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President Obama Richly Deserves to Be Dumped
As evidence of a failed Obama presidency accumulates, criticism of his administration is mounting from liberal Democrats who have too much moral authority to be ignored.
Most prominent among these critics is veteran journalist Bill Moyers, whose October address to a Public Citizen gathering puts the lie to our barely Democratic president’s populist pantomime, acted out last week in a Kansas speech decrying the plight of “innocent, hardworking Americans.” In his talk, Moyers quoted an authentic Kansas populist, Mary Eizabeth Lease, who in 1890 declared, “Wall Street owns the country.. . .Money rules.. . .The [political] parties lie to us and the political speakers mislead us.”
A former aide to Lyndon Johnson who knows politics from the inside, Moyers then delivered the coup de grace: “[Lease] should see us now. John Boehner calls on the bankers, holds out his cup, and offers them total obeisance from the House majority if only they fill it. Barack Obama criticizes bankers as fat cats, then invites them to dine at a pricey New York restaurant where the tasting menu runs to $195 a person.”
As it happens, Moyers’s remarks anticipated the trenchant question posed in an interview by another prominent liberal, Barbara Ehrenreich, just after billionaire Michael Bloomberg and mayors of other cities cleared public spaces of Occupy Wall Street protesters: “Where in all this was Obama? Why couldn’t he have picked up the phone and called the mayors of Portland and Oakland and said: ‘Go easy on these people. They represent the anger and aspirations of the majority.’ Would that have been so difficult?” Well, yes, particularly if your principal occupation is shaking down bankers and brokers for campaign donations on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.
By now it should be obvious that the system, and the Democratic Party, run Obama, not the other way around. Under this arrangement, the president carries out his duties as pre-eminent party functionary — fundraising being at the top of his list of responsibilities — and defers on legislation, leaving it to corrupt Democratic barons such as Sen. Max Baucus (D.-Mont.), devoted friend of the insurance, pharmaceutical, and banking crowd and sworn enemy of reform.
As Ron Suskind’s book “Confidence Men” confirms, there was never any question of doing things differently. Describing the then president-elect’s choice of economic advisers, he notes, “Obama, after all, had selected for his top domestic officials two men [Lawrence Summers and Timothy Geithner] whose actions [in the Clinton Administration] had contributed to the very financial disaster they were hired to solve.” These anti-reform appointments did not go unnoticed by party regulars, even though they were ignored by Obama groupies. “I don’t understand how you could do this,” Suskind quotes Sen. Byron Dorgan (D.- N.D.) saying to Obama. “You’ve picked the wrong people!”
The “wrong people” included Rahm Emanuel, now mayor of Chicago, and his replacement as White House chief of staff, William Daley; both of these advisers were four-star generals within the Chicago Democratic machine who cut their teeth in Washington during the campaign to pass that job-killer North American Free Trade Act and who later worked for investment banks. But Obama’s hypocrisy in Osawatomie, Kan., set a new standard in deception. Among other things, his speech blamed “regulators who were supposed to warn us about the dangers of all this [the unfettered sales of bundled mortgages], but looked the other way or didn’t have the authority to look at all. It was wrong. It combined the breathtaking greed of a few with irresponsibility all across the system.”
What’s truly breathtaking is the president’s gall, his stunning contempt for political history and contemporary reality. Besides neglecting to mention Democratic complicity in the debacle of 2008, he failed to point out that derivatives trading remains largely unregulated while the Securities and Exchange Commission awaits “public comment on a detailed implementation plan” for future regulation. In other words, until the banking and brokerage lobbies have had their say with John Boehner, Max Baucus, and Secretary of the Treasury Tim Geithner. Meanwhile, the administration steadfastly opposes a restoration of the Glass-Steagall Act, the New Deal law that reduced outlandish speculation by separating commercial and investment banks. In 1999, it was Summers and Geithner, led by Bill Clinton’s Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin (much admired by Obama), who persuaded Congress to repeal this crucial impediment to Wall Street recklessness.
