Excerpt: "Like most Americans, at this point, I have no idea what Barack Obama - and by extension the party he leads - believes on virtually any issue."
Litter, after an Obama-Biden train stop in Baltimore days before the 2009 inauguration. (photo: Todd Heisler/NYT)
What Happened to Obama?
07 August 11
t was a blustery day in Washington on Jan. 20, 2009, as it often seems to be on the day of a presidential inauguration. As I stood with my 8-year-old daughter, watching the president deliver his inaugural address, I had a feeling of unease. It wasn't just that the man who could be so eloquent had seemingly chosen not to be on this auspicious occasion, although that turned out to be a troubling harbinger of things to come. It was that there was a story the American people were waiting to hear - and needed to hear - but he didn't tell it. And in the ensuing months he continued not to tell it, no matter how outrageous the slings and arrows his opponents threw at him.
The stories our leaders tell us matter, probably almost as much as the stories our parents tell us as children, because they orient us to what is, what could be, and what should be; to the worldviews they hold and to the values they hold sacred. Our brains evolved to "expect" stories with a particular structure, with protagonists and villains, a hill to be climbed or a battle to be fought. Our species existed for more than 100,000 years before the earliest signs of literacy, and another 5,000 years would pass before the majority of humans would know how to read and write.
Stories were the primary way our ancestors transmitted knowledge and values. Today we seek movies, novels and "news stories" that put the events of the day in a form that our brains evolved to find compelling and memorable. Children crave bedtime stories; the holy books of the three great monotheistic religions are written in parables; and as research in cognitive science has shown, lawyers whose closing arguments tell a story win jury trials against their legal adversaries who just lay out "the facts of the case."
When Barack Obama rose to the lectern on Inauguration Day, the nation was in tatters. Americans were scared and angry. The economy was spinning in reverse. Three-quarters of a million people lost their jobs that month. Many had lost their homes, and with them the only nest eggs they had. Even the usually impervious upper middle class had seen a decade of stagnant or declining investment, with the stock market dropping in value with no end in sight. Hope was as scarce as credit.
In that context, Americans needed their president to tell them a story that made sense of what they had just been through, what caused it, and how it was going to end. They needed to hear that he understood what they were feeling, that he would track down those responsible for their pain and suffering, and that he would restore order and safety. What they were waiting for, in broad strokes, was a story something like this:
"I know you're scared and angry. Many of you have lost your jobs, your homes, your hope. This was a disaster, but it was not a natural disaster. It was made by Wall Street gamblers who speculated with your lives and futures. It was made by conservative extremists who told us that if we just eliminated regulations and rewarded greed and recklessness, it would all work out. But it didn't work out. And it didn't work out 80 years ago, when the same people sold our grandparents the same bill of goods, with the same results. But we learned something from our grandparents about how to fix it, and we will draw on their wisdom. We will restore business confidence the old-fashioned way: by putting money back in the pockets of working Americans by putting them back to work, and by restoring integrity to our financial markets and demanding it of those who want to run them. I can't promise that we won't make mistakes along the way. But I can promise you that they will be honest mistakes, and that your government has your back again." A story isn't a policy. But that simple narrative - and the policies that would naturally have flowed from it - would have inoculated against much of what was to come in the intervening two and a half years of failed government, idled factories and idled hands. That story would have made clear that the president understood that the American people had given Democrats the presidency and majorities in both houses of Congress to fix the mess the Republicans and Wall Street had made of the country, and that this would not be a power-sharing arrangement. It would have made clear that the problem wasn't tax-and-spend liberalism or the deficit - a deficit that didn't exist until George W. Bush gave nearly $2 trillion in tax breaks largely to the wealthiest Americans and squandered $1 trillion in two wars.
And perhaps most important, it would have offered a clear, compelling alternative to the dominant narrative of the right, that our problem is not due to spending on things like the pensions of firefighters, but to the fact that those who can afford to buy influence are rewriting the rules so they can cut themselves progressively larger slices of the American pie while paying less of their fair share for it.
But there was no story - and there has been none since.
In similar circumstances, Franklin D. Roosevelt offered Americans a promise to use the power of his office to make their lives better and to keep trying until he got it right. Beginning in his first inaugural address, and in the fireside chats that followed, he explained how the crash had happened, and he minced no words about those who had caused it. He promised to do something no president had done before: to use the resources of the United States to put Americans directly to work, building the infrastructure we still rely on today. He swore to keep the people who had caused the crisis out of the halls of power, and he made good on that promise. In a 1936 speech at Madison Square Garden, he thundered, "Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me - and I welcome their hatred."
