Twitter
StumbleUpon
Facebook
Delicious
Digg
Newsvine
Google
Yahoo
TechnoratiA Show About Nothing: The Placeholder Presidency of Barack Obama
I think we're at the point now where it's become inescapable that the Obama presidency is also a show about nothing.
It's the same as Seinfeld. Except for two things.
First, unlike Seinfeld, it bills itself as a show about something, if not everything (remember Mr. Bigtime Change from just last year?).
And, second, the nothingness of the Obama administration is not very goddam funny, thanks just the same.
Consider the following crop of headlines, all from the New York Times, and all published in just the last week alone:
"49 Million Americans Report a Lack of Food"
"N.A.A.C.P. Prods Obama on Job Losses"
"The Drug Industry Cashes In"
"3 Democrats Could Block Health Bill In Senate"
"Another Standoff May Be Looming On Abortion Issue"
"Obama Hobbled in Fight Against Climate Change"
"Leaders Will Delay Agreement On Climate"
"Obama Backers Fear Opportunities to Reshape Judiciary Are Slipping Away"
"Guantánamo Won't Close by January, Obama Says"
"China Holds Firm On Major Issues In Obama's Visit"
"As Weight of a Relationship Tilts East, Obama Opts for Nuance and Deference"
"Israel Moves Ahead on Plans to Expand Settlement in Disputed Part of Jerusalem"
"Kurdish Legislators Threaten Boycott of Iraq Election"
"High Costs Weigh On Troop Debate For Afghan War"
If you get a sense from this list that the man holding the most powerful position on the planet is bound and determined to be an object of action, rather than a proactive force on the historical stage, there's a good reason for that feeling. That appears to be precisely his intention.
At a time of significant peril to the country and the world, this president will not act.
And he certainly will not act in any way that is remotely controversial. In normal times, that list would cover just about everything. In our era, however, where rabid regressives have entirely lost even a remote satellite uplink to reality, and have devoted themselves to destroying Obama's presidency at any cost, there is nothing that a president who is worried about ruffling feathers could actually do about anything. If he salutes the fallen returning to Dover Air Force Base, they excoriate him. If he shows a scrap of politeness bowing to the Japanese emperor, they eviscerate him. If he claims he was born in America, they call him a liar for it.
That seems to be fine with Obama. He seems quite content to be a placeholder president, just as Bill Clinton was before him. And, you know what? Placeholder presidents can be just fine. If you're living in the nineteenth century, that is. They've even been survivable recently, though the scale of blown opportunity can be jaw-dropping. Just the same, every time I find myself cringing at the thought of Bill Clinton's eight year self-reverential celebration of all things Bill Clinton, I can always rescue myself by remembering how much worse things there are than indifference in the White House. At last, I have finally discovered a reason, however slim, to be grateful to Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney. Thanks for the perspective, fellas.
This president, however, doesn't have the luxury he seems so intent on taking. He came to office at a time of multiple crises. 2009 sure as hell isn't 1997. It isn't even 1993. It's a lot worse, and on multiple fronts.
In fairness to Obama (a sentiment which I'm finding increasingly difficult to muster up as the first year of his presidency segues into the second), many of the problems represented in the headlines catalogued above are America's problems, not necessarily his, per se. They would, that is, have greeted any new president inaugurated last January, and lots of them are going to take years or decades to go away under the best of circumstances, assuming they ever do. But that's also the point - he is the president, and he is supposed to be fighting to improve his country's situation. In case after case, however, he appears instead to be sitting aloof on top of his mountain, evidently admiring his admiration. The problems aren't necessarily of his making, but the absence of credible solutions to those problems very much is.
To be even more generous to this president, these aren't, generally, just any random national problems that he inherited, either. They are chiefly the product of America's insane and disastrous experiment with regressivism these last three decades. They are, in short, Reagan's and Bush's gift to Barack. But again, while he's not responsible for his inheritance, he is responsible for what he does with it. And what this fool has done with it is to turn it into a Seinfeld sitcom. That is to say, nothing. He not only doesn't identify the paternity of this bastard child for all to see, he won't even speak up as the very same people who left him this plate of swill have the gall to blame him for it and seek the destruction of his presidency at every turn.
There is, of course, a certain profound richness to the notion of these regresso-bots critiquing Obama from the day he walked in the door. "He's spending outrageous amounts of money!", they fervently decry. What, you mean like the last guy did, the one who doubled the national debt from $5.5 trillion to $11 trillion? What, you mean because spending huge sums is the only possible way to clean up the economic meltdown and myriad other disasters bequeathed to him? What, because it ain't cheap to pay for two sprawling unfinished wars, banking system rescues, a car industry gone off the cliff, unemployment insurance for millions and a drowned city?
But enough with the fairness doctrine already. These caveats don't begin to mitigate the epic disaster of the Obama sclerosis. This guy isn't just a deer caught in headlights, he's Bambi on the 50 yard-line, under the klieg lights of a national stadium. He's Mr. Bill. No, strike that. He's Mr. Bill's nerdy little nephew, Kirby Herbert Pollywog Bill. He's a beetle walking across a school yard, where a hundred bored sixth-graders are standing and staring at their feet during an outdoor assembly. He's a tenth inning hanging tired arm curve ball with an angry Babe Ruth at the plate. He's Neville Chamberlain and Spongebob SquarePants' love-child. Suffering from an anemic blood disorder. Republicans just live for this sort of Democrat - which is to say, nowadays, practically every Democrat. They eat them for breakfast. And, as much as I loathe Republicans - rather like I feel about, say, botulism - I mostly don't blame them.
And, as much as it pains me ever to find myself agreeing with a regressoid, Edward Whelan, president of the right-wing Ethics and Public Policy Center, was right when, expressing his surprise that the Obama administration has made so few nominations to fill open positions in the federal judiciary, he noted: "On judges as on so much else, this administration seems to be much less competent than both its supporters and critics expected". Hear, hear.
Count me in on that one. I didn't know what kind of politics these guys would have, but I felt real confident that they'd be damn good at those politics, whatever they were. And not without good reason did I come to that conclusion. Obama is obviously smart, and he ran a near-perfect campaign, just as he had to, in order to win the presidency against long odds.
And, you know, it may even be the case that these guys would be good at their politics. But, apparently, we're never going to find out, since they don't seem capable of trying. When they're not busy, as they are so much of the time, aping the regressive policies of Bush and Cheney, they're working hard at hardly working. Folding cards, blowing opportunities, missing deadlines, breaking promises. It's hard work putting on a show about nothing, lemme tell ya! Think of all the liberal judges they failed to appoint just today alone! Think of all the prisoners they haven't transferred from Guantánamo! Think of all the egg they have to wipe off their faces as they get spanked by Israeli prime ministers, Big Pharma CEOs and punky members of their own party alike! Think of all the women whose reproductive rights they have to sell out in order to get their Aid To Corporations With Dependent Billions legislation through Congress! Imagine the number of American children and grandchildren who must be saddled with a load of debt and a climate like Venus, just so Obama can receive his Daily Minimum Allowance of ass-whuppin' every day!
Nah, man. It can't be easy takin' it easy. I thought George W. Bush's act would be a hard one to follow. That little puke took 1020 days of vacation during his eight years serving as Cheney's marionette. That was more than one-third of his presidency, and it far exceeded the time taken by any other president. Who could top that?!
Obama's smarter than Bush, though (and how tough is that?). He's figured out how to take vacation while on the job. And so he has. All around him serious crises for the country and the world rage across the landscape, demanding attention. But Barack remains in comfortable contemplation, never breaking a sweat. On a good day he might share with us some of his famously stirring oratory, filled with broad platitudes about niceness and bipartisanship. On a really good day we'll get half-measures, poorly communicated, to deal with full problems. But on most days, alas, we just get an undiluted shot of Goldman Sachs, Big Pharma and every other corporate plutocrat working directly out of the Oval Office.
Why is Obama such a do-nothing dud? Does he feel for financially strapped Americans to the point of doing his own permanent staycation in the White House, the better to model his empathy for them? Does his personality simply prevent him from doing anything that some person or another might object to? Is he yet another tool of Wall Street, whose only difference from George Bush is stylistic? Did some guy in a black suit and sunglasses pull him aside after the election, and say, "Okay, so you're the president now. You'll be following our instructions from here on out, in exchange for which we're gonna let you live."?
I don't know what his deal is. But I do know that this presidency is catastrophic for progressive ideas, and likely as well for the remaining shards of American democracy itself.
As to the former, our values and solutions are being ridiculously associated with this fundamentally conservative administration, and ironically repudiated right along with its mounting failures. This is yet another marketing masterstroke by the regressive right, a group of folks whose politics are so obscene that they've been forced to become geniuses at slinging bullshit. They remind me of nothing so much as the poor fat kid in junior high who had to learn to use humor to keep from getting pummeled every day after school, and grew up to become a famous comedian as an adult. But, whatever. The upshot is that Obama is going down in flames (or would be, except that his muted implosion is careful even to lack that much cinematic drama), and progressivism will be tarred for years and decades because of that. Our politics will be blamed for committing a crime, when they were actually in another country (literally) at the time.
As for American democracy, I think it likely that the elections of 2010 and 2012 will mark continuations and indeed extensions of the pattern from 2006 and 2008. The condition of the country sucks. People want change. But, unless something dramatic happens, they continue to only have two choices - the party in power, or the other party. In 2010 and 2012 the incumbents will be the pathetic Democrats, and the only real alternative will be the just recently comatose Republicans, newly revived courtesy of Barack Obama, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi.
Since we can expect the GOP monsters to win those elections handily under such conditions, the question becomes, what will that party stand for, and who will represent it? Here, the signs are especially bad. From New York to Florida to Alaska to all across the radio dial, the GOP is doing the impossible these days. It is actually becoming more regressive, more repressive, more narrow, more stupid, more greedy and more vicious. It's hard to imagine they could surpass their current personal bests in the pathology decathlon, but indeed they are.
Meanwhile, my guess is that the winner of the GOP nomination in 2012 will be the winner of the presidency that fall, just as the real contest in 2008 was to win the Democratic nomination.
My guess is that that person is now running around the country plugging her book.
And my guess is that the next go-round of Reaganism/Bushism will make the last one look like a friendly game of gin rummy by comparison.
They will almost certainly have to pull the plug on any remaining vestige of democracy at that point, since their policies will be utterly useless in addressing people's mounting concerns and their growing impatience.
Get your passport renewed.
Mexico might be a good alternative. The weather is nice and warm.
And, evidently, the money is good. At least compared to what the very sick Uncle Sam's got going on his hospital ward.
Here's one more indicative (and quite real) headline to add to the list above. No offense to my amigos south of the border, but you can file this puppy under "Y", for "You Know The Show Is Over When..."