And then there’s Afghanistan. Obama should be condemned for escalating this grotesquely expensive, destructive, and self-defeating war. Thoroughly discredited by analysts on both the left and the right, the Afghan madness seems to bore liberals who once would have marched against Vietnam. I suggest they watch the brilliant new documentary “Hell and Back Again” to enhance their knowledge of the war’s casualties. The pitiful story of Marine sergeant Nathan Harris ought to make them furious at our commander in chief; shouldn’t it also spark an intra-party revolt?
I urge people who haven’t given up on politics to examine the career of Allard Lowenstein. Lowenstein founded the Dump Johnson movement in 1967 and, against all odds, persuaded Sen. Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota to launch a Democratic primary challenge against the incumbent president over the issue of Vietnam. His example, I hope, might inspire someone to challenge another Democratic incumbent who has forfeited the trust of the people.
You may say it’s too late, that Obama is impregnable. Consider Gene McCarthy’s obscurity on Nov. 30, 1967, when he announced his insurgent crusade. At the time, many Americans confused him with Sen. Joe McCarthy (R.-Wis.), the notorious communist hunter, and in January 1968 a Gallup poll showed him winning just 12 percent of the votes in a presidential election. But on March12, McCarthy nearly beat Johnson in the New Hampshire primary. The opposition was galvanized, Robert Kennedy jumped into the race, LBJ announced he would not seek re-election, and American democracy was revived.
Granted, there are big differences between 1968 and 2012 — for one thing, there’s no military draft to frighten the young — but the great issues are the same: an immoral war and a merciless money power. Moreover, high unemployment and the dominance of Wall Street do frighten the young. They need a tribune.
In November 1967, before he announced his candidacy, McCarthy told an audience of college students, “There is deep anxiety and alienation among a large number of people. . . . Someone must give these groups entrance back into the political processes. We may lose, but at least in the process of fighting within the political framework, we’ll have reduced the alienation.” Two days later, in remarks that would have pertained just as well to the current Occupy Wall Street movement, he said, “Party unity is not a sufficient excuse for silence” and Vietnam was “not the kind of political controversy which should be left to a children’s crusade or to those not directly involved in politics. It should rather be taken up by adult political leaders and activists in America.”
Are there any adults left in the Democratic Party?
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357 Comments so far
Show AllWrite in Jessie Ventura/Bradley Manning ?
Rocky Anderson, former mayor of Salt Lake City has formed the Justice Party and is talking up his candidacy on radio shows. I find it stunning that so-called progressives are still willing to vote for Obama. Obama must be removed from office, he is worse than Bush if you look at his record on the environment, torture, immigrant deportation, war spending and the list goes on.
Amen, and I know I'm repeating myself but one can find out about Rocky Anderson on yesterdays democracynow. Amy G interviewed Rocky and might I say I was TOTALLY IMPRESSED!
And well, lets not forget his total ineptness with creating new goals and doing whatneeds to be done, which is making stimulus targeted at building rail and pedestrian and non-car retrofit of cities, and wind and solar, to truly get us off oil counterattack against republicans disasterous plans to building huge toxic chemical pipelines and massive tar sand and shale extraction, including destruction of Americas water with fracking.
Another failure is his inability to finally get wall street out of health care through national health insurance, instead they are expanding the privatised disaster of health care to schools by turning schools over to wall street, and counterattack the republicans by creating a new tax on the wealthy in addition to the payroll tax that would be adjusticed by the health secretary to assure social security and medicare remain fully funded, removing the time limits on the unemployment aid, reapaling the debt ceiling, getting out of afghanistan, rolling back Republicans 1990s welfare reforms, using a fair/balanced trade policy to bring jobs back to the US rather than further degrade US worker pay and rights to "compete" with chinese slave labor, strengthen rights of all workers to form all inclusive unions, bringing back glass steagall, ending real estate and commodity speculation, actually find a solution to housing criss that does not seek to reinflate the bubble but readjusts debt and returns home costs to a more reasonable and affordable level for all americans, and on and on.
To summarize your observations, ervadaras, had Obama done nothing during the past three years he would have a far more progressive legacy compared to the regressive legacy he has established with his serial pro-corporate track record.
Great comments, Ray; and I think SJRyan's idea has merit. An alternative basis for an election, a sort of Virtual Occupy The (official) Elections alternative... hmm. If it went viral and MILLIONS voted for other, how legitimate would the herd of current clown-kings then be?
