Well, you knew it was coming. The day of reckoning. And I'm not talking about November 2010 and the mid-term elections. I'm talking about the growing feeling that President Obama has become one of THEM, rather than one of US. A Washington insider/Wall Street water carrier like all his predecessors, which he promised not to be (like all his predecessors). I must admit, I never expected a radical change from what had gone before. If you go back and read some of what I wrote in 2008, you will see that I never expected even a slight change in the most importnant policies. So I am not disappointed.
No, I never believed in much of Candidate Barack Obama's promises to forge a new kinder, gentler brand of capitalistic economy. Only young, idealistic people who hadn't been around long enough to become old and cynical actually fell for the schtick. Now they are learning the hard way, the Rahm Emmanuel way, of how it is Wall Street uber alles. And the rest of us get no bailout, only empty speeches.
What irks me is not the fact that it is business as usual. What irks me is that there is no need for business as usual and every need to break with the past. There is a dramatic, pressing need to chart a bold new course away from the Wall Street chicanary and towards a self-sustaining economy based on paying people a living wage. Candidate Barack Obama needs to find President Barack Obama and give him a good dose of soaring rhetoric from last year's campaign trail. Or forget them both and let's exhume the withering, skeletal remains of Franklin Delano Roosevelt to give some life to actual change worth believing in.
As it stands, there's far too many entrenched, powerful bastions of corruption in the way of real reform. What is making people angry these days is the lack of fire coming from the White House directed at these bastions, and the unnecessary capitulations towards them without putting up any fight whatsoever.
Then there is the whole, baffling effort at bi-partisanship. What is the point of trying to placate people who will not only never support you, but actually do everything they could to obstruct what you are trying to do? That doesn't make you look magnanimous, it makes you look WEAK, if not downright foolish. The lastest fiasco along these lines is another disgusting cave-in to Joe Lieberman. Instead of letting him play God with thousands of peoples' lives, Obama should tell him to get on board...or else. Remind him that you gave him support in his primary challenge and that he was allowed to keep committe chairs DESPITE his campaigning for Republicans. Tell him that his ass is OUT and that every Democratic resource will be used AGAINST him in 2012 if he decides to oppose actual health care reform. This is supposedly the Rahm way of doing things. We need to see some of that right now. Or else you can bring back the Republicans in 2010 and the country can go into a real depression. Torches and pitchforks, anyone?
4 comments:
My torch and pitchfork is at the ready. All I need now is my marching orders.
We were told that Rahm Immanuel had a knack for getting things done, and this was why the president hired him in the first place as White House Chief of Staff.
If there was an attack dog without teeth, and not even a threatening growl, it's Rahm Immanuel.
But many feel that this was the goal of the Obama administration from the beginning: A gift to the insurance industry of billions of dollars in the form of millions of new members, with the government paying hefty premiums when a person was too indigent to buy it him or herself.
Some Dems, and the president, wish to ram this thing through, no matter how much it stinks, and whether it fails to achieve what it set out to do.
Before coming here, I sent off an angry letter to the president, with followups to my elected officials.
I will do whatever I can to defeat this mockery of health care reform, and put my Senators on notice: Vote for this piece of crap and I'll vote against you the next time you're up for reelection.
Americans need to take back their government. Now, corporations are running it, and I'm damn sick and tired of it.
Good thing I have a pretty good health care plan: As sick as I am over this pretense at health care reform, I'm going to need it.
Thanks for this blog entry. It allowed me blow off a little steam.
Anytime, BD. This was building up for a while. I am getting tired of being put in the position of defending the indefensible, which is what this administration has been doing to you and I a lot recently.
Do you remember Skeptical Brotha's blog? I have it linked on my page. The blog is moribund now, but it's worth going back and reading his old threads from the 2008 campaign, since it illustrates the misgivings a lot of us had about what we saw coming.
I'm glad you are letting your feelings known to those who need to hear it. I have been doing the same, but I remain at wits end with system in place and wonder if it will change short of a mass insurrection. The teabaggers are phony but we may yet see a genuine uprising if this mess continues.
Merry Christmas, Ernesto, and may the New Year provide you with so much joy and prosperity that you won't be able to consume it all.
BD...I am not much of a consumer, but I most humbly accept your wishes and would like to see that the Universe acquiesces to your every whim and wish in 2010 and beyond. :)
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