"Money Starts to Trickle North as Mexicans Help Out Relatives"
133 Comments so far
Show All"Is he yet another tool of Wall Street, whose only difference from George Bush is stylistic? Did some guy in a black suit and sunglasses pull him aside after the election, and say, "Okay, so you're the president now. You'll be following our instructions from here on out, in exchange for which we're gonna let you live."? "
-- Yes.
It makes you wonder why the Publicans hate him so much.
The constellation of truly hapless Presidents is fairly small. The two others that come to mind are Buchannan (1857-61), and Hoover (1929-1933).
Both inherited really awful messes that were not of their own making and proceded to sit around and largly do nothing resulting in the Civil War in Buchannan's case and the Great Depression in the case of Hoover.
Obama has the opportunity to become both the new Buchanan and the new Hoover--yes he does! It will all depend on how quickly the worsening economic crisis pushes people to violent action against those perceived--rightly or wrongly--responsible for the problems and how ineffectual White House action remains.
At this point Obama is merely the new Hoover.
Hoover was aware of the problems confronting him as the Depression went to rock bottom, but was also of the firm conviction that government should have no signifificant role helping its citizens in such circumstances.
Hoover expected the Salvation Army and Red Cross to do that job. As the resources of those limited charities were overwhelmed by the reality they confronted HH sat on his ass in the White House, issued statements of concern, wrung his hands, and did nothing equal to the multiple crises he faced.
Obama similarly sits in the White House expecting community organizers to do the work that is his own to lead and accomplish. He has meetings with representative citizen's groups and famously tells them "make me do it" and then shows no discernable intention of doing anything.
These words could come back to haunt both his supine adminstration and the PR firms that dreamed it up as well as the many multinational corporations who are its patrons. Hungry and idle people quickly grow weary of such circumstances and growing numbers are both hungry and idle.
It is only a matter of time before this irresistable force confronting the immovable object of corporate privilige creates a social explosion of thermonuclear proportions.
For me the greatest satisfaction in this entire matter is to once again see the "can do" or at the very least "will try" spirit of FDR vindicated.
Hate him though they do, working tirelessly to eliminate all vestiges and even any memory of his New Deal accomplishments though they have over the past 29 years, its spirit, optimism, and accomplishments shine out in stark contrast to the total mess his detractors have made of their brief hour in the sunshine of public scrutiny.
If President Obama manages to out-Hoover Hoover and out-Buchanan Buchanan, then he just might just be the unwitting agent of "change we can beleve in". All of that is also assuming that there is some new FDR waiting in the wings to set about the business of putting business in its place.
Maybe he is already in Congress and representing the citizens of East Cleveland Ohio. Find your spine DK and start telling the Democratic Party the same truth you have been telling the rest of the American people. Otherwise you remain part of the problem and not an agent of its solution, despite knowing better.
Poet
You're far too harsh on Hoover. Well over halve of what FDR experimented with in 1933-35 were Hoover administration ideas. A case can be made to show Lincoln was just as hapless as Buchanan.
My evaluation as an historian is that we've had one decent president--FDR. The remainder are mediocre or inept/corrupt, with the very worst being major criminals.
One decent leader over 230+ years.
Nicholas Von Hoffman has called Hoover "the unluckiest president in American history" and I would agree with him. After all, what can you say for someone following two empty suits the likes of Harding and Coolidge?
What is most maddening to me is that Hoover was a decent man who, when he coordinated aid to the suffering of Europe after WWI, showed himself an able administrator of aid to masses of suffering people. What disconnect personally paralyzed him when his own people were suffering is hard to figure out. Certainly both the House and especially the Senate didn't make activism easy, but Hoover ended up delivering pious platitudes for the last two years of his administration especially when everything about the situation as well as the man tells you he must have known better. Great ideas without any follow through and action are pointless don't you think?
As far as denigrating Lincoln, most (but not all) who have done so get involved in the kind of petty change accounting with no regard for the vision that emerged as Lincoln not only fought the Civil War, but also sought to figure out how to bring back together those so alienated by the entire affair and most of all his own party.
I would agree with your evaluation of FDR as our greatest president for many of the same reasons. From his fireside chats to his "we'll try anything rather than sit idly by and watch people's lives destruct before our very eyes" approach, the people knew that FDR did not need to be perfect or even close because he cared and showed that care by what he would try as much as by what he said.
If you go to the web site http://millercenter.org/scripps/archive/speeches/detail/3307 and listen to his campaign speech at Madison Square Garden in late October of 1936 you will get a sense of what real stem-winding partisan campaigning used to be when politics actually mattered in the US.
Sadly, by the beginning of his second term when he decided to try to balance the budget by raising taxes and reducing spending the inertia of Washington was even catching up with the New Deal. The appointment of Henry Wallace as VP from '41-45 was one last hurrah for the New Deal and he was summarily booted off the ticket for the '44 election precisely because he was a committed New Dealer and the Democratic Party (particularly the segregationist Southern wing) had had enough of the New Deal by that time.
Poet
John Conner,
THANK YOU for giving up!
To quote Bill Maher, "Religion IS a 'gateway psychosis.'"
The people who believe in a "Magical Cloud Being" are directly responsible for getting W. PLACED IN OFFICE--twice! (I say that because it's well-documented that Rove and the B*sh Crime Family actively courted, and EXPLOITED, the religious right in the farcical "elections" of 2000 and 2004.)
Self-delusion has NO seat at the table of governance. Therefore, if you willingly attend a so-called "house of worship" then you are, by self-definition, mentally incompetent to participate in a representative democracy, especially one based in human secularism (as opposed to ANY religion).
Thank you for removing your psychotically-disillusioned self from the political process.
If only MORE PEOPLE had your love of country!
True Patriot
Whatever pal.
You are free to latch onto your ideal of perfection and write off the vast majority of people in this country, along with writing off anyone like Grassroots1 who tries to organize among them.
The divisive holier-than-thou carping at John Conner's excellent work is just petty and stupid, and misses the point as well.
Yeah, working to organize worker co-ops and build real economic power among disenfranchised populations, what a horrible stupid idea. I mean, some of these people believe in God! Keep my political organizing PURE!
John Conner, i've not replied to you previously but have noted your efforts to organize people into worker co-ops as part of a strategy to build real grassroots economic power. i salute you and wish you the best. i am engaged in similar work here in Seattle (not the same but along similar lines). i don't reject, and would be a fool to reject, participation by anyone who believes in God.
Don't let these narrow-minded idiots bring you down.
"Why is Obama such a do-nothing dud?
I don't know what his deal is."
But since this is the money question of B.O's presidency to date, could we hear from someone who DOES know what his deal is?
Come on, what's not to like? We get free money at the expense of foreigners!! We get to print money and blatantly hide our defaults (toxic waste) while China and others must continue to buy our treasuries to maintain their currency peg, propping up the dollar. We get to keep interest rates near zero. Wall Street can borrow artificially cheap dollars to invest in China assets (carry trade) and they have no choice but to weaken their currency to maintain their peg.
To reduce the amount of US treasuries they must buy, China prints RMB as well and spends it as fast as it can on increased export capacity, greentech leadership and other mal-investments. If they stop, it will result in our inflating our way out of our debt to them. Since neither we (nor our children) will likely pay them back, they can't do much about it seeing we spend so much of the money they give us on our military.
We just need to keep inventing new ways to carry more debt for them to buy (hello derivatives and fiscal deficits). No wonder Cheney said "deficits don't matter".
This logic suggests we should spend as much as possible on everything possible. Obama probably wouldn't mind helping us serfs more, but regressives only permit more debt if it is banker bailouts, corporate welfare, and on the military and their private contractors, made easier by continuing and perhaps expanding 2 wars, . They howl about social spending so all we get is a little extended unemployment and maybe some Cobra help all of which is temporary.
This explains some of the reason why Obama is so much like Bush.
Obama is a complete failure and empty suit who is easily pushed around....
Bill Clinton told Charlie Rose, regarding potential voters for Obama that it "was a roll of the dice."
Bill Clinton was much smarter politically than this Obama guy will ever be....Obama should have stuck to the U.S. Senate for awhile....
No, I'm relying on the First Amendment to protect me from having the religious beliefs of others imposed on me by law. And I'm relying on it to protect you from having my religious beliefs imposed on you by law.
Obama has broken all of his promises. Transparency? Visitors logs to OUR house, the White House, are still secret, as under Bush. The AfPak wars are increasing, and we are fortifying Colombia to go after Venezuela, Bolivia, El Salvador, and any other country which wants economic independence from us, or who has leaders elected which are not CIA-approved. Remember, we got Bush twice in fraudulent elections....and Obama, a two-year Junior Senator appoints Cheney's Dark-Side General McChrystal to run the war in AFghanistan...all the while, trying to convince Progressives that he is running a "kinder and gentler war", so that the Progressives will feel good about the re-branding of our National Security State under Obama, and their consciences will be eased by their silence, or muted protest, or their "demands" that we leave Afghanistan on a "timetable". We see how well the timetable withdrawal the Democrats championed worked in Iraq. Sure, Guantanamo will not be closed as promised. Instead, we still have hundreds held there, while a few are tried in show trials. This is classic Modified Limited Hangout...give them a bone, and they will forget the big story. The big story is the secret torture prisons in Eastern Europe, and the thousands tortured, and murdered there, and in Iraq prisons, and other facilities. Does ANYONE not think that Obama is not simply the slicker face of the same National Security State which has been in place since 1947? Americans should look at the reality of their country with unvarnished, non-rose colored glasses. Only then is change possible. War continues, and increases in the Middle East, and there are still 128K troops there. Obama said he would remove all COMBAT troops...but Progressives heard in their heads that he would remove ALL troops. These words are Psyops, and are designed to fool you. In reality, the Vatican-sized "Embassy" in Iraq will be protected by 58K troops...we have not left South Korea, and we will not leave Iraq...as Alan Greenspan said in his autobiography "Why don't they just admit that they invaded Iraq for the oil?"
If you're helping churches organize for even more power over legislation, no thanks. Give me the First Amendment any day.
Okay, here's an example of "hope? change? not so much..." that is a HUGE tiny gesture: http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/11/19-5
The International Criminal Court started up 7 years ago and this is the first US attendance? Sure, the government that does not know how to define the word torture is now baffled by the word "aggression," and yeah, sending some guy to sit in on a meeting is like tossing a dime into a starving man's empty bowl, but the world did not even get a dime from the Bush thugs. When Obama won the election, the fact that the rest of the world peed their pants celebrating and then showered a Nobel Prize on him tells you that the change of faces in the White House was enough to raise a few heads from the duck-and-cover position. If Obama's making choices that seem odd for "a man like him," maybe he's not being given much of a choice. But -- if one President could move fast enough to give us everything we wanted all at once, we would have a dictatorship, not a republic.
You wouldn't have posted such bunk if you had bothered to read the comments to that item.
Is it time for me to officially unsubscribe from the Organizing for America list. Sometimes it's been amusing to read the BS, but this kind of takes the cake. Here's what I found in my e-mail box today:
"We just launched our new Organizing for America online store, and I wanted to make sure you saw it.