When Barack Obama stepped into the Oval Office, he stepped into a cycle of American history, best exemplified by F.D.R. and his distant cousin, Teddy. After a great technological revolution or a major economic transition, as when America changed from a nation of farmers to an urban industrial one, there is often a period of great concentration of wealth, and with it, a concentration of power in the wealthy. That's what we saw in 1928, and that's what we see today. At some point that power is exercised so injudiciously, and the lives of so many become so unbearable, that a period of reform ensues - and a charismatic reformer emerges to lead that renewal. In that sense, Teddy Roosevelt started the cycle of reform his cousin picked up 30 years later, as he began efforts to bust the trusts and regulate the railroads, exercise federal power over the banks and the nation's food supply, and protect America's land and wildlife, creating the modern environmental movement.
Those were the shoes - that was the historic role - that Americans elected Barack Obama to fill. The president is fond of referring to "the arc of history," paraphrasing the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous statement that "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice." But with his deep-seated aversion to conflict and his profound failure to understand bully dynamics - in which conciliation is always the wrong course of action, because bullies perceive it as weakness and just punch harder the next time - he has broken that arc and has likely bent it backward for at least a generation.
When Dr. King spoke of the great arc bending toward justice, he did not mean that we should wait for it to bend. He exhorted others to put their full weight behind it, and he gave his life speaking with a voice that cut through the blistering force of water cannons and the gnashing teeth of police dogs. He preached the gospel of nonviolence, but he knew that whether a bully hid behind a club or a poll tax, the only effective response was to face the bully down, and to make the bully show his true and repugnant face in public.
n contrast, when faced with the greatest economic crisis, the greatest levels of economic inequality, and the greatest levels of corporate influence on politics since the Depression, Barack Obama stared into the eyes of history and chose to avert his gaze. Instead of indicting the people whose recklessness wrecked the economy, he put them in charge of it. He never explained that decision to the public - a failure in storytelling as extraordinary as the failure in judgment behind it. Had the president chosen to bend the arc of history, he would have told the public the story of the destruction wrought by the dismantling of the New Deal regulations that had protected them for more than half a century. He would have offered them a counternarrative of how to fix the problem other than the politics of appeasement, one that emphasized creating economic demand and consumer confidence by putting consumers back to work. He would have had to stare down those who had wrecked the economy, and he would have had to tolerate their hatred if not welcome it. But the arc of his temperament just didn't bend that far.
The truly decisive move that broke the arc of history was his handling of the stimulus. The public was desperate for a leader who would speak with confidence, and they were ready to follow wherever the president led. Yet instead of indicting the economic policies and principles that had just eliminated eight million jobs, in the most damaging of the tic-like gestures of compromise that have become the hallmark of his presidency - and against the advice of multiple Nobel-Prize-winning economists - he backed away from his advisers who proposed a big stimulus, and then diluted it with tax cuts that had already been shown to be inert. The result, as predicted in advance, was a half-stimulus that half-stimulated the economy. That, in turn, led the White House to feel rightly unappreciated for having saved the country from another Great Depression but in the unenviable position of having to argue a counterfactual - that something terrible might have happened had it not half-acted.
To the average American, who was still staring into the abyss, the half-stimulus did nothing but prove that Ronald Reagan was right, that government is the problem. In fact, the average American had no idea what Democrats were trying to accomplish by deficit spending because no one bothered to explain it to them with the repetition and evocative imagery that our brains require to make an idea, particularly a paradoxical one, "stick." Nor did anyone explain what health care reform was supposed to accomplish (other than the unbelievable and even more uninspiring claim that it would "bend the cost curve"), or why "credit card reform" had led to an increase in the interest rates they were already struggling to pay. Nor did anyone explain why saving the banks was such a priority, when saving the homes the banks were foreclosing didn't seem to be. All Americans knew, and all they know today, is that they're still unemployed, they're still worried about how they're going to pay their bills at the end of the month and their kids still can't get a job. And now the Republicans are chipping away at unemployment insurance, and the president is making his usual impotent verbal exhortations after bargaining it away.
What makes the "deficit debate" we just experienced seem so surreal is how divorced the conversation in Washington has been from conversations around the kitchen table everywhere else in America. Although I am a scientist by training, over the last several years, as a messaging consultant to nonprofit groups and Democratic leaders, I have studied the way voters think and feel, talking to them in plain language. At this point, I have interacted in person or virtually with more than 50,000 Americans on a range of issues, from taxes and deficits to abortion and immigration.
