrong.
Joseph Schumpeter believed capitalism would peacefully evolve into socialism, through egalitarian distribution of mass-produced goods in the name of market enlargement: the more successful capitalism, he thought, the closer to its grave it is. He was wrong.
Capital has a single goal - its own growth - but capitalism knew from its inception how to overcome obstacles applying subtle and less subtle instruments, from appeasment of the proles through consumerism all the way to brutal fascism as an ultimate expression of its unwillingness to share power with anybody.
I'm old enough to fear and not believe in revolutions - even Soviet revolution was paid for by Wall Street: Trotsky left NYC in 1917 with 10,000 J.P.Morgan's dollars and President Willson-signed passport in his pocket. USSR was created by National City Bank, the Carnegie Foundation, General Electric, the DuPont family, New York Life Insurance, American Bankers Association and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Just a few years later, they heavily invested into nazi Germany.
What's to be done, then?
I'm an atheist but then again, maybe the Amish are not all that laughable.
David Sirota is right. The left need to get over the "cult of personality" of obama and other democrats and looks instead towards issues. I beleive it was woody allen that said basically "i feel a lot better now that hope has died"....now as progressives we ned to return to our activism and grassroots efforts. It doesn't matter who's in the White House. No one but ourselves will create the change towards social justice we want. Get to work!
"No one but ourselves will create the change towards social justice we want. Get to work!"
I'm sorry, but you're barking up the wrong tree here. We're much too into the "I told you so's" to look to ourselves, much less get to work. Unless, or course, it is to preen in the mirror as we buff our perfect images.
Progressives - let's get over ourselves. When our shit don't stink, then we can crow.
I agree -- David Sirota is right. That why Cindy Sheehan has it right -- and so does Cynthia McKinney. It's the issues -- you abandon the party when it goes against what is important to you. It's not about lining up with a party and being loyal to it -- why anyway? it's not loyal to YOU. Be true to thyself -- not any party.
JenniferBedingfield's comment connected with my vague recollection of Sirota rooting for Obama.
Sirota is prolific, and I didn't try to track him through the campaign season. But here's an interesting tidbit-- the conclusion of a Huffington Post article dated October 28, 2008:
The Potential Progressive Mandate*
[...] In short, John McCain's message during the stretch run is creating a mandate that - if Obama wins - makes America safe if not for full-fledged socialism, then at the very least, for aggressive progressivism.
Whether a President Obama would seize that mandate is an open question - one far less important than the more bottom-up question of whether that mandate would embolden the progressive movement to pressure a President Obama to reach farther than his own more incrementalist impulses may initially lead him to reach.
Our national religion may be presidentialism (ie. the worship of presidents as gods who hand down change to the masses), but American politics has always been the other way around. Electoral mandates create popular pressure and expectations that force presidents to embrace the change they may never have embraced. That McCain is forging this mandate for a President Obama is certainly ironic - but it's also an undeniable reality.
*The word "potential" will be removed if Obama wins on Tuesday. At that point, it WILL be a progressive mandate.
_________________________________________
In fairness to Sirota, this is not exactly jumping on a partisan bandwagon per se. Sirota consistently asserts that his belief in a progressive movement animates him, and focuses on the pitfalls when movements engage politicians.
Still, one must ask in retrospect how Sirota's firmly-stated convictions and prognostications, asterisk or not, fit the eventual reality.
One can't really say they're "inaccurate", insofar as Sirota DOES pose his arguments in the form of open questions. So it may be true enough that Obama really did come across as a left-leaning progressive susceptible to a progressive vox populi, that potentially-- or theoretically-- the chemistry and political environment were ripe for a progressive catalyst.
So where did the "progressive mandate" go? If it happened, I must have missed it. I've experienced farts that linger longer. If it ever existed, Captain Obama must have jettisoned by the time he chose Rick Warren to give the invocation at his coronation, to lighten the ballast burdening the re-engineered Unitary ship of state.