There are a bunch of new products to choose from, but there's one item in particular I hope you'll pick up.
As the President often reminds us, the real change we all fought so hard for has only just begun.
Our "Community Organizer" T-shirt shows that you understand the importance of building a door-by-door, block-by-block organization, and that you're hard at work making it happen.
Proudly wearing your OFA gear -- whether this shirt or any of the other items -- is a great way to show your support and spread the word about our ongoing campaign for change.
There are T-shirts, buttons, and stickers, as well as a fleece, hat, and water bottle.
They're all union-printed and American-made, and feature our updated logo.
Check out the new "Community Organizer" T-shirt here:
Thanks,
Natalie
Natalie Foster
New Media Director"
Hey, but it's union jobs, right, folks? At least that's what the letter says.
Come on now, they've got to raise the money to pay Natalie to promote T-shirt sales, don't they?
It's heartbreaking when organizations turn to commercialization of the message and you're not sure what they're doing anymore aside from selling products. I've felt that way about several prominent environmental organizations that shall remain nameless (I'll make a plug for NRDC here and say they're still on track and well worth the donation, thank God). I don't know which is worse, getting more plugs to buy merchandise than news of what's actually happening with the money, or being asked to "click here" to save the environment.
That's it, isn't it? Obama is finally, after a year's evidence, worthless. Most of us knew he would be, over a year ago, but we were of no consequence. Only the cheerleaders for Obama were taken seriously, since the alternative was unspeakable. Now the unspeakable looms because the great half-black hope is proven utterly worthless, except to ultra-conservatives. Wall Street loves Obama, Big Pharma and Big Insurance celebrate his magnificent aplomb in doing what needs to be done, for them. The military/industrial/infotainment complex adores him. Progressives need apply elsewhere, as always. But by all means, let's keep up the bullshit about how important it is to VOTE FOR DEMOCRATS, if only to keep those nasty Republicans at bay! Third parties just aren't practical! And who could be more EGOCENTRIC and EVIL than Ralph Nader?!!!
Absolutely correct, Ephriam, our government has been highjacked by the corporate good cop/bad cop two-party system. Only an independent working people's organization, capable of organizing boycotts, strikes and non-cooperation has any hope of forcing the return to constitutional government.
Tony Vodvarka
In short, DMG is still trying to "reform" a broken beyond repair Democrat Party when he could use his same writing and power of persuasion to give progressive independents a voice to be heard and known well.
If I read the caption about DMG clearly, he has plenty of time to write lame party apologist articles 9 out of 10 times but not enough time to read and assess feedback? Thank you everyone here who nailed this article.
While Obama does not live up to my hopes and dreams, as least he is not Bush.
All Americans should thank god every day that they are not living under President McCain....
...well actually President Palin, because I am sure she would have found a way to off the old fool by now.
You bet. What really pisses me off is that the media won't stop giving her page space every frickin' day. Who gives a *sh..t* about the book "everyone is talking about"??? Everyone in the Palin-happy cult world that is, because she won't go near the real world where no one will come to a book signing. She's getting global headlines for a book tour of rural podunk towns while skipping all the major cities because no one wants her there??? She's the best looking loser from Alaska, that's about it.
You are definitely right about the way change happens. What I am trying to say is that expecting Presidents or Congress to make progressive reforms is a delusion. Expecting to elect an Obama and watch him make progressive change is a fantasy in the current situation. Obama can't really make policy the way the Constitution says he should because his decisions are controlled by the corporatocracy that actually controls this country. And he is smart enough to realize this and acts accordingly.
As for "going after Wall Street", until there is an organized and ideologically coherent movement that has a vision of an alternative way to organize finances, no headway against Wall Street is possible. The fact that "most people want" something is meaningless in this environment. There is nothing less relevant in Washington than what most people want. The whole system must be changed.
The Demoks' role in Washing-town is to hold the fort for the Repuks. Had the people elected Nader, he would have quickly united and rallied the people, and we'd have secured Medicare for All, and recalled all MIC out of Iraq/Afghanistan by now.
In terms of domestic/foreign policies, it makes little difference whether Obama is President or Palin is. The controlling factor is the American political system where election results depend on candidate’s ability to pay for super expensive TV advertisings. So political candidate, Obama or not, begs for money at the feet of big corporations, super-rich and various lobbying firms which deliver big money to his/her campaign coffer. Once he/she is in office he/she has to keep those bib-money contributors happy at every steps so that they will not withhold their funding for his/her reelection campaign. If we want government which reflect populist aspiration, what we need is a campaign financing reform where private funding is outlawed and campaigns are financed by public money so that the lobbying industries will be shut down and no special interests will hold inordinate power.
Until such reform is enacted, the US policy direction will not change.
Mr Obama is just the shop window dummy, as far as real change goes.
Seriously how much change can you get with just one new man in new clothes?
The only way to get change is to demand it from the overwelming crowd.
To massively combine with unity, strikes and slogans so very loud.
Overcome the betrayal of elections and good for nothing politicians.
Push aside their hired goons and excuses about blind limitations.
Ditch the current parties and run the country for yourself.
After all, nothing will work and run without your good health.
That exactly is the policies of the current bunch.
The only difference may be who will be getting the free lunch.
David Michael Green asks, "Is he yet another tool of Wall Street, whose only difference from George Bush is stylistic?".
BINGO!
As to the left being tarred and the repukes coming back, no shit, Sherlock.
DOTS......--> CORPORATE DICTATORSHIP
Dot 1) same Bush policies
Dot 2) no moves to get rid of Bush appointees or place progressives in key positions(or any positions, for that matter).
Dot 3) no defense of inaction in the face of a crashing economy
Dot 4) continued deference towards repukes
Dot 5) Appearance of placeholding for repukes causing disgust with demopukes in general and progressives in particular
Connect the dots and you have a cynical, calloused maneuver to get the populace to favor the repukes in an election.
"Hungry people and jobless people are the stuff dictatorships are made of."
FDR (1944 speech)
NOW DO YOU GET IT?
AGG,
Thanks, i've read through this entire thread wondering if anyone would ever note that Prof. Green did point past Obama to the real powers in the USA. Your post is the only one that touches slightly on this.
Admittedly Green is only gingerly continuing his approach toward the truth, but in this article he continues to move closer.
Green writes:
"But on most days, alas, we just get an undiluted shot of Goldman Sachs, Big Pharma and every other corporate plutocrat working directly out of the Oval Office."
That is unequivocal, but Green then goes on to equivocate (including the quote you cited):
"Why is Obama such a do-nothing dud? Does he feel for financially strapped Americans to the point of doing his own permanent staycation in the White House, the better to model his empathy for them? Does his personality simply prevent him from doing anything that some person or another might object to? Is he yet another tool of Wall Street, whose only difference from George Bush is stylistic? Did some guy in a black suit and sunglasses pull him aside after the election, and say, "Okay, so you're the president now. You'll be following our instructions from here on out, in exchange for which we're gonna let you live."?
I don't know what his deal is. But I do know that this presidency is catastrophic for progressive ideas, and likely as well for the remaining shards of American democracy itself.
As to the former, our values and solutions are being ridiculously associated with this fundamentally conservative administration, and ironically repudiated right along with its mounting failures."
i think much of the skewering of Green in the comments here, fails to note that the Professor continues to edge closer to a realistic understanding of the true structure of power in the United States.
As i wrote after Green's previous article on CD, when i noted his gradual willingness to include Obama in his habitual rhetorical blasts at Republicans (a trend amplified in today's article), perhaps soon the Professor will begin to write about what US residents need to do to address the structure of power in this country...
Once again, recently in Honduras as in Columbia, Obama pisses on the embers of hope. With cynical contempt, it seems, he baited the progressive flock and delivered it to the wolves with little pretense or hesitation.
Perhaps Obama suffers from Stockholm Syndrome, becoming a dependent collaborator with his captors, the seemingly invincible military-financial-industrial complex (MFIC). If so, he was probably captured long before, at Harvard Law School, where the devil’s finest advocates matriculate.
Then again, maybe this is his great destiny after all, a preordained role in a cosmic drama---to further 'enable' this corrupt current system, militaristic free-market cannibalism beyond reform or redemption, to the point where it finally destroys and eats itself. Then a phoenix can rise from the ashes.
Pretty close to my calculation of o but I knew it when he promised his(government) support for corporate america and the izraeli public affairs committee in his campaign, maybe even before 2008, but he did and any fascination of voting for o that I had went out the window and sure enough and even though the crises are many and big, what o has done is to just simple keep playing w & dick's tune and try as hard as he might about what he campaigned on, 'change to believe in', all of his actions speak mostly the opposite for what he was elected for as our 'new' president.
And now, I would expect hillary to put on a move to run for president and to show how truly insane far too many americans are, they would vote for her just like we really needed another clinton after slick willie 'naftaed' the jobs out of america at a faster rate and that makes me question america's sensibilities even more because what do people like so much about something that has done nothing but drag the country down than a string of shit like reagan/reagan, bush, clinton/clinton/ bush, bush and now the next 'fixed' link in the chain, obama who is just w's surrogate, which is insanity because the people just keep electing the samo families expecting things to change like attention would be paid to the people the elect them to office, think so?, naw, not a chance.
"The problems aren't necessarily of his making, but the absence of credible solutions to those problems very much is."
That's the problem for people who vote for a representative. They'll elect someone to do their work, forgetting that he or she is supposed to represent everyone, not just the majority that elected him, then they join the minority in criticizing him when he can't possibly please everyone.
The question might be, why do we need leaders or representatives that can be easily bought when We the People could decide things direct democratically?
true democracy: logistics, 360000000 some odd voters, who tallies
"Obama is obviously smart, and he ran a near-perfect campaign, just as he had to, in order to win the presidency against long odds."
He's smart insofar as his ability to play the character. His handlers managed the campaign, not him...he just did what they instructed. He's a smart...stooge. And there weren't any "long odds" of him winning. He was in from the start. McCain/Palin? Com'on! Just like old man Dole (& Kemp) Nothing but stand-ins while the other side gets its turn at the cash register. Cha-ching.
You are correct on this; Palin is a good bet for 2012. My money is on her. At this point I'll probably vote for her just to see the democrat hacks scream, blog, cry and pull each others hair out for another eight years. I'm mean, it makes no difference anyway. Unlike Obama and his lying democrat peers & hacks, I can expect her to do exactly what see says she'll do. She will murder & pillage just like the Obamanator.
Besides, she's got nice bod, and I just love a good cat-fight.
What the hell. Why not?
Meow.
Why not indeed? That "thank God we didn't get McCain/Palin" is starting to sound more ridiculous every day the more things unfold with Obama. Why not the devil you know? Why not someone who you know will keep their promise to screw you?
However, must as this could be amusing in a twisted way, I will not pull the lever for Palin in 2012 to make it happen. Of course, I won't be voting for Obama either. That would be just as repugnant.