It was Cliton who decimated the middle class safety net under the guise of welfare reform. He championed it and signed it into law. Reagan set the tone and Cliton put the nail in the middle class coffin. The safety net was created to keep people in the middle class and Cliton changed the strategy. Keeping a middle class intact is more efficient that letting them pick themselves up by their bootstraps when they cannot afford the boots. It's like a building that has collapsed and it is more efficient to build another building than to resurrect the old building. As usual Reagan used unhealthy shame, implying that not being a success is shameful. This was in concert with the propaganda of the pretend christians, businesses and political interests and a longtime component of coordinated American Political/religious/commercial propaganda of creating unhealthy shame.
Obama's first term should finally muzzle the tireless Democrat apologists who insisted throughout the Clinton and Bush administrations that there were real and substantial differences in the economic and foreign policies of the two parties, and that Greens or other independents were "spoilers" who would "hand the election to the Republicans."
I hope to be able to vote against Obama in the Democratic primary myself, though I hold little hope that the Democrats will allow that to happen. Since Democrats' attitude toward the Occupy movement has ranged from apathy to contempt, there's no reason to think that they will move in a more populist direction. Instead, we'll be given meaningless feel-good slogans and told to vote for the lesser of two evils again....
But, but but wait.............. There's the upcoming Supreme Court nominations that are Sooooooooooo important that any and all crimes by Obama should be forgiven! Blah blah blah
Heard that dumb ass analysis from the talking heads?
They fail to point out that the 2 Obama has put on the Supreme Court - one was named to the Federal Bench by Bush 1 - and the other was on the Goldman Sachs payroll - if that's what passes for 'progressive's' nowadays then we are truly screwed.
Not to mention that Kagan defended Monsanto and was selected by Obama only because he knew the GOP loved her.
My hope is that "Rocky" Anderson will challenge Obama for the Democratic Party's nomination, and will abandon his Justice Party efforts.
It would be 110% wasted effort for Anderson or any other progressive to attempt to be nominated by the Democratic Party when you consider how the party treats Kucinich and other progressive leaning Democrats.
If former GOP Presidents Eisenhower, Nixon or Ford were to attempt to run in a Democratic Party primary today the Party would label them too leftist to attract enough corporate money to satisfy the Party's funding goals.
These so called intellectuals are late comers to the party. It is and was blindingly evident from the beginning that Obama was nothing more than a lying mouthpiece for the 1%, and now that it is safe to voice it, they appear out of the woodwork to pronounce their understanding. These are cowardly creeps who now seek redemption and restored legitimacy. Sorry, the people paid the price of admission, not your ilk.
Re: Rocky Anderson
An unknown candidate representing an unknown third party is wasting his and everybody else's time, unfortunately.
When Ralph Nader ran as an independent, everybody in the country knew him and what he stood for; what he lacked in resources he made up for in brand-name appeal.
When Perot ran as an independent, he was able to spend tens of millions of dollars advertising himself and his cause. He ended up getting 20% of the popular vote and bringing down GHW Bush.
If a third-party candidate is not wealthy or famous, he stands no chance whatsoever in today's electoral climate.
Thats your opinion and in my opinion you need to think again my friend.
I'm voting for ROCKY ANDERSON. SAY IT LOUD AND SAY IT PROUD!
I urge all to check out yesterday's interview with Rocky Anderson on DemocracyNow. Amy G did a great job asking good questions and if you truly want to vote for someone who hasn't been responsible for killing and mayhem, Rocky is the man!
During previous elections very few of the 99% were at the point of having been bled dry by the 1%. Today many of the 99% have been bled dry, many more are on the verge of being bled dry, and even more can see what the 1% has in store for them in the not too distant future.
The epidemic of denial syndrome among the 99% and the fact that so many of them find security in thinking inside the box are the impediments to third party candidates' success.
Before you commit, check out
www.jillstein.org
this may have been true before, but I wouldn't generalize too much -- the times they are a-changing.
"If a third-party candidate is not wealthy or famous, he stands no chance whatsoever in today's electoral climate."
He might have a chance if he tried to associate with a known and established party such as the Greens, they accepted him, and all progressives and many liberals voted Green.
