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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
I read your post and just shake my head, as I do when reading about others who go on and on about Obama's supposed total lack of Progressive creds.
Have any of you ever checked out Obama's pre-politics record? The work he did for non-profits, for housing advocacy groups? For voting rights? Have you?
Do yourselves and me a favor and Google. You'll see the record of a guy who worked as an advocate for normal, working people, not financial elites. For real people. If that's not progressive, I'm sorry, I don't know what you're talking about. Look at Raul Grijalva, tapped to run EPA. Not progressive enough for you?
He's trying not to duplicate the errors of the Clintons -- by getting in people who know and have been embraced by the system. I think he's choosing, in a climate of utter financial catastrophe, the most wary and politically canny approach possible to effect real change.
The question is whether Obama himself will be able to steer the agenda, and judging from his campaign, it looks pretty fucking possible to me.
Remember how people were howling for Obama to go for McCain's jugular when things looked bleak? Remember that? Nearly everyone thought that he was a weak, naive puppy with no stomach for a fight, with no guiding principle or vision. And what happened?
He stuck to his guns. He took a longer, more strategic view, he paced his campaign with foresight and calm and won in a landslide. Now I watch as people knee-jerk once again to his every decision and I can only think, "well, yes, I'd prefer more instant "change I can believe in". But after seeing the guy in action, after considering his formative years in public life, I think I'd be a fool to throw in the towel on him.
Especially before he's even taken office.
Well, let's see what he does about Detroit to find out whether he is -- or is not -- beholden to the auto industry and its unions for having delivered Michigan to him.
Thanks for the comment. I always enjoy corresponding with you folks. Your retorts often make me laugh.
I agree with you that Mr. Obama is intelligent enough to be president. Like him, I finished near the top of a first tier law school (not quite Harvard, but not bad). Also did well in a challenging undergraduate program. It would be fun, for me, to match up my GPA's to Mr. Obama's in both programs, along with SAT/LSAT scores. I haven't been able to find his numbers on-line. I would also like to read either a law school Note of his, if he published one, or anything he published during his work as a part-time law school instructor, but I could not find that either. I did flip through one of his books at a bookstore, and found it o.k. as a political memoir (the standard is pretty low for such writing). Although, in all modesty, I think I could probably explain his political positions more cogently than he did. Regardless, he passed the Illinois bar, and that is an adequate foundation for future political service in my book. I think I understand where is coming from in terms of book knowledge.
When hiring a CEO -- and let's use GM as an example -- there are at least two types. The go-along-get-along type when times are good, and the SOB when times are bad. Right now, GM needs an SOB to break the union. If the government is going to finance anything, it should finance the strike-induced operation GM will need while replacement workers are employed to leverage steep concessions.
For the USA, another sick corporation (to use the old "Wall Street" cliche), we also need an SOB. Someone to either jawbone the country into higher taxes, or break the government equivalent of unionism -- the senior citizen entitlements. We can't get away from our $10 Trillion debt without it.
John McCain could have been that kind of president. So could Barack Obama, but I am not seeing it so far. His pledge to borrow more than $1 Trillion to "rescue" us from the economic cycle is as silly as it is politically brilliant. The incumbacrats and incumbacans will both go along with it, because it helps them too. Borrowed money (payable well in the future) is the mother's milk of the perpetual political class.
So, in sum, intelligence is good. Backbone is better. Time will tell whether Mr. Obama has both.
Mr Sirota compares P-E Obama with FDR, who, he says, gave no hint of the New Deal before he took office. The difference in the political environment between 1933 and now is enormous. There are no significant Communist or Socialist parties now as then. People out of work do not number 25%, even with the lying statisitical methods of our government's reports. There is still a relatively well-off middle-class, though it is suffering attrition. In 1933, our nation was not at war; now it is, and the caché of CIC is formidable in our militaristic population.
Moreover, Senator Obama and candidate Obama have shown their words to be unreliable many times in the past. Every time he voted for funding the wars, instead of lining up with MCs like Murtha, Feingold, Kucinich and others, he misled those who expected him to behave like the Illinois state legislator who spoke against the war in 2002. His vote for FISA-revised, giving even more freedom for spying and immunizing federal and corporate felons from prosecution, was another strong signal of how little his word is worth.
P-E Obama is an ambitious politician, purely and simply. He will do whatever is expedient for him. Promises and principles will not stand in his way. For the next four years, we are in for it!
What will we learn from this? Probably nothing! This is not a country that learns from its mistakes. What should we learn? Our political system does not work to give us government by consent. We have rule by a ruling class, and they will not let go.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
219 Democrats and one Republican join in favor of the legislation, which passed by a narrow margin
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Salon headlines in your mailbox