_________________________________________
So it's not a case of Sirota putting "party over principle", but it may be a case of his being a little too trusting. An excerpt from a comment I made to Glenn Greenwald's post today may be relevant:
...most Amerikans are steeped in the civic piety that amoral and corrupt politicians are the exception, not the rule.
My impression is that moderate liberals and progressives still find it very difficult to break the habit of presuming that Amerikan government officials, all things being equal, speak truthfully and act responsibly.
I've commented a couple of times that as an ad hoc "tryer of fact", the present maladministration, especially the Unitary Executive branch, has already been caught in so many misstatements and prevarications that in my view, its collective credibility is utterly impeached.
So I'm comfortable in rejecting all of it, and provisionally presuming that it feels no compulsion to either communicate truthfully or act in accordance with its pronouncements-- unless it's pragmatic, expedient, and convenient.
The day that the media discovers and reports on a controversial disclosure that looks bad for Obama, I'll grudgingly "walk back" my presumption of bad faith a baby step or two. But I warn you, this will be only an incremental change!
· Yr Obd't Servant
It will be interesting to see how Sirota shifts his thinking come election season in 2010 and 2012. Off-years, anybody can pretend progressive independence but the litmus test comes in election season.
"Likewise, had the big anti-war organizations reacted to Obama's Afghanistan escalation plans with promises of electoral retribution, we would know those organizations were steadfastly loyal to their anti-war brand."
And what about Iraq?
At the end of this year there will still be more troops in Iraq than Afghanistan, and the force level in Iraq will still be higher than it was in Jan. 2004.
While we wait til 2012 for a possible "full withdrawal/redeployment" or perhaps an unspecified level of residual forces, the occupation of Iraq continues unabated. Obama has committed to not withdrawing anymore forces from Iraq for 2009, and if he holds to his promise of only withdrawing no more than 1-2 per month (starting Jan. 2010), he will not be able to meet his goal for troop levels for August 2010 (35,000 - 50,000). Not to mention that at any point between now and 2012 the SOFA might be re-negotiated, or withdrawals might cease.
Why aren't people more skeptical of the SOFA? If they announced in 2003 that they planned to end the war by early 2007, should we have ceased our protests and simply ignored it? Because that is effectively what the antiwar is doing right now.
It makes no sense to ignore the Iraq war just because Bush/Obama have promised that they MIGHT complete a full withdrawal by 2012. This is no different than Bush declaring "Mission Accomplished", or Cheney saying that the insurgency in it's "death throes". These assurances are designed (and have been since 2003) to give people the impression that the war is just about to end, so don't worry about it, don't protest it, it's already over.
I like JenniferBedingfield's cogent comment with it's thoughtful suggestion for positive action.
For my part, I've begun notifying those seeking contributions or action, telling them what I see them failing to do that I think we need, or what they are doing that I see as no good. I tell them about the movement people and organizations that I am favoring. Finally, I do favor those progressive movement people and organizations with my money and actions.
As George Lakoff would point out, money only comes on top of the basics of thinking and think tanks. It's tricky to envision that but to my knowledge I haven't seen the progressives or liberals put thought before worrying about the money first unlike the conservatives.
Bring America Back !!!!
****Sorry, but David Sirota's "truisms" ain't !
**He tries with this feeble exercise in linguistics to get
us to absorb blame for the fiasco now going on in the White House !!
**I was not confused at all ! Obama was the only surviving candidate who voted as a Senator AGAINST the very original War authorization. (Remember Edwards repudiating his vote, and trying to get Clinton to repudiate her vote?)
===Obama promised to support Single Payer Healthcare; He promised to END the War not escalate it; He promised to fight the DC Culture of Corruption and lobbyist Control; He promised to fight Big Oil drilling off the Atlantic; He promised Change--Hope--Inspiration for the common man !!!