Otherwise, no chance whatsoever.
Yeah, and no one could run a slave plantation without money and connections. And certainly it was unrealistic for slaves to ever be free, because they had no money or connections.
You are saying that the elections are controlled by the wealthy few, and then use that to defend business as usual. That is illogical.
Either elections are controlled by the wealthy few - you say if a "candidate is not wealthy or famous, he stands no chance" or they are not. If they are, then that is all the more reason to look outside of the system. If they are not, then why would you say that it takes wealth to have any chance of getting into office?
Many here are saying in effect - the system is really corrupt, so we need to work within the system; nothing is possible within the system, so we should not look outside of the system.
You cannot have it both ways. If the system is bought and paid for by the few for their benefit, then the system needs to be overthrown. If the system is not bought and paid for, then why can people not support Anderson or other third party candidates?
If, as you say, the system is bought and paid for, is all about the interests of the wealthy few, then it wouldn't make any difference whom people supported or voted for. But you say that supporting and voting for certain candidates is a "waste of time." Both cannot be true.
"You are saying that the elections are controlled by the wealthy few, and then use that to defend business as usual."
No, you're confused:
1. I am not "defending business as usual." I understand, and have understood for quite a long time, that the American electoral system is deeply corrupt and needs to be scrapped.
2. I believe people should vote for third-party candidates, be they greens, libertarians, or anything else.
3. I also happen to know that the existing electoral system will not be threatened one bit if reformers rally behind an unknown third-party candidate with no resources to speak of. I've seen what's happened to the likes of Lenora Fulani, Larry Agran, Mike Gravel et al. over the years.
4. If we want to see the established parties seriously wounded right away, or better yet, totally ousted, then the best option would be for someone wealthy or famous to head a third party and for the legions of disaffected voters in this country to get behind the person.
I fail to see how point 4 contradicts points 1-3.
Thanks. I agree with points 1-3.
I disagree with point 4 because I don't think being elected to office is the same thing as being in power, any more that being hired as a waiter means that you are running a restaurant.
Also, since the battle is between the haves and the have nots, even if the have nots could get a wealthy person to champion the cause, we would still be dependent upon the haves. Were politics a battle of belief systems, then what you say would be true. But that is not what politics is about. Politics is, and always has been, about wealth and power. The interests of those with wealth and power are contradictory to the interests of those without wealth and power, and that is where the battle lines are drawn.
Why must the have nots always be told to "get behind" the wealthy and famous? Why must we assume that this is the way to power? At best it is a way to an improved "house slave" status for a few, and that not only will not end slavery, it tends to reinforce it by creating the illusion that good outcomes can be derived from it - "if only we had a slave owner who was on the side of the slaves!"
Well said. Your logic and sanity are impregnable.
No, I'm afraid they are in fact pregnable. See below.
I understand your point and am sympathetic to it for the most part; however, I still see a few cracks in your reasoning.
First is the problem of assuming that EVERY wealthy or famous person must look at politics and society through the narrow lens of selfish material interests. This simply is not true. You can be wealthy and famous and be a socialist or a pain-in-the-ass rabble-rouser. Take, for instance, Noam Chomsky and Ralph Nader. Both are white, rich, male, and famous, yet I cannot think of 2 other people in this country who have done more to effect radical social change. Michael Moore is a multimillionaire, yet he's spent many years advocating for single-payer healthcare and standing on the side of workers against their corporate bosses (with whom he has more in common socioeconomically).
Second is the problem of assuming that pragmatic strategic considerations have no place whatsoever in a radical analysis of things. The option of a "dictatorship of the proletariat" is simply non-existent in this country. However, forming a third party and recruiting somebody with a brand name and means to head it are very much in the cards. The need to dilute the monopolistic power of the two parties is as high a priority as any other right now, and it won't happen in the short term unless a credible and viable opposition is created.
You completely missed my point. What one individual does makes no difference. Many, many working class people speak for the ruling class. The occasional ruling class person speaks for the working class. That does not change anything, It is not about individuals.
I am not talking about whether or not a rich white man here or there is "good." I am talking about you, as a working class person, encouraging all working class people to seek out this one rich white make who is "good," and to see that as the best option available.