If you are right, Obama can't do a thing progressive because of the Democrats (which he is very much a part of, remember his record, please) then we need to take down the Democratic Party itself. It is not the party of the people. They have betrayed us. They have a filibuster proof majority and the Whitehouse. If they can't do it, then it's clear, they don't want to. This majority has been sought after for decades. It is what Obama said would usher in single payer health care, remember? I know that was a whole year and half ago. We don't go into the past, just forward! ha!
Take the party down. Vote independent. The Democrats stink!
Or how about working in key districts to try to elect more progressive democrats?
Thank you Boyd R Collins for getting to the heart of the matter. As usual, Green, along with many posters I read on Common Dreams, prefers to live in an alternative fantasy reality where Obama can do whatever he wants - without apparent approval of Congress - and if every progressive measure hasn't already been inacted, well, that means he is no different than George Bush.
I mean, is Green even aware of how American government actually works (if you can call it that)? Is he, for example, watching the health care debate that is going on right now (Saturday afternoon) as I type? How on earth could single payer have a prayer of getting enacted when you can't even get 60 Senators to sign on to a very weak public option? Obama has said time and time again that if we could start all over, he would do single payer, but it is completely unrealistic to start all over with a country of 300 million people and more importantly, a congress where the majority are nowhere near progressive. And meanwile thousands with no insurance die each month and Dennis Kucinich thinks we have all the time in the world for perfection. 3 Senators - Lieberman, Lincoln & Nelson - have the potential power to torpedo the aforementioned weak public option. This is political reality - like it or not. What can Obama do about it? Yes, he might have made a more persuasive case for the public option earlier on in the year but does anyone think it would change the mind of the possibly insane Joe Lieberman?
I don't see any evidence that Green is interested in analyzing the political world as it is but rather prefers to live in some utopian fantasy where everyone in the U.S. agrees with him and we don't have 50 distinct states, each with representatives clamoring for whatever will benefit their own constituents in the short-term.
I've always thought people on Common Dreams have two options:
1)Continue to preach to the converted and yell at people who don't already agree with them.
2)Get out there in the community and make persuasive but respectful progressive arguments that change people's minds. Hell, why not get a group down to Arkansas as soon as possible and point out to the morons who largely make up Blanche Lincoln's constituency that a public option would actually help them??!!
Essentially, your post consists of making feeble exculpatory excuses for Obama (single-payer is "completely unrealistic" with this Congress, blah blah blah), taking a whack at Dennis Kucinich (one of the few in Congress with any principles at all) & blaming the whole hideous spectacle on "bad" senators (Lieberman, Lincoln & Nelson) who are actually very similar to Obama. (Why couldn't the same excuses you offer for Obama be offered for the bad senators, for example? Do you think Lieberman & Nelson are free to do "whatever they want"?)
No one needs "advice" from a foggy-headed Obama apologist like you. What makes you think you know what other CD readers are involved in? Probably because you do nothing yourself except sit on your butt pontificating, you assume everyone else is doing the same. Why don't you create your own group and "get down to Arkansas" to educate all the morons, instead of assigning this task to others?
Essentially, Rich M., your insulting and flip reply to Tramaker proves his point about purer-than-thou ideologues. Do you watch C-SPAN? If you did, you'd see how difficult it is to pass even the most watered down sliver of reform. If passing single payer is not realisitic, then please, in your God-alighhty wisdon, educate the rest of us on how it can be done with this Congress. No? You Can't? Just more invective about me being an apologist zombie for Obama? OK fine, then lets move on...
I've read Tramaker's comment several times and I did not once see him "take a whack" at Kucnich. He was merely pointing out that health care is not some political abstraction, but a matter of life and death. It is not something for wannbe radical trust-fund lefties to use to fuel theri narcissism. (And speaking of Kucinich, can you tell me how he voted on the House version of the health bill? On the other hand, never mind....)
Your "Bad Senators" comment is ignorant beyond laughable. Those senators Lieberman, Lincoln and Landreau are taking advantage of a profoundly weak and timid leadership to squeeze extra pork for their states, in exchange for their votes. This is truly digraceful and makes a mockery out of those who stand behind reform on principle. I'm not necessarily saying that Obama is morally better than those senators, but to compare his position as president to those individual senators is comparing apples to kumquats.
Your final dig seems to be a case of projection. Tramaker's pint seems to be--not to apologize for Obama--but recognize that its is going to be up to us to organize and pressure these legislators into making real, meaningful progressive change, not only in health care but in our overseas advunturism and our national priorities at large. You make the presumtion that he's sitting on your butt while you are--doing whatever right now.
Lastly Rich M you can rest assured that none of these comments matter in the least, becasue I confess I am nothing more than a CIA funded globalist lackey running dog of the neo-liberal worldwide order. So is Tramaker. And we've tapped your phones. Have a nice day.
So your argument is that single payer IS realistic at this point in history? Great - than it shouldn't take you much time to show us where the votes are in Congress.
Regarding the Senators...Connecticut voters favor the public option overwhelmingly so thus my comment that Lieberman might be insane. But to your point, I thought I WAS offering the same rationale for the Senators as Obama, namely that Congress largely votes to please their constituents. You call them "excuses", I'm calling it political reality.
You're right - I don't know what other CD readers are involved in but I have yet to see in any posts like yours, any realistic suggestions to advance progressive causes. Though my original language could have been more tactful, I still think I have a point about going down to Arkansas as an example (or at least a metaphor) - that's something constructive people can do to change people's minds. What do you advise, other than just bashing Obama all day?
My larger point is - we need to change people's minds and "preaching to the choir" over the top nonsense like Green's article does nothing to further the cause, in my opinion.
- Yes, single-payer could certainly have developed overwhelming popular support. Instead of awarding seats at the table ONLY to corporate stooges, Obama could have invited single-payer proponents as well. In fact, he could even have excluded the corporate stooges, explaining that lobbyists are intrinsically biased & thus should have no role in developing public policy.
He could have launched a nation-wide tour of real "town halls," using his much-touted "eloquence" to explain to the public in simple terms why single-payer was in their interest, & that the only thing standing in its way was greedy insurance & Pharma companies. He could have waged a serious populist campaign, making it very risky for any congresspersons to oppose him.
But in fact, he didn't even make a feeble attempt to do this. He sold out 100% to the lobbyists from the get-go. If he had literally been hired by the insurance companies to develop "health care reform," he wouldn't have done any differently than he in fact did.
Look at all the talking points against this watered down bill we're getting. You don't think plenty of powerful forces wouldn't have spent hundreds of millions to crush the scenario you describe above? Look at all the uproar over just a tiny little public option. And then we'd have Obama having wasted all his time and political capital and been defeated.
In a perfect world, with all the time in the world on his hands - and no other pressing issues (ha!) - I think you've got a good plan, as outlined above. I just don't see this as being realistic in terms of how much effort it would take to convince minds in a short period of time - and that it could be done by one man. And we haven't even gotten into the expense. You think even with the most persuasive rhetoric in the world, he would get single payer past Congress in this economic climate with the U.S. in such debt?? C'mon.
And consider this: 80% of Americans are happy with their health insurance. It would be a HUGE uphill battle to convince them to go for single payer. It would be too radical for them, especially seniors who are already the least supportive of any healthy care reform. I'm not saying that's right - I'm saying that's reality. Huge change - and this is 1/6 of the economy we're talking about - always comes incrementally.
Personally, I recognize this current bill is far from perfect...but it's better than the status quo and it leaves open plenty of possibility for future congresses (hopefully more progressive) to improve on it.
Tramaker,
You're wrong about the expense of single payer vs. the "public option."
CBO estimates project that SINGLE PAYER would REDUCE THE FEDERAL DEFICIT by $100 BILLION DOLLARS in it's first 10 years, and something like $650 BILLION DOLLARS in the next 10 years.
RichM's plan of having Obambi tour the US in small town meetings, touting that ONE FACT would have done much to de-arm the Reich Wingers of their "but our TAXES WILL GO UP with health care reform!" meme.
But don't let the FACTS make you reconsider your Obambi-apologist stance and delusions....
True Patriot
The fact is that Obama sold us out by keeping single payer off the table. Period. FDR and LBJ faced huge opposition, too, but they actually FOUGHT for what they wanted. Obama just folded before the fight even began. So please spare us the rationalizations about why he didn't even try.
Obama won't even be a good motivational speaker after he leaves office if he can't understand that you can't WIN unless you first MAKE AN EFFORT. Of course, making an effort implies that you care. Obama has shown all too clearly that if his campaign sob stories about his mother's struggles with insurance companies as she lay dying meant anything to him, it was that he'd get his, and screw the rest of us
Many people have said that Obama could, just by executive order, expand Medicare to include everyone. Is this true?
And if it is, why doesn't he do it?
You say "80% of Americans are happy with their health insurance." That is a lie. The CNN poll that you and the rest of the Republicrats base that statement on really said that 80% of Americans are satisfied with the quality of health care they receive. Please note that "health care" is not the same as "health insurance," however much Obama tries to conflate the two.
Also note in the CNN article below that Americans' satisfaction with their own health care providers (this means physicians) somehow becomes twisted to mean satisfaction with their health insurance companies, which is not what the poll demonstrated.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS
/03/19/health.care.poll/index.html
"More than eight in 10 Americans questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. survey released Thursday said they're satisfied with the quality of health care they receive.
"And nearly three out of four said they're happy with their overall health care coverage.
"But satisfaction drops to 52 percent when it comes to the amount people pay for their health care, and more than three out of four are dissatisfied with the total cost of health care in the United States.
"When Americans say they support health care reform, that doesn't mean they want to lose their own coverage or give up their own doctor," said Keating Holland, CNN's polling director. "That's something that the Clinton White House didn't realize in 1993."
"It suggests a prescription for health care reform that Americans can swallow -- start by addressing health care costs while allowing Americans to keep their current coverage and their current health care providers," Holland added. Half of all Americans questioned in the poll said they are very confident that no one in their household will lose health insurance. However, 29 percent said they are very confident that they could meet their bills if someone in the household had a major medical emergency."
As far as pinning any hopes on "future congresses (hopefully more progressive)," good luck. You are seriously underestimating the sense of anger and betrayal among many of those who most enthusiastically supported Obama. Now that we have seen him sell us out, and we have seen all too clearly that Congress demonstrably is just a collection of crooks on the take, it is going to be even harder for "progressives" to get elected: not only will they not get the corporate dollars, but they won't get our dollars, either, because we'll assume they are just more of the same ilk as the other "progressive" Democrats who talk big and then sell out big. As more and more lives are destroyed by war, financial collapse, and lack of access to health care, all that will be left for voters will be apathy and revenge.
We now know that the Democrats and Republicans are just different brands of the same toxic product ; the difference is that Obama inspired so much hope, which has now turned into very dangerous anger. It is going to seem worth it to put Palin into office, just to see Obama, Clinton, and the rest of them fall.