The average voter is far more worried about jobs than about the deficit, which few were talking about while Bush and the Republican Congress were running it up. The conventional wisdom is that Americans hate government, and if you ask the question in the abstract, people will certainly give you an earful about what government does wrong. But if you give them the choice between cutting the deficit and putting Americans back to work, it isn't even close. But it's not just jobs. Americans don't share the priorities of either party on taxes, budgets or any of the things Congress and the president have just agreed to slash - or failed to slash, like subsidies to oil companies. When it comes to tax cuts for the wealthy, Americans are united across the political spectrum, supporting a message that says, "In times like these, millionaires ought to be giving to charity, not getting it."
When pitted against a tough budget-cutting message straight from the mouth of its strongest advocates, swing voters vastly preferred a message that began, "The best way to reduce the deficit is to put Americans back to work." This statement is far more consistent with what many economists are saying publicly - and what investors apparently believe, as evident in the nosedive the stock market took after the president and Congress "saved" the economy.
So where does that leave us?
Like most Americans, at this point, I have no idea what Barack Obama - and by extension the party he leads - believes on virtually any issue. The president tells us he prefers a "balanced" approach to deficit reduction, one that weds "revenue enhancements" (a weak way of describing popular taxes on the rich and big corporations that are evading them) with "entitlement cuts" (an equally poor choice of words that implies that people who've worked their whole lives are looking for handouts). But the law he just signed includes only the cuts. This pattern of presenting inconsistent positions with no apparent recognition of their incoherence is another hallmark of this president's storytelling. He announces in a speech on energy and climate change that we need to expand offshore oil drilling and coal production - two methods of obtaining fuels that contribute to the extreme weather Americans are now seeing. He supports a health care law that will use Medicaid to insure about 15 million more Americans and then endorses a budget plan that, through cuts to state budgets, will most likely decimate Medicaid and other essential programs for children, senior citizens and people who are vulnerable by virtue of disabilities or an economy that is getting weaker by the day. He gives a major speech on immigration reform after deporting a million immigrants in two years, breaking up families at a pace George W. Bush could never rival in all his years as president.
he real conundrum is why the president seems so compelled to take both sides of every issue, encouraging voters to project whatever they want on him, and hoping they won't realize which hand is holding the rabbit. That a large section of the country views him as a socialist while many in his own party are concluding that he does not share their values speaks volumes - but not the volumes his advisers are selling: that if you make both the right and left mad, you must be doing something right.
As a practicing psychologist with more than 25 years of experience, I will resist the temptation to diagnose at a distance, but as a scientist and strategic consultant I will venture some hypotheses.
The most charitable explanation is that he and his advisers have succumbed to a view of electoral success to which many Democrats succumb - that "centrist" voters like "centrist" politicians. Unfortunately, reality is more complicated. Centrist voters prefer honest politicians who help them solve their problems. A second possibility is that he is simply not up to the task by virtue of his lack of experience and a character defect that might not have been so debilitating at some other time in history. Those of us who were bewitched by his eloquence on the campaign trail chose to ignore some disquieting aspects of his biography: that he had accomplished very little before he ran for president, having never run a business or a state; that he had a singularly unremarkable career as a law professor, publishing nothing in 12 years at the University of Chicago other than an autobiography; and that, before joining the United States Senate, he had voted "present" (instead of "yea" or "nay") 130 times, sometimes dodging difficult issues.
A somewhat less charitable explanation is that we are a nation that is being held hostage not just by an extremist Republican Party but also by a president who either does not know what he believes or is willing to take whatever position he thinks will lead to his re-election. Perhaps those of us who were so enthralled with the magnificent story he told in "Dreams From My Father" appended a chapter at the end that wasn't there - the chapter in which he resolves his identity and comes to know who he is and what he believes in.
Or perhaps, like so many politicians who come to Washington, he has already been consciously or unconsciously corrupted by a system that tests the souls even of people of tremendous integrity, by forcing them to dial for dollars - in the case of the modern presidency, for hundreds of millions of dollars. When he wants to be, the president is a brilliant and moving speaker, but his stories virtually always lack one element: the villain who caused the problem, who is always left out, described in impersonal terms, or described in passive voice, as if the cause of others' misery has no agency and hence no culpability. Whether that reflects his aversion to conflict, an aversion to conflict with potential campaign donors that today cripples both parties' ability to govern and threatens our democracy, or both, is unclear.