You present a false choice in your second paragraph - we either work within the system, as you would have us work within the system, or else we go for an option that according to you is "non-existent."
We should look for our salvation to a "brand name" with wealth? Good grief, that perfectly describes the problem. That is what we have been doing. How could it possibly be a solution to anything?
The argument you are using was used to defend slavery and in opposition to the Abolitionists. "Not all slave owners are evil!" was one variation on this. "Support for Abolition is virtually non-existent" they said. "The only alternative to working within the system is bloodshed and chaos" they said.
"What one individual does makes no difference."
Really? So Ralph Nader's work over 50 years has made "no difference"?
(Something about your continued "protests" here leaves me wondering about your sincerity and motives, so I'll let you go.)
What one individual does is of no relevance to what we are talking about. You took that phrase out of context. Yes, some slave owners were kinder and more progressive than others. Yes, that could possibly make some difference. However, it does not address the fundamental problem of slavery, does it?
I object to the snide insinuation, utterly unfounded, about my sincerity and motives.
What IS "today's electoral climate"? Polls show that we rate Congress (BOTH parties) at a historic low of 7% for honesty/trustworthiness. Obama and the Republican Presidential candidates excite nearly no one. The Occupy Movement has taken off because so many of us know that the economic/political system is broken beyond repair. This "climate" is unprecedented in my 63-year lifetime. This is a very different "climate" than ever before.
So the new McCarthy is Ron Paul, favorite of many OWS and young people. Will he be a write in? Stay tuned!
I agree. But it is sad that your positive comment came so late in the list of comments. President Paul, as Commander-in-Chief, can immediately and unilaterally end wars, withdraw troops from foreign nations, close Guantanamo, initiate investigations of war criminals and finance criminals, and many other progressive actions. His opposition to social welfare services cannot be enacted unilaterally by himself. He will need Congress to agree to changes. That will go slowly, or not at all. Vote Ron Paul please, in the primaries and in the 2012 election.
"His opposition to social welfare services ..."
So forget him.
Although I agree that Paul appears splendid compared to what the Dims and GOP have to offer, it is very sad the bar has dropped so low.
Right, ray. We need a truly progressive party to screen out these posers.
This Rocky Anderson too merits a closer look. Wiki says he's a fiscal conservative, and his stance on economics seems shrouded in mystery. It's possible he's another Libertarian in sheep's clothing.
I'm a progressive, with deep social democracy instincts, why would I want to vote for Ron Paul? He and Congress could put an end to SS in one term. Forget it!
I'd rather vote for the Pillsbury Dough boy than Obama. And if that's the choice I am given, I'll do it. When we elected Obama we elected Goldman Sachs. I won't do that again. I'd like to write in Bernie Sanders, but that might give the White House back to Obama. Wouldn't want to do to Newt what I did to Gore when I voted for Nader.
Please stop perpetuating the erroneous conventional establishment narrative that Nader "gave" the 2000 election to Bush II. Gore ran a lousy campaign against a moronic candidate but still won Florida, as subsequent newspaper investigations showed, but the 5 corrupt, ideologically-biased Supreme Court justices who were picked by Reagan and Bush I illegally stopped the complete Florida vote count, the "Brooks Brothers Rioters" intimidated Florida officials, Katherine Harris interfered, and then Gore threw in the towel instead of demanding a full recount. Bush II stole the 2000 election in Florida with the help of the 5 corrupt Supremes, and Bush II most likely stole the 2004 election in Ohio with the help of that state's biased Republican state leaders.
Those new voting machines with secret software and no paper trail are spreading like a fungus, so get Absentee Ballots and write names in; say Jessie Ventura/Bradley Manning...etc. At least send a message to the facist sob's.
I vowed not to vote for Obama again long ago, but would never vote Republican. I was planning to vote for the Green Party candidate, but now I'll give Rocky Anderson a good look. Obama does present himself well on t.v.
I think Obama might be better than Newt (????), but when you vote for the lesser of two evils, you're still voting for evil.
Observing the lesser of two evils strategy since the 1964 election, I have concluded that voting for either of the two evils has proven to give both evils tacit permission to become more evil.