The current bill is NOT better than the status quo. For example, see the recent short article by Dr Marcia Angell (a distinguished professor at Harvard Med School), "Is the House Health Care Bill Better than Nothing?", published at CD at http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/11/09-5. (Her explicit answer to the question posed in the title is "No.")
The current bill is essentially a plan to enhance insurance company profits, written entirely by lobbyists and/or persons known to be sympathetic to lobbyists. All advocates of single-payer were excluded from the policy-development negotiations, right from the outset.
Your post, once again, consists entirely of excuses for the status quo; arguments to the effect that any attempt to do better "would have been crushed"; & that therefore, nothing but this P.O.S. was "realistic." You're essentially saying that total capitulation to corporate power is the only "realistic" way things can be. Anyone saying anything different is an "unrealistic dreamer or radical." You're saying the public is too stupid, the corporate forces are too powerful, & that therefore, nothing is Obama's fault, & we should regard this massive sellout as "acceptable." We should lie to ourselves and call it "not perfect, but better than the status quo," when the truth is that it's a maximum sellout, without even a serious effort to do the right thing.
Who cares if it enhances insurance company profits as long as people are covered? Why is that such a big deal? Every single progressive in the House and the Senate except Kucinich (and if you count Eric Massa, though I think he is providing cover for the fact that he's from a fairly conservative district in upstate New York) is in favor of their respective bills, including Bernie Sanders.
Do you think if this bill is defeated that there will ever be another chance for ANY kind of improvement to health care in our lifetime? Do you get the politics of this AT ALL? You need a dose of pragmatism to go along with your utopian view of the American political system.
Green's article is a prime example of what's wrong with political thinking on the liberal side these days. He piles metaphor on metaphor to characterize the impotence of the Obama executive, which certainly makes for an entertaining and well-written article, but misses the bigger question: "Is the U.S. President really the most powerful position in the world?" Green assumes it is and that the reason for Obama's inaction is a personal reluctance to act, but what if Obama is simply recognizing the realities of power and is acting accordingly?
We knew in our hearts that true progressive reform was no longer possible within the current political and economic context, yet still we wanted to believe. Progressive action is no longer possible in our political system, but we, like Green, want to believe it is and that's what fuels our colorful frustration.
I'm not sure progressive reform is impossible in this country. A hell of a lot of Repubs want to go after Wall Street and the Fed--that is one area the American people agree on. The same with outsourcing. Most people hate CEOs who make 10 million a year--of every political stripe. And they aren't taken with outfits like Walmart that pay their workers so little they are eligible for federal programs like Medicaid. As usual, the people will drag these goddamn politicians by the napes of their necks as they demand change. That is the only way it ever has happened and it is the only way it will happen now.
A lot of Republicans want to go after Wall Street and the Fed, NOW, when they are in opposition. When they are / were in power, and can / could actually do something, what did they do? That is the test.
Similarly with the Democrats. Put the Repubs in power, dump the Democrats into opposition, and they too would talk rhetoric about wanting to go after Wall Street.
Yes, it's all great theater for the masses. And as has been stated by Bill Moyers, in his interview with Bill Maher earlier this season, there is very little in this bill that the Repubs shouldn't like (except for any PO -- again, no different from Dems or Obama, who has not even tried to fight for it) and the only reason they are against it is that there is the tug of war over the pot of money from the Medical Industrial Complex for their campaign coffers.
"he is the president, and he is supposed to be fighting to improve his country's situation."
You have got to be f**king kidding already!
Which part of "Frankly, THEY OWN THE PLACE" doesn't this author understand? He's constantly bitching about the same nonsense, as if he simply refuses to embrace the TRUTH as told to us by a Senior Senator.
Obama was hired to run the place THEY own. How hard is that to get? He was not hired by the OWNERS of the PLACE to reform the OWNERS of the PLACE - or the PLACE, for that matter.
He was hired to ensure all Big Everything bottom lines continue to rise - no matter the consequences to We The People.
Our government is owned. That is the starting point. Until WE find a way to wrest ownership out of their uber-greedy, ruthless, venal little hands, nothing will change. Nothing.
Thank you Frank, Now I understand, finally.
Jeevee
WHY DID "WE" VOTE FOR HIM? ARE MOST OF US TOO LAZY TO LOOK UP HIS SENATORIAL VOTING RECORD?
Laziness, yes... but also a mixture of willful ignorance, cognitive dissonance, "subjunctivitis", false hope, lemming/herd-mentality, fancy marketing techniques, hypnotic oratory skills, fear of the "greater" evil, blind faith, and an utter failure of leadership by the liberal & progressive journalists/soothsayers who championed Obama as the next messiah...
I asked ALL of my liberal and progressive friends prior to the election why they were voting for Obama, and when I informed them of his Senatorial voting record, they scoffed at me and dismissed what I had to say as a right-wing conspiracy... just some slanderous rumor that the Repubes were circulating on the internet...!
It is the same wall of denial that the 9-11 Truth movement runs up against when trying to inform "educated" Liberals about the evidence of demolition of the WTC & missile strike on the Pentagon... They dont WANT to know the truth, for it would upset their insulated relativistic reality, and force them to come to uncomfortable realizations about the current political reality...
I voted for Obama. I would have voted for Dennis Kucinich if he had been the final candidate. However, I was very happy when Obama won. Now I realize that Kucininch couldn't be bought and that's why he got nowhere. Obama was bought and paid for by the powers that be.
Now I realize that an honest man with real ideals will never be able to be President of our country. I guess I should have realized that back when Jimmy Carter lost to Ronald Reagan. AN HONEST MAN CAN NOT BE PRESIDENT.
I give up.
Well, I am one who drank the Obama Kool-Aid. Mea Culpa. I almost wish Palin would win in 2012 and take the country down the drain. Perhaps then people would arise and demand change.
A MAN THAT INTELLIGENT ---- ACTING THAT STUPID?
Guaranteed to lose his next election, surely the effects of all his actions.
And his two Ivy League degrees establish that it would be absolutely
impossible for him not to know it.
For it all started about 1987 when Obama was working for a rich and powerful
multinational called Business International Corporation, and he was called to
the CEO’s office for this high level conference:
Corporate rich: “We have decided that the Secretary of U.S. Treasury
in 2008 will be Tim Geithner, and were looking for a President who
knows how to take orders, are you a good team player?”
Obama: “But politics is something I have never participated in, not even a
single debate, not even in high school. Surely you jest?”
Corporate rich: And we would demand that it stayed that way, as government
in Washington has nothing to do with politics, as it is all about acting, all
about pretense, deceit and smoke screen generating.
Obama: “Well then, as Shakespeare would say,
“All the world a stage and every man a player.”
Zaphod Beeblebrox, need I say more?
David Michael Green, like so many democrat excuse-makers is wrong on numerous points in this article.
Obama is not a "placeholder". He has actively participated in the gutting of this nation.
BEFORE Obama was elected last November,
He vowed to increase the Pentagon budget,
He stated he would not hesitate to escalate attacks within Pakistan,
He chose Joe Biden to be a heartbeat away from the presidency (Biden made sure that there would be no intelligence presented to the Senate which was contrary to Bush's claims of WMD's AND Biden voted in favor of giving Bush the power to start the Illegal war against Iraq),
He alligned himself with religious fundamentalists,
He voted to protect the telecom criminals from prosecution for participating in warrantless wiretapping AFTER he had sworn to do all he could to prevent granting immunity,
He PROUDLY rushed into the Bush oval office to enable the stealing of HUNDREDS of BILLIONS of tax dollars and give them to the banks without any regulations or oversight, and
He made numerous statements which deliberately led people to think he was a progressive.
SINCE being elected, he has worked to distance himself from almost any progressive ideas,
He filled his cabinet with a "who's who" of people who have promoted the very ideas and actions which have led to the disastrous state we are in,
He made another warmonger his Secretary of State,
He pushed the highly respected environmentalist Van Jones out of the White House because it was more important to please Glenn Beck,
He has been deliberately indifferent about climate change,
and
He deliberately restricted any discussion of health care to a narrow path which would lead more money directly into the bank accounts of the greedy corporate insurers.
It is NOT that Mr. Obama is not up to the challenge. It is quite the opposite.
This distorting article also tries to portray Bill Clinton as innocuous, while trying to promote the false idea that all of the corruption was the result of the republicans. While I agree with the assessment of the venal nature of republicans, no administration has done more to implement these debasing policies than did Clinton's (and, of course, Obama has filled his administration with the same pigs).
So, yes, it is likely that the next election will see a reinstating of arrogantly stupid conservative venality, but it is hard to tell right now whether it will call itself republican or democrat.
Please wake up.
Stage name for above paid actor is, "Birdbrain Alley" as he is being
paid to generate the bird brain illusion that the corporate rich
have nothing to do with politics. Every president a free spirit
with unlimited ability to destroy what the super-intelligent
rich have established by their Empire USA since World
War Two.
"Alabama john"
This "john" is obviously clogged with itself.