A final explanation is that he ran for president on two contradictory platforms: as a reformer who would clean up the system, and as a unity candidate who would transcend the lines of red and blue. He has pursued the one with which he is most comfortable given the constraints of his character, consistently choosing the message of bipartisanship over the message of confrontation.
But the arc of history does not bend toward justice through capitulation cast as compromise. It does not bend when 400 people control more of the wealth than 150 million of their fellow Americans. It does not bend when the average middle-class family has seen its income stagnate over the last 30 years while the richest 1 percent has seen its income rise astronomically. It does not bend when we cut the fixed incomes of our parents and grandparents so hedge fund managers can keep their 15 percent tax rates. It does not bend when only one side in negotiations between workers and their bosses is allowed representation. And it does not bend when, as political scientists have shown, it is not public opinion but the opinions of the wealthy that predict the votes of the Senate. The arc of history can bend only so far before it breaks.
Drew Westen is a professor of psychology at Emory University and the author of "The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation."
THE NEW STREAMLINED RSN LOGIN PROCESS: Register once, then login and you are ready to comment. All you need is a Username and a Password of your choosing and you are free to comment whenever you like! Welcome to the Reader Supported News community. |
Comments
A note of caution regarding our comment sections:
For months a stream of media reports have warned of coordinated propaganda efforts targeting political websites based in the U.S., particularly in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election.
We too were alarmed at the patterns we were, and still are, seeing. It is clear that the provocateurs are far more savvy, disciplined, and purposeful than anything we have ever experienced before.
It is also clear that we still have elements of the same activity in our article discussion forums at this time.
We have hosted and encouraged reader expression since the turn of the century. The comments of our readers are the most vibrant, best-used interactive feature at Reader Supported News. Accordingly, we are strongly resistant to interrupting those services.
It is, however, important to note that in all likelihood hardened operatives are attempting to shape the dialog our community seeks to engage in.
Adapt and overcome.
Marc Ash
Founder, Reader Supported News
Great job of enlightening us, professor. After all the karlrove style MSD (manipulation, spin, distraction) we are constantly being hit with, this article made me feel as if a window had been opened, with both sunlight and fresh air pouring in. Thank you.
Please read my article, "Crusader Christianity, Tea Party Cult, & the Left" when you can:
http://open.salon.com/blog/ronrobinson/2011/08/02/crusader_christianity_tea_party_cult_the_left_wip
Believe it or not, military people WANT TO fight. They WANT a war. So announce that we will STAY in Afghanistan "until we win" or until there is not enough soldiers that want to fight anymore. BUT it HAS TO BE FUNDED by TAXES on DEFENSE CONTRACTORS and People that make more than $1 million/year. Cut ALL public employee retirement payments and revert their pensions to a lump sum IRA account, equal to what they might have accrued, based on their annual incomes, and time in service. They can earn the same interest on those accounts that the rest of us get and they can worry about how long it will last versus how long THEY last, just like the rest of us.
What were they going for? To save 2 trillion over ten years? How much PER YEAR do you suppose those two savings would amount to alone?
Leave Medicare and Social Security alone but go ahead and cap increases on them. As the economy slows down, we'll see more deflation and increases in those programs won't be needed for a while.
If you live in a state that has Congressional and Senate leaders that advocate for "smaller government" and cuts to the stimulus and other social programs, exempt the entire state from taxes and benefits that serve those programs.
How the American voting public responds to this deception is what will set the course of history. It really is that important. Politicians are masters at manipulation - and stamina. They know that your anger and indignance will fade - and you'll be rattling on about the devil you know.
Here's a tip- you don't need to vote for a devil. Americans need to send politicians a message, a truth: that politicians work for voters, not the other way around. Obama is out of his depth and Mr Westen has provided an explanation for it - Obama lacks any type of real leadership experience. And it shows. The alternative to him is not the GOP - lose the mentality that if you don't vote for Obama you are voting for the Republicans. They too are at their weakest. Demand a new candidate stand up, show leadership and take control of both the party and the country. And demand that your current representatives start acting like your representatives - you 'employ' them, you can fire them.
Apathy is what will destroy America even faster than a weak President.
Time to stop complaining and get to work though.
warren above all others!
YES! They are THE BEST of Democrats!!