===All these Promises were Progresssive whether he was a Dem Party member or not !! From what I read in this blog, the core CD membership was NOT confused whatsoever. And, we are a Movement, believe it or not !
====WHO KNEW He would fail miserably in only seven months to deliver anything even resembling His Promises ??? His actions and behaviours since assuming Office are a preponderance of evidence that His promises were outright lies to us who voted for him ! He has caved-in to everything we voted against which represented 8 years of War Crimes, Civil Crimes and the criminals that pulled them off !
====The good thing is we now know enough, with enough advance time, not to make the same mistake again, as Team Obama is a one trick pony not deserving another term of Office. They simply don't have a clue on changing or running this Nation===and most of Obama's re-election votes will come from the Bush Neocons he has appeased and served. Who knew Obama would vote against the War, then keep as Secretary of Defense one of Bush' war criminals--Robert Gates. He just appointed another Republican as Secretary of the Army !! That
David Sirota is dead wrong to blame us for whatever confusion he perceives between a Party and a Movement !!
The most sad thing is Team Obama's total failure to recognize where his base was====and in alienating us, the Neocons, FOX war cheerleaders, and most Pundits are making a laughing stock out of him, and his band of Keystone Cops.
We are proud to have a Black American in the White House,
but we sure expected a whole lot more !! This time around we will NOT be there to pick up the pieces. That's why most of Sirota's beliefs are simply erroneous !
While I do not totally agree with Mr. Sirota, your rant is pathetic in its errors.
1. Obama was elected to the U.S. Senate in the fall of 2004. The resolution was from 2003.
2. Obama said lots of things without any specifics.
3. During the campaign of 2008, he was specific about;
He would not hesitate to attack Pakistan,
He promised to INCREASE the pentagon's budget,
He chose Biden as his running mate after Biden (while on the senate intelligence committee) refused to allow ANY reports which challenged the need for war and also voted for the war,
He voted (in the fall of 2008) FOR amnesty for the illegal telecom companies spying on U.S. citizens after previously stating he would fight against any such law,
He was (again, fall 2008) one of the most prominant supporters of giving 700+ BILLIONS of dollars to the same criminals on Wall Street who refused to say how the money would be spent and who refused ANY regulations on their corrupt little game of screwing the rest of us,
He went out of his way to kiss up to right wing fundamental asshole preachers like Rick Warren.
4. I KNEW AND SO DID THE THOUSANDS OF US WHO VOTED FOR RALPH NADER OR CYTHIA McKINNEY.
5. Don't blame others for your lack of insight. You are merely proving the author is correct. Please wake up.
Actually, TruthKnoller's rant makes a lot of sense if you consider Obama's support for the Spanish-American War, the War of 2032, and his advocacy of anarcho-syndicalism. It also helps to huff glue and watch MSNBC while repeatedly hitting yourself in the head with a hammer.
Thank you.
Are you joking? Is this satire? I sincerely hope it is.
"**I was not confused at all ! Obama was the only surviving candidate who voted as a Senator AGAINST the very original War authorization."
Obama became a Senator in 2005, after both wars were authorized. I mean, come on, this is extremely basic information...
As a Senator he consistently voted to fund the wars (except for one vote on May 24, 2007, against an appropriations bill that included funding for the military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, because he supported a different funding bill).
"Obama promised to support Single Payer Healthcare; "
He gave lip-service to it when he ran for Senate in 2004, but not while he was in the Senate, and not as a candidate for president. Clearly, he has opposed it or ignored it for the past 5 years.
"He promised to END the War not escalate it"
He promised to end the Iraq War by 2011-12. And he promised to escalate the Afghan war. Do you enjoy just making things up?
"All these Promises were " - imagined by you.