as much as i enjoyed david's first ten skewerings of prez peacnik i am feeling a little worn out with the endless punchline analysis he provides
i am not a big supporter of this prez but to be honest about the whole situation there is not much he can do about it in the final analysis
david can't have it both ways - he calls obama a puppet then he rails him for being - a puppet
mr green should move on and cast his eye on the greater realities of the country as they exist right now
the evidence is in - this country is run by corporations not the government
when referring to a state that has undergone the marriage of corporation and government mussolini termed the word fascist state as its definition
and that is, friends, like it or not, where we are today
the fascist states of america
the country is controlled by the banks, the hedge funds, the nwo, the mic and fervent rabid right wing extremists
into that mix we dump brother o and attach to him our unrealistic hopes that he can undo history with a wave of his wand
we expect him to clean a very dirty and declining slate of all its ills and evils
we projected - and weakly at that - our hopes to go back to a fictional shangri la of america the beautiful, a place that never existed and i should add that based on the thin efforts of what passes for progressives in this country, never will happen
obama sits on the tinfoil throne of the presidency fully aware of the dangers he faces vis a vis the steroid raged military - they tell him he doesn't tell them
then there is the cia - who orchestrated the assassination of jfk on national tv. leon panetta, its curent director, has said that both he and obama are AFRAID of the cia
so much for the invincible president
to say nothing of the nsa and the myriad quilt of intelligence agencies each more dangerous than the last
together these agencies have: killed the president of this and other countries, funded color revolutions in a number of countries, overthrown democracies left and right, destroyed democracies at their whim, cannibalized the world's resources and brought us all to the brink of disaster
these agencies have huge budgets from the congress and in addition have black budget appropriations we never hear about and then there are the proceeds from the trade and sale of cocaine from colombia (where we have a huge protectionist armed presence to ensure the trade is unmolested) and afghanistan where our military guards not only the coming pipeline but also the poppy fields and the heroin they produce
obama's predicament reminds me of an old (and tired) joke i heard about a guy who was buried to his neck in the sand by an emir from way back in the day - a mean and nasty bull with sharp horns was then let loose to skewer the poor guy's head for the sport of the king
so anyway, on the first pass the guy is able to tilt his head a bit and the bull misses his stab
on the second pass as the bull goes by the guy tries to reach up and chomp on the bull's balls and when he does the emir jumps up and yells - hey no biting
so we put this unknown media fabrication into office and then expect, while he is buried in sand up to his neck we expect him to bite the testicles of the corporations, the hedge funds, the security agencies, the nwo, the military and while he is at it finally put the republicans in their place
and then we have the nerve to stomp our feet like angry little children when we don't get our problems solved
never mind the republicans not having an up link to the real world - the progressives don't have a satellite to up-link to
bashing obama, though fair sport in our toxic politics, is not going to accomplish anything anymore. he has been outed as a nwo plant and the question becomes - what do we do next
the real problem lies with the progressives in this country who are not really that progressive anyway but who have decided to disengage from politics after the election as if our job was done, when it was in fact just beginning
there is more excitement among the thousands of fools that turn out for a sarah palin book signing event than for a health care rally
and that says a lot
then there is this sick and sad notion that we can move forward without atoning for or acknowledging our past sins against the world - a notion enjoyed by both the left and right
its the old and ignorant refrain: what did we ever do to them
well, we did and still do lots to them
they don't hate us for our freedoms - we don't have freedoms anymore - they hate us because we have been killing them for two hundred years while stealing their resources and turning them into free labor
forget obama - we have abandoned him to a lonely aria that no one can really hear and we expect him to rip the arpeggio'd solo like jimmy page on stairway to heaven
brother obama has a two string banjo that is out of tune
any change that is going to come about is only going to come about if we take to the streets and insist that it take place
while we are out there we also need to stand down the military, the intelligence agencies, the fed, the investor class and the nwo they represent
sad to say, we are not up to it
it is us who don't have the courage not brother obama, buried as he is, up to his neck in sand
This is right on target - it explains why the liberal critique of Obama always falls flat, no matter how entertaining it might be. The liberals start by assuming that the U.S. government works more or less like it's written in the Constitution and then rail about the personal weaknesses of those who occupy the offices. But they won't take the step of believing what their own words are actually showing: the government of the United States is under the control of the corporatocracy. This is not a rhetorical flourish - it is literal fact. We need to come up with a serious strategy to initiate a new form of government that would allow a restoration of democracy to the U.S. As entertaining as Green's metaphors are, they don't get us any closer to that.
"....The liberals start by assuming that the U.S. government works more or less like it's written in the Constitution and then rail about the personal weaknesses of those who occupy the offices. But they won't take the step of believing what their own words are actually showing: the government of the United States is under the control of the corporatocracy...."
- Exactly right.
Well said!
OTOH: it is interesting, and maybe nothing more than interesting, that more and more liberals are more and more, losing "hope" in Obama.
If your "worn out" by this good article, then from where comes
all the energy to post such a world record for hate mongering,
confusion generating and disjointed logic?
it takes talent ala to convolute so few words into such pointless dribble
good for you
no doubt you are confused, i see that
I'd "unflag" your prior post if "flagging" actually did anything...
hilarious & original thoughts... well said...
ignore the folks that take on a moniker of "first-name + State of origin"
Odds are likely that they aren't from that state (or even the States), and it isnt even their name...
likely a paid shill or IDF troll trying to derail the discussion,
like Nebraska Nathan or infinite others of their ilk...
.
I am fascinated that 0bama can continue and extend Cheney's policies in almost every aspect and be reviewed so favorably as "A Show About Nothing" anywhere left of the NYT.
Would it were nothing! Bring on the Nothing!
Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Colombia, Venezuela, Honduras, Ecuador, Cuba, Syria, Somalia could all use a lot more Nothing from the United States.
No new coal mines and no mountaintop removal would have been nice.
No dollars and zero cents of bailout would have been economic.
Come on, quit fudging! This is an aggressive corporate-imperial, anti-environmental and anti-popular presidency. How much difference does it really make to the structure of an empire that they hire one executive who is black?
What can we say? I wish there wasn't so much truth in this article? I had a bad feeling when I saw our Pres. standing with other leaders in Asia and he was the only one with a silly grin on his face!
At least he hasn't tried to rub Angela Merkel's shoulderss yet while hollerin' "where's the bar-b-que."
That is the one good thing I can say about Obama, at least he isn't an embarrassment. Sometimes I would literally cringed at some of the things that Dubya used to do.
But other than that I'm really not seeing that much difference between the two of them. Both just servants to the powers that be.
Latin America has its barrios.
Gringo America its Barrie 0.
His Excellency, The Great Obama, now replaces Thomas Dewey as the person who most resembles the little wimpy wax figure of the groom on top of the wedding cake.
Our mistake was in believing that what Obama promised was still possible. We knew in our hearts that true progressive reform was no longer possible within the current political and economic context, yet still we wanted to believe. And that belief has worked to destroy the last vestiges of the possibility of progressive reform.
Yes, it was our mistake, the King Kong of mistakes. We will not make it again in '012. DO NOT WEAKEN! DO NOT SUPPORT OBAMA! VOTE THIRD PARTY!
HEAR, HEAR!
Actually, I'm not criticizing Obama directly, though naturally I'm no fan of this Presidency. I'm saying that in terms of the current power relations now existing the U.S. no President can make progressive changes, whether Democratic or Republican. In fact, I think Green's article is a prime example of what's wrong with political thinking on the liberal side these days. He piles metaphor on metaphor to characterize the impotence of the Obama executive, which certainly makes for an entertaining and well-written article, but misses the bigger question: "Is the U.S. President really the most powerful position in the world?" Green assumes it is and that the reason for Obama's inaction is a personal reluctance to act, but what if Obama is simply recognizing the realities of power and is acting accordingly? That's what I was actually trying to say in the first post: "We knew in our hearts that true progressive reform was no longer possible within the current political and economic context, yet still we wanted to believe." Progressive action is no longer possible in our political system, but we, like Green, want to believe it is and that's what fuels our colorful frustration.
Don't blame yourself or others, left center or right,
ok the mean spirits maybe.
We have been lied to our whole lives.
This problem has been growing for centuries,
started small and has exploded exponentially lately.
There is no political system anymore,
only them(CAPITAL holding all the cards) and us(empty handed people).
Socialism is not a dirty word,
nor a perfect answer.
It's a new day and age,
a new place in time and space.
New thinking is needed.
Voting third party won't do any good if there are no third party candidates on the ballot. Are you planning to run for office? I think you'd be great. All the seats in the House of Representative are up for grabs next year. Petitions have to be in by the beginning of April, I think. Check your secretary of state's office or your local board of elections.
I'm not talking about third party presidential candidates. Not one has a chance in hell of winning until we change the way we vote. Google "Electoral College" to see what I'm talking about.
Yeah! King Kong the gorilla, get it (nudge)? JEB BUSH IN 2012! WOOOOT! :0
A professor of "political science" that makes no mention at all that all these inherent problems are the results of a capitalist system that by its very nature is unable to address the problems it is responsible for creating. He's so upset that a president is there who supports the system and is constrained by the system in what he can and cannot do. He suggests that if we just had the right guy in there, all is possible. He looks upon politics from the slant of capitalist commodities, where it's simply a question of a choice between one item or another. He's blinded by the capitalist ideology that dominates our society and culture. He offers NOTHING to further a working class struggle against this rotten system, but rather laments the fact that a bourgeois politician isn't bringing about the political results he wants. Prof. Green is just a waste of bytes.
ooooh, thank you. Nice post. But what are we to DO? Item: Elections are run by the wealthiest Amerikans. Item: Elections are won by the 55% who get all their 'information' from Fox network. Item: Fox network is owned by the chief fascist of them all. Item: Short of armed revolution, we are losers.
"what are we do DO?"
Good question. So here's my suggestion, obviously in a very short form...
1. Firstly, understand how the system of capitalism works. How it is structured, where surplus value comes from, what private property is all about under the capitalist system and what the two main contending classes are in this type of economic-social system. For help on this, read either Marx's Capital ** (heavy reading, but so so eye-opening) or read some later Marxists who have simplified the thing. Here's a good one to read ...
Ernest Mandel: http://www.marxists.org/archive/mandel/1967/intromet/index.htm
** Here's a series of lecturers that will help anyone get through Capital Volume I:
http://davidharvey.org/reading-capital/
2. After getting a handle on the above, you'll be more equipped to look at all aspects of society with a dialectical viewpoint and a class analysis. This opens up an understanding of what will be necessary to carry out an effective class struggle against capitalism, the capitalist class and its ideology. You'll begin to notice that all extra-parliamentary class struggles if conducted with the underlying intention of exposing the capitalist system for what it really is can make significant inroads into ultimately changing the system. So ...
3. Choose your struggle, be it in the labour movement, the woman's movement, the peace movement, the environmental movement, the unemployed movement, the electoral sphere, etc. with the idea of expanding your class allies' understanding of what you've learned in step 1. Real change will come about when members of the working class start to understand that they in fact are members of a class that can only find true political and economic liberation by changing the system itself.
4. Discard the idea that the system can be changed in one quick stroke through what you stated was a "violent revolution". That may indeed become the case down the road, but the ground work needs to established first and that means winning over the vast majority of the working class to stop playing the capitalist game.
5. Remember that EVERY action, no matter how small, that is directed to advance the interest of the working class over the interests of the capitalist class, further weakens the capitalist class and impacts on how THEIR economic system works. It is the "butterfly effect".
6. Take advantage of the fact that the global capitalist economic system is now at its weakest stage that it has been for a number of generations. It is in a very grave crisis which is only compounding as the various contradictions of the system percolate to the surface and become more and more obvious to ordinary people. Contradictions of things like: growing unemployment, environmental crisis, failing rates of profit, busting bubbles, etc., etc. make capitalism more and more unmanageable and more obviously irrational.
7. Be aware that the ultra-right (fascists) historically build their strength when the reserve army of the unemployed grows significantly. It is becoming increasingly important that this trend be stopped before it has time to become a real threat. Demands for a shorter work week at the same take home pay, must be a marshalling call today to deal with this reserve army of the unemployed and to lower the rate of capitalist exploitation and increase the strength of the working class both economically and politically.
I won't go on at this point, since understanding the real nature of capitalism from a Marxist perspective provides all sorts of answers to your original question, "what are we to DO?". In its simplest form, it is building the class alliances of all the classes within capitalist society that's interests are opposite to those of the bourgeoisie with the intention of building a new and different society than the one we presently have to endure.
WHAT DO WE DO? ORGANIZE!
Hi Michael. Good question. The answer is, we learn how to organize - unions, communities, students, churches, and especially how to form coalitions of ALL these elements. And we create schools and forums for organizers in every city.