Yes, LBJ stepped down, and look who we got, instead! ... can you REALLY stomach the idea of a "President Bachmann"? because that's EXACTLY what we COULD get (and maybe what we deserve ... )
Well, I thought he was too. And he may still be. But he certainly hasn't shown that to be the case.
But maybe you and I don't know the whole story. Maybe Obama, who thought he could come to Washington and, with the support of the American people, change things, found out that the American people are too friggen stupid to support him. Maybe that idiotic election of Teabaggers threw him. And all those economics experts told him "either do this or everyone gets screwed".
I've said it before and I'll say it again; Obama and the Democrats in charge couldn't play hardball with a used car salesman. It's astounding how they cave on the threats from the right. But then, if you saw an American public that acted the way most people are now, would you be motivated to help them?
Americans have become selfish, single minded fools and the Teabaggers punctuate that statement. The ones that are working (and there are a lot) couldn't give a rip about anyone else. The public workers with their 60-90% salary retirements for life, vote Republican to keep ALL of "their" money. Those "heroes" don't give a damn about the rest of us; Until they need us to save their friggen pensions.
Nope; America has the "leaders" they deserve. Obama isn't the problem. WE ARE.
Enjoy the crash and burn George, enjoy the future you and yours have created. I've said it before and I will say it again, a tea bagger/republic an couldn't play fair with a preacher even if their grandmother was watching...
Now that you've had your little rant, Beth, maybe people will see what I mean a bit clearer now.
I personally know of two police officers, three teachers, and two firemen that ALL "retired" with no less than 60% of THE HIGHEST WAGE THEY EVER MADE while working at the age of 55! BOTH firemen get 110% because they worked the system to go out on a medical disability. One for bad knees. Of course, the bad knees were caused by riding quads in the California desert, but the system doesn't know that.
Funny thing too; These people ALL voted for Bush and continue to send me right winger crap about taxes.
Now, I know that not ALL public workers get these great deals, but where do you think the private sector stories about great pensions are? NOWHERE! And what about the tight job market? I saw an ex-military guy on the news saying "I deserve a chance at a job because I fought for freedom". B.S!
These people are true Socialists and they don't even know it. Everything in THEIR life has been provided by the government but, "OH MY GAWD; Don't let Socialism take hold in America."
I guess I'm just tired of all the lies and the B.S. People need to feel the pain before they will change.
He went on to predict what would happen to the Health Care Bill and, sure enough, he was right.
I failed to see that Obama had the desire but not the temperament to truly play hardball in these very high stakes political debates. Like it or not (and I don't much) the "intelligent" leaders in America have all failed and the dumbass leaders that had the balls to just force things down our throats, have prevailed.
LBJ, Carter, Obama; All cut from the same cloth I'm afraid. I think Gore is the same. Perhaps Bernie Sanders, Howard Dean, and few others would be the right choice. Or maybe Obama's intelligence will kick in if he wins a second term.
I sure wish we had an alternative!
Thank you, I agree!
If there was ever a chance that a third party with real left leaning people at the helm could make it, now is the time.
I'd be OK with Nader as a V.P. pick but I like Howard Dean better I think.
Yes, he may be the "emperor with no clothes," but I am reminded of the Clinton campaign's assessment that he was an "empty suit." Sad.
I also agree that it is, and should be, all about Congress.
To all you "progressive" Obama naysayers: You put Obama in the White House. The least you can do is stand behind him, and work hard to give him a Democratic majority in Congress.
Split the party or stay at home on election day and you risk turning the government over to the teabaggers. If that happens, you will be directly responsible for turning back progressive politics in this country a hundred years.
Grow up! All of you!
In the South and parts of the Midwest, there is only "Republican" and "Conservative Democrat". It's about ideals, not parties. And the ONLY way to get your ideals forged into law is by ramming it down people's throats (as GWB and the Republicans do) or by use of the bully-pulpit and gaining public support enough to scare the politicians into submission. Obama failed to do what he has a talent and gift for doing. And the American people are too disengaged and ignorant to even bother listening today anyway.
As Maslow has shown; The less intelligent respond only to fear, and pain. So fear allowed GWB to take us to war, and keeps people voting for Teabaggers and Conservatives and pain will get people waking up to reality. Too bad it will be too late for us all by then.
You have "chugged" the koolaid if you really really believe that progressives should "...quit your griping and start working ...to get the congress back to the democrates..." - thanks, but no thanks (gosh, you sound just like Obama telling progressives to "stop whining" when he didn't keep his campaign promises...) - the dems are worse than the teabagging pubs - at least the baggers are open with their insanity, Obama is the great deceiver.