Thank you. Another indispensable essay from one of our last true Publishers.
All through this past spring and summer, there was a growing and vibrant movement to challenge the Wall Street Pimp in the upcoming Demo primaries: petitions, radio ads, full-page print ads in the NYT and WSJ. Then out of nowhere comes Occupy -- and the Challenge Obama movement immediately disappears. (Also in the midst of Occupy comes the final nail in our police state coffin, again out of nowhere: McCain-Levin. Which the WH hustler will now certainly sign.)
What has bothered me about OWS is its Holier-than-Thou contempt regarding leadership and its refusal to engage at all with the admittedly insane and hijacked political system. And the automatic embrace of only the "Gandhian" aspects of protest and revolt -- ignoring the historical truth that what finally kicked the Brits out of India was the violence of WWII. Same with Batista, apartheid South Africa, the French in Vietnam (and the genocidal US follow-up), Marie Antoinette, etc etc etc. After all, the 1% we're talking about here is the most vicious, ruthless, and violent prone money-class in the history of Man.
I just hope OWS does not go the way of the Wisconsin & Ohio "revolts," or the way of WikiLeaks, once the new iPhone 5.0 comes out in the Spring. (And once Obama is once again safely in the driver's seat for four more years of betrayal.)
OWS has already been successful in doing what no person or organization could do...force the facts out front !
Had OWS had a designated leader, a list of demands, or a candidate, they would have provided a target 1% to shoot down and they would not have succeeded. OWS knew they had to be amorphous enough to prevent the 1% from having anything to grab and strangle.
Although the 1%'s goons may have oppressed and dispersed OWS, the facts and ideas cannot be oppressed or dispersed. OWS will morph or disappear to allow the next stage of reform to progress.
I want Obama to stay the course and continue his run for a second term. That alone is going to do more damage to the current crop of weasely TPTB'ers of the democratic party than any republican could do. Let him lose (and he's going to), then let the bloodletting begin.
Too bad, Obama could have changed the world for the better. Instead, he was just as goddamned evil as the others that came before him. Even worse.
Oh my.
1968 Election, Nixon won. 2012, Newt? Mitt? Vote against Obama, yes, I hope we get some one who is competent. How about Kucinich/Paul ticket? Why vote parties if they do not function?
"Why couldn’t he have picked up the phone and called the mayors of Portland and Oakland and said: ‘Go easy on these people"
The problem with that Bad Analysis is that the Obama Admn are the ones coordinating the attacks on OWS thru the Homeland Security.
And let's remember that Obama threw the democratic party nominee under the bus in order to support that rightwinger Lieberman - so Obama supports one section of the dem party - the DLC corporate section - Obama has nothing but disdain for democratic office holders that are really on the Left.
Obama will destroy the dem party to get his corporate agenda passed - in fact that is probably one of his Main Goals - destroy the traditional populist left while solidifying the corporate control of the dim party.
Well, I'm very glad to see Mr. MacArthur come out with this commentary. I expected the trigger for the article to revolve around the new law that will give our nation's unchecked power-hungry, unitary executive the right to consign any human being to indefinite detention. And given the fact that the media is "occupied" by the corporate, pro-war interests, and that this engine is strong enough to incite support for war based on conjured "evidence,' the notion of actual guilt no longer matters. The apparatus is in place to justify just about anything on the basis of fixing the evidence, arranging the props to suit the occasion.
I also expected Mr. MacArthur to mention the health care debacle since it is to Big Insurance essentially what the bankster bailout was to "fixing" the economy. Yeah, fix is the right word, as with this abject, amoral sell-out to power, every move and policy determination is based on The Fix being in.
I sure do hope a challenger emerges... the "choices" served to the Amerikan people are those suitable to Dante's Inferno. Nor are they particularly good for much of the rest of the world.
Has anyone seen this "Justice Party" candidate, Rocky Anderson, I think his name is- former mayor of Salt Lake City- who was interviewed on "Democracy Now!"? Any thoughts?
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It doesn't matter that he may have good ideas or may be right on the issues, etc.
If he doesn't have money or fame, if few people know or care about him, he's headed for the same fate as Larry Agran, Mike Gravel, Kucinich and many others like them.