Next time you go to a meeting or a rally, here is a slogan to remember. "A meeting is never complete until everyone leaves with a job to do and someone to do it with."
Every rally I go to consists of a collection of speeches. Sorry "leaders of the movement," speechmaking is not organizing. Cut short your speech and ask people to gather into action teams. Everyone who wants to go door to door, over here. Talk show callers, this way. People who will bring the message to unions or jobsites, in front of the stage. Church organizers, here. Only in this way will we build up an infrastructure which, over the long haul, can eventually challenge corporate dominance. Unless we learn to function in affinity groups, families if you will, we will never build a real movement, much less a serious party. Now that more and moree people are becoming disillusioned is the time to start.
In reading an article here on CD about Obama's golf game, I found a very telling insight into his character. One of his colleagues stated that in golf, as in his politics, Obama is "risk averse".
So I would assume that the least risky position for him to take would be to maintain the status quo, which is exactly what he has done with Geitner, Summers and the military heirarchy, as well as torture, illegal imprisonment, war, the economy, and so on.
He's not a "Change" kinda guy, but he plays one on TV.
"He's not a 'Change' kinda guy, but he plays one on TV."
excellent.
The top 1-10% don't seem to be having any problems as the FED blows another bubble in the stock market, more bailouts are arranged to shift more monies from the poor to rich, and the deficits/debt they make lots of money on keeps rising at breakneck speed. So, the constituency Obama was chosen to represent is doing just fine with his current and proposed policies. Obama is the lead general on the opposing side in the Class War--something Green apparantly can't bring himself to write.
So, Obama isn't a "place holder" president. He's doing real damage to millions of US citizens as the Class War escalates bigtime. There's one theme the Tea Baggers have correct--The great majority of Obama's policies are not good for the commonfolk, as one would expect from the escalation of an already lopsided Class War. Can anyone point to a specific policy of Obama's (aside from medicinal marijuana) that's worthy of support? Are there any legitimate excuses for his lies? Clinton was a horrendous President and War Criminal, as were the Bushes before and after. Obama will probably exceed them all in destruction.
Obama will be remembered as the man who made Sarah 'Cariboo Barbie' Palin the next US President.
Perhaps.
But wouldn't you agree that 153 weeks ahead of time is just a BIT too early to concede Election Day 2012?
If a new political party (or a current small party) could form a cadre of 1,000,000 fund-raising members/voters by May 2010, folks who would agree to raise $1 a-day for the purpose of political campaigning, then by the time the 2012 Elections ramp-up that summer this new (or current) party will have $730,000,000 to spend on them.
The fact that an idiot/lunatic like Sarah Palin could even be CONSIDERED as a candidate for Governor, let alone alone acheive that office, be made a Vice-Presidential candidate on a ticket that got almost 46% of the vote, AND be the presumed Presidential candidate for the Repubs in 2012 is, to my mind, solid and absolute proof that quantity and quality of TV exposure has become the main factor in U.S. political campaigns.
$730 mil. buys A LOT of TV time.
To put this 1,000,000-member fundraising team into perspective, size-wise:
-This would represent significantly LESS people than 1% of the 131,257,328 Citizens who voted for President in 2008. 300,000 less people in fact.
-This would also represent significantly LESS people than the 1.41% of Presidential voters who chose to vote non-Dem/Repub. 850,000 less people in fact.
And focusing just on the "progressive" or "leftist" tack:
-This would represent only 99,922 more people than the combined voters for Nader and McKinney in 2008 (900,078). In other words, a modest 11% growth in support for the True Left after more than a full year (by May 2010) of Obama, combined with a new-found willingness to put their money where their mouth is.
-Even restricted to the Naderites, this would represent only 261,525 more people than Ralph's 2008 showing. Or 35% growth plus some true grit.
---
$1 a-day is an exceedingly modest sum for all but the most destitute of U.S. Citizens to raise. But if even a relatively tiny proportion of them could be organized to do so, day in and day out, for two years, for a cause they believe in, then they could invoke an avalanche, a hurricane, a tidal wave of change in U.S. politics and Government. All without even altering the de facto structures of TV-based politics or threatening the Media Conglomerates' bottom line (at least in the sort term)!
That this doesn't happen means one of two things are true about the people of the U.S., and especially the "progressives" and "leftists":
1. The thought of organized, massive participation, low-contribution fund raising has never occured to them.
2. They are too lazy or full of fear to do anything about it once it has.
I'm trying to take care of number 1 -and I need help in spreading the word. I'll leave it to others to address number 2.
I'll leave this with a possible slogan for the campaign to recruit such a fund-raising cadre:
"I'd pay a Dollar-A-Day to Change the World. Wouldn't you?"
Good luck,
-matti.
The amount of money we could conceivably raise is irrelevant. THEY actually own the printing presses. If the real left were ever to begin to raise a substantial amount of funds, all we would prove is that the elites have infinitely more access to money and power than we have.
They also, by the way, own the other printing presses. The ones you seem to hope we could "buy ALOT of time" on. You think fox would air the truth? or maybe msnbc?
Bravo, Matti. A great idea. If more of our people would give some thought, as you do, to things we might do to SOLVE our problems, instead of just discussing them, we'd soon have a movement that would plow the one-party two-face system under. It's new ideas we need, and the will and the means to implement the good ones.
Yeah, but Jabba the Rush will still demand credit for it.
It's another "well, duh" moment.
Prof. Green, if you're reading this, then I urge you to remember our common obligation to reason. Now that you (and many others) have identified the problem repeatedly, what will you do to move people away from their illogical responses?
It raises the question: are you yourself prepared to cease offering the Democratic Party unconditional support?
In keeping with the title "A show about nothing" I find myself reading this from a perspective of asking, am I an observer or a participant?
The litany is an undeniable profile of where we stand within the context of a society that has been sold a bill of goods over a long history of promises, misrepresentations, extreme concentration of resources and the price coming home both here and all over the world.
It would seem that just as a litany is an itemization, the answer is equally in biting off, step by step, stepping into participatory democracy in ways that are unfamiliar to media presentations, and being prepared to do so learning and being in for the long haul.
Hold not only Obamas feet to the fire but those of all representatives. All of the problems are also individual opportunities to go on record and documenting from the local level on up. No society can survive as complete negation and the more pressure applied the more will get shaken loose for reform.
Document, pressure, repreat....
These people STILL don't seem to get it. Barack Obama is a Chicago thug who knows EXACTLY what he's doing. And, like George Bush, he's laughing at all those who fall for his innocent (well, in George's case it was idiotic) act.
People, it's actually racist not to give this guy credit for thinking through his "decisions." I put that in parentheses because Obama is another corporate puppet. HE DOES WHAT THEY TELL HIM TO DO.
It's not because he's "only" 50 - for crying out loud, is 50 the new 20? His frontal lobes are fully developed. Barry KNOWS what true Democratic principles are. He just voluntarily and with full knowledge CHOOSES TO IGNORE THEM...AND YOU!!
Wake up and smell the freakin coffee, and STOP making excuses for the guy - he's a sell out and NOT what you voted for!
Thank God I heard he is seriously considering NOT RUNNING in 2012. Yep, you heard it here, folks. Well, here:
http://primebuzz.kcstar.com/?q=node/20575
Happy Saturday!
Chicago gangster politics is actual the Chicago Gangster
Theater Guild. As all the paid actors are hand picked
by the rich nobility of Chicago.
Yup. The racists just can't get their mind around the fact that this is just a power hungry fool, no different than many of his Republican counterparts. Power for the sake of power. I knew this was not a nice person when I heard him explain why he was backing corn based ethanol and putting a tariff on sugar based ethanol. National security, he said. Despite the fact that the policy was killing millions of the invisible poor. In fact, most of racists believe that the whites have Barry on such a short leash that he can't even play golf with the guys he likes. Poor Barry, had to play golf with that old white stiff from UBS during his vacation. No rest for such a good hearted person as he. Poor Barry. He just doesn't have enough power and all those hand picked neo cons aren't going to give it to him. Even if he were king of the world, they would be saying that there was some higher power controlling him. President of the U.S. just doesn't cut it. Not according to the racists.
Are you saying that racism is causing the left to believe that Obama is not in control of the country? That somehow we believe that his inferiority to the white masters is the source of his inaction?
That may be the the case. I, we, may be racist. Maybe we just can't understand that he is just another Harvard-educated elitist who in reality cares nothing about the people of the US and is cynically doing the bidding of the people who made his presidency possible. I think this argument has merit. Is this what you are saying?
In any event, I really don't give a damn what Obama's motives are. One way or another, the POTUS is ALWAYS under control of the corporate elites. Whether or not he believes, in his own mind, that their way is right is irrelevant. He is doing nothing for us. That is what matters to us.
In the end we'll never know if he is being overtly threatened, if he begrudgingly accepts the compromises in hopes of achieving at least some good, or if he in fact is just one of the elites, as you seem to imply.
While it may be true that our stereotyping is biasing our beliefs about Obama's intentions, the fact is that we were lied to. His campaign and his presentation of his views and self were misleading at best. In many cases, his stated positions on specific policies have turned out to be lies. I don't care if the guy is white, black, brown, yellow, pink or blue; he is simply a defective product in my eyes. False advertising.
Obama has kept one promise. He said during the campaign that he would spread war into Pakistan. That promise he has kept. We now have war in Iraq, war in Afghanistan, war in Pakistan, and proxy wars in Somalia and Palestine. One more war is planned for Iran, and maybe another in Georgia and Ukraine. Wars are illegal, expensive, and they very rarely achieve their purpose.
" Wars are illegal and expensive and they very rarely achieve their purpose". The purpose of wars are always a punic, canard put out by the whores and presstitutes in the MSM. They never denigrate who the evil war profiteers are and their enormous profits. General Butler had it right when he said: " war is a racket"!
wars always achieve their purpose - profit for the mongers.
You forgot the incipient proxy war between US Military/CIA backed Columbia and oil rich Venezuela.
We see pessimism overstated. Obama finds himself enmeshed in a corporate controlled political system. The legislative servants of big business largely serve the corporate masters that finance them (with a few exceptions). Greed of the few determines outcomes more than the welfare of the people. Yes I would like to see Obama become more audacious, perhaps use executive powers more effectively. But I suspect he is the best we can get. If he lost the election we'd have "bomb,bomb bomb Iran " McCain as president and Palin as his replacement.
Let's not undermine Obama. I suspect that he'll make good on ending torture, closing Gitmo, ending "don't ask, don't tell", winning the trust of foreign countries, etc. He wont be able to deliver nirvana.
No, your comment is wrong and naive to boot. McCain wouldn't bomb bomb Iran any faster than would Obama. It has nothing to do with what the sock puppets of empire want. It has to do with what the Shadow wants.
Can we just deal with what is and not get trapped in never ending wishful thinking. Your, "I suspect" Obama will do this or that is not useful. It's not all that important what anyone thinks might happen, or suspects will happen, or hopes can happen. We need to deal with what is actually happening.
and "let's not undermine Obama" is a weird thing to say when so many lives are at stake. If he is continuing the torture, indefinite detentions, etc. IT'S OUR DUTY TO UNDERCUT HIM! duh. Were you raised in a military school?
Your logic: "I know he's ordering drones to fly over villages, killing little children, but let's not undercut him here, because I SUSPECT he'll, at some point, stop doing it."
IMHO the overall policies and actions of the United States concerning any MAJOR issues would be the same if the president was Obama, McCain, or Palin. Watch "The Secret Global Empire" video that is in the video section of CD. They lay it out pretty nicely there.
Let's not undermine Obama. I suspect that he'll make good on ending torture, closing Gitmo, ending "don't ask, don't tell", winning the trust of foreign countries, etc. He wont be able to deliver nirvana.
-----------
Torture is already continuing.
Bagram is the new Gitmo.
DADT is small potatoes.
You think Latin America trusts him?
I heard that those who really are in power sat him down, showed him the Zapruder film and then said, "Any questions?"
The man is who he is, an utter failure. But this should have been known BEFORE the election, if people cared to pay attention!!!
Ha!
Yes, that was a Bill Hicks routine actually, and the key is that the new President is shown not the Zapruder film of Kennedy's assasination, but a previously unheard of one which seems to have been shot from the infamous "grassy knoll".
The new President's response to "Any questions?" is:
"Just what my Agenda is!"
Great stuff. ;)
I strongly encourage anyone here to check out Bill Hicks's stuff, he was truly great. He died of cancer in 1994 so the younger crowd especially might have never heard of him.
--A warning though, his gleeful -then skeptical- reaction to the defeat of H.W. Bush in 1992 might just cause time-warp induced logic failures in the CPUs of any still-functioning Obamabots.--
Secession might be a better option. Let's form a Northern alliance with a truly representative parlimentary legislature. Let us fortify our borders and keep Texas from getting Nuclear weapons. I don't want to fight a civil war with them again but I don't want to deal with them either except across a well defended border.
I was one of those who was supportive of the nitwit demagogue Rick Perry's calls for secession (though he was not serious, just positioning against Hutchison). I think it is a long shot, but a break-up of the US might be the only thing that could save the US middle class and prevent the US from continuing its catastrophic economic and environmental policies that threaten the long-term welfare of and even the survival of the human race.
The US political system never functioned well, but now that the corporatists have strengthened their grip, it is completely dysfunctional. I do not see how we can ever fix it (e.g., how do you get public financing when the corporate-financed politicians must vote to switch to public financing) without a new constitution establishing a new political system, but that appears extremely unlikely unless the US does break up and each region can develop its own new constitution (I know, that is also extremely unlikely).
Obviously, one obvious improvement in a constitution would be the requirement of public financing in elections and another would be a provision that corporations are not persons and do not have any political rights. And another could be the addition of certain types of instant run-off voting. Also, many would want to consider more closely resembling some of the parliamentary systems of Europe than the current system of the US.
Maybe some could consider something a bit more radical. I believe that representative democracy should be issue-focused and not candidate-focused. So candidates should not campaign and voters should not vote for candidates. Instead, there should be some set of requirements (different for each type of office) an individual would have to meet in order to become a candidate for a particular office. Then the candidate would fill out a form, completely confidential and prior to an election (e.g. between 30 and 60 days before the election), indicating the candidate's position on a wide variety of issues (there would need to be several dozen, almost certainly with some weighted more, balancing the need to allow voters to punish candidates for their stands on some important issues but not allowing any one issue to be determinative). The voters would also fill out a similar form at an election. The candidates could not advocate for any issues in advance of the election. Using some agreed upon mathematical formula for calculating the exact score (if one wanted to use some weighting scheme for issues or for one's stand on the issues), the winner of the election would be the candidate whose answers most closely matched the answers of the voters. At that time, the candidate's answers would be revealed and after the election there would have to be some process for recalling candidates whose performance in office did not match their answers, which could be considered as something more serious and binding than traditional campaign promises. Such candidates could then be forced to suffer public humiliation and be banned for life from the political process (that should also be the case for politicians in traditional systems who break their promises, but in the current system of course it does not).
Probably this system could be gamed too over time as the current system has been gamed by economic elites, but until that time possibly some progress could be made.
"I believe that representative democracy should be issue-focused and not candidate-focused. So candidates should not campaign and voters should not vote for candidates."
Before the last presidential election, the Berkley Carroll School in New York held a school wide mock election. Each of several US candidates was given a fictitious name but the real candidates' position on issues remained the same. So essentially, student voted on the issues. Ralph Nader won with 46% of the vote. Obama won 29% (and that was based on what his positions were back then).
I agree, I think we should forget about personality. It's obsolete. It's a dangerous way to run a democracy. As members of relatively small tribes, we looked up to leaders because we trusted them. And those leaders would have to walk among us. If a leader betrayed it's members, a new leader would have to be found immediately, life depended on it. We never would have survived as a species with the kind of media driven politics that we have today.
Have you heard of the National Initiative. Nader and Mike Gravel talked about it during the campaign. Check it out.
I totally support the calls for the breakup of the US. This whole system has collapsed and there's no possibility of fixing it. End the nightmare once and for all and restore the sovereignty of the states. If some of those states wish to join others in new unions that would be fine. But the federal government is a bankrupt dead duck. We need to move on and start all over.
You're comment reminds me of a Groucho patter song in "Duck Soup," I think it was.
"If you think this country's in bad shape now,
Just wait'll I get through with it!"
Our elite oligarchs, who elevated Obama to the presidency, saw in him a man who'd be able to sell their wars, bailouts and keep them out of jail at the same time.
The country no longer wanted to have a beer with a Connecticut cheerleading cowboy. Stupid was out. Grammar was in.
Obama's oratorical mastery, combined with his dapper looks, skin color and SPINELESSNESS was the resume our elites were looking for in a new leading man.
They would make this Obama puppet dance harder than the Bush puppet.
And the masses, who voted for change, would be rendered inert.
How can you say Obama is SPINELESS?
He's screwing We the People over, isn't he? Doesn't that take some spine? He betrayed millions of us - that takes some nerve. Sending young innocent teenagers to Afghanistan to kill and be killed is not only nervy, it's obscene. But progressives seem to have a very low bar these days. Obama's voice and rhetoric seem to be enough for them. Heck, Bill McKibben says Obama is the greatest president in his lifetime! Am I the only one who's living in a Twilight Zone? Or maybe I set the bar too high.
"Whenever we compromised, we lost." -- the Arch Druid, David Brower
No, the problems weren't of his making, but the aggravating thing is that he chose all the wrong people to solve those problems. Wall Streeters Geithner and Summers to fix the economy? Pro-Israel hack Hillary Clinton to fix the Middle East? Warmongering Gates to fix Iraq and AfPak? The list goes on. No one expected Obama to fix everything--or even anything--in his first year. But if he had at least chosen credible experts who could have been perceived as working for the people, or for the country, his ratings would be much higher. Obama's administration is one giant give away to corporate America, and either he's too cynical or too stupid to notice.
It is a fallacy that the POTUS is the most powerful man on Earth.
Bush II was proof positive.
He is the front, the face, an impotent talking head.
The power lurks in the shadows off screen.
Obama's goal was to get elected as the first black (half-black)POTUS. Mission Accomplished!
The Shadow Government is dangerous and needs to be engaged and put on the defensive. Obama is merely theater, puppetry, a man who believes that style trumps substance.
Today, well educated and experienced generalists are needed. It is they who have the capacity to understand widely diverse subjects and the skills to bring one or many to life as needed to meet the challenges. Their strength lies in their diversity and in their decentralization. Strong decentralized actions, each unique to their location, cannot be controlled by centralized authority. The architecture of successful change is decentralized actions. What is missing is strong action. We must actionize locally. Many of the values of the new economy have been identified, now get busy and do something.
Stone,
Please explain what you mean by the values of the new economy.
It looks to me like there aren't any values,
unless it is the rich get richer,
same ol' capitalistic economy.
If my memory serves me, the last fellow who tried to 'do the right thing' - talked of the Shadow Government and made some moves toward actual governance, ended up on a stainless steel table in a hospital in the Bush's adopted home state.
"For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence--on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations."
- President John F. Kennedy-
Wasn't he refering to the Communists in that quote?
Is the "Shadow Government" supposed to be a part of the Global Communist Conspiracy?
Kennedy was referring to the european banking cartel, which owns the Federal Reserve, Bank of International Settlements, Private central banks in most countries, & controlling stock in the largest trans-national corporations... They have funded both sides of every major war & "revolution" since the late 18th century, collecting huge profits on interest on loans to kings & parliaments & dictators, as well as weaponry & munitions & mercenaries... The Rothschilds, Schiffs, Warburgs, and others, who can and have ruined entire economies and hundreds of millions of lives by wars, fractional reserve debt, intentional booms & busts and depressions great & small to consolidate their power for fun & profit... they fund the Capitalists like Rockefeller & Morgan, as well as the Bolsheviks like Trotsky, Lenin, & Stalin... And Fascists like Hitler, Mussolini, & Bush to carry out their dialectic of problem-reaction-solution for global hegemony...
Kennedy, like Lincoln before him, had recently signed executive order #11110 to end the private control of the US money supply, which is the reason behind both of their assassinations... Johnson hadn't even waited for the body to get cold before he reversed that law while on the flight from Dallas to DC
The driver of his convertible limo was the one who pulled the trigger, (which is why Jacqui tried to climb out of the back of the limo), Oswald was the patsy, and the CIA helped to coordinate the psy-ops event of the national tragedy for maximum effect...
Owebama was groomed for this role, just like baby bush & Clinton before him....
He knows well enough that he either takes the sack of gold or he will get the gun...
Now you know why he is the Goldman Sachs go-to man.... they are the ones who hold the sacks of gold...
It is up for debate whether JFK was referring to the USSR.
The description aptly fits what I perceive to be in the shadows.
But it isn't a government and definitely not communistic.
It's private enterprise that uses governments, religions,
media, anything and everything money can buy to achieve greater wealth
and control.
Know The Show Is Over When..."
"Money Starts to Trickle North as Mexicans Help Out Relatives"
I'm glad I wasn't alone in noticing this new phenomenon.
New York Times headlines are offered as evidence?
Please.
It is true that Obama does not appear to support progressive ideas. But if I were to bet on a poker player, I’d put my money on Obama. It is essential to remember that progressives ARE NOT IN THE MAJORITY and hold a very weak position. When British troops outnumbered Colonial troops at the battle of Bunker Hill, a Colonial general gave this order: "Don't fire til you see the whites of their eyes"; i.e., hold your fire until the moment when shooting will have the greatest effect. A prudent general can't form strategy using imaginary troops.