Onward, united, we CAN work on these many many problems...but NOT with the fake fool Obama...
These hard core conservatives make up about 15-20 percent of the real electorate; the difference is that they are LOUD and well funded.
The tea party is mostly a fiction, propagated by the large corporations that want to make the US into a new slave state.
I have.
All true, in my humble opinion, and all-the-more reason for a primary challenger such as Russ Feingold to begin a 2012 campaign run.
Then, today, he was made to look evasive and dumb, by a LOCAL interviewer. He'd be chewed up big time with someone that really knew what they were doing.
That said, if you feel you can trust him, go for it with a write in or whatever. But, please do research and WATCH interviews with this guy. We don't need any more Obamas.
I could go on and on but the bottom line is that Obama has failed completely as the leader of this Nation, the Democratic Party, and the agent of "change we can believe in."
We can get out in the street and make all the noise in the universe but without a strong leader, we are just rabble and easy prey for the very organized corporate/Repub lican machine!
Why? What part of your mind or reality will come asunder if you stop fantasizing about this president magically reinventing himself and accept the overwhelming and clear evidence about who he is?
Hillary Clinton was not perfect, either, and they would have attacked her, and she is certainly not such an inspiring orator (although she can speak for a couple of hours, intelligently, without notes). But the Clintons are fighters. She would not have, in my opinion, backed down, and she made almost every promise Obama made, and then some -- her health care and education plans were far superior, for instance.
The sole excitement I felt for Obama was because he was mixed ethnic background. I thought of it as a wonderful statement on a major step forward in our political culture.
I did not expect him to be more than mediocre, but I did not expect him to be what he evidently is -- so well described by the writer of this essay. It was eloquent, and tragic.
But the Supreme Court is one thing he has done well. A Republican would be a disaster on that front. There are three reasons to re-elect him, "Supreme Court, Supreme Court, and Supreme Court." Can we nominate and elect a challenger. History says "no." Look at what happened to Teddy Kennedy.
I am not a Democrat any more. Appeasement is for cowards who don't know what they are there for. I want to find a candidate I can trust to know the difference, and I will go to work for them to get them elected.
Only President Obama, himself, can save the Republican Party, by giving in to them, by allowing to compromise with them –which would lead to the decline of democracy in America. We KNOW that Obama did not learn American History, let alone European History. We have not learned the lessons of “appeasement” (the Munich Pact of 1938, when British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain appeased Adolf Hitler).
It may be possible to have John Kerry, Joe Bide or Nancy Pelosi as opposing candidates.
Can you think of anyone else?
I believe that all above have TOO much baggage (history). What about Kennedy (strong on environment and not dependent on military).
Obama is at 40% - even with Republicans - Obama should resign for the good of the country and World (his militarism).
On the other hand, if it does have legs, it could light a fire under a lot of people, including the Obama re-election team. We'll see.
Here's part of my thought for President Obama's "centralist" actions for bi-partisan or lack of blaming the Bush (and Reagan) administrations ---
1. The birther and racist attacks are real. My family has wondered if he fears an assassination. That is how vile the remarks from the right have been. The Turtle openly stating "his only goal is to make Obama a 1 term president -- when he should be passing legislation for JOBS" is surreal"
2. Never has the filibuster been used to stop the majority as it has in these 2 1/2 years.
3. I personally do NOT want another Republican president. A second term president is usually stronger than in his first term. I do not buy the "idea" that he is sold out to the GOP.
4. He is not a king and we expect him to demand.
5. He does not blame although we ALL know he inherited a depression that was far worse than he (and we) were told.
I've run out of room.
Get registered and get mail-in ballots and Vote in 2012.
seems plausible that he would surrender to foreign terrorists too.
Security!
Obama is an Establishment man. Isn't Progressive. Never has been. And never will be. But he's a great blank screen upon which to project one's hopes and dreams.
As a former Psychologist myself (and not really a very classical one at all), I'd like to add one more piece of the puzzle to understanding him and his so-obvious-to-e veryone-else weaknesses: his father left him as small boy. And now, Obama seeks to fill that void by being accepted and loved by the Father figures in the room, the Authoritarian Repugs. He'll never get their love, of course, but he wouldn't be the first person with the "idiot hope" that he will succeed at it. If only he does everything right. This is no excuse for him, just another piece of information.
Obama has done far more to alienate me from my the political system than anyone could have. Bush was horrible. And his horribleness woke