To RichM: I agree. Actions speak louder than words and Obama's actions in the Senate pointed to his protection of corporatism. Now he is paying off the banks, the warmongering corporations benefiting from perpetual war in Iraq and Afghanistan and the insurance industry. He is an actor and a bad one. Anyone with an ounce of intelligence should have seen through his rhetoric of change and hope. At least actors are playing a part and you know it; they do not pretend to be something they are not. Create change locally: do what you can to protect the environment, animals and people against chemicals and suffering. Stand up and speak out when you see an injustice. Quit waiting for some idol in the White House to make everything better. The only one who could have made that happen was Dennis Kucinich and you fools bailed on him.
"Quit waiting for some idol in the White House to make everything better. The only one who could have made that happen was Dennis Kucinich and you fools bailed on him."
I'd laugh if the irony weren't so painful.
Let's quit waiting for an idol but let's idolize Kucinich...no, Nader...no, McKinney...no, (fill in the blank). Our next savior.
Reminds me of that childhood song, The Bear Went Over the Mountain. Always another mountain. Always another candidate. Always another president.
If only so-and-so would get elected we'd get to the promised land and progressives would be delivered into the land of milk and honey. A child-ish song.
How about we deliver ourselves? Oh, I forgot, not popular here.
"...you fools bailed on him."
Spare me.
Have you read many articles about how Nader would make the White house "cool" again? Or seen McKinney on MTV? Or watched a TV show dissecting Kucinich's fashion sense?
Hmmm... What could the difference be between a person who "idolizes" a politician like Kucinich or Nader or Mckinney, compared to someone who "idolizes" Obama?
Might it be that those who idolize Obama do so because they like his style and image, whereas people who idolize Kucinich or Nader or McKinney do so because they like their policies?
So, in progressives like a politician because of their progressive politics, where's the harm in that? Would it be wrong to "idolize" Eugene Debs or MLK purely on the basis of their political views? Somehow, I just don't see your point.
Would it be wrong to "idolize" someone like Bush while ignoring their political views? Ted, can you see the harm in that?
Are these two examples really equivalents?
Surely if Nader became President and preserved the ENTIRE BUSH ADMINISTRATION AGENDA, he would have no supporters left.
On the other hand, how's Obama doing, Ted? Have you stopped calling for all of us to throw our support behind him like you incessantly did before the election? Has that moral contortion becoming tiresome?
For you to act like it's irrelevant whether people support progressive politicians over neoconservatives like Bush or Obama demonstrates that you are afflicted with a partisanship on par with Bill Kristol or Charles Krauthammer.
Progressives support people like McKinney or Nader or Kucinich because they will stand up for progressive policies, something your candidate of choice refuses to do. I've never met a progressive who would be unhappy with any of them in power.
Ted, face the music, you worked against the very people advocating "change" and voted for a third term of Bush.
To attack someone for lacking your delusions is "childish".
First, I never idolized Obama or Nader or Kucinich or McKinney. Doing so is vapid.
Second, Nader gave up on the Greens before I gave up on him. Nader is not about building a movement, as this article suggests Progressives do. If you want to idolize lone wolves, g'head. You must love the wilderness. Don't worry, you'll have lots of Progressive company. A regular bitch-fest, which Progressives excel at.
Third, I have worked for the movement, not the person. It was down to one of two people, and I supported and voted for the best choice available. I would have loved for Kucinich to win the nomination, but he didn't. Not that I had much of a choice in the matter, I'm not a Democrat, so couldn't vote for him in the primary.
I would not be unhappy with any of the above if they had a real, cohesive movement behind them. They don't, so voting for any of them for president is like pissing in the wind. Messy.
I'm afflicted with partisanship like Kristol and Krauthammer? Pot calling the kettle black. I supported the lesser of the evils (ok, sling it on) knowing how much worse the worse of two evils could be. I am not settling for or liking the choice, but that's life sometimes.
Okay, so it's all my fault. I voted for this and got it and you can keep your moral rectitude in perfect order. I'll take what's at hand and move on. I suggest you do the same. Unless you want to hang back with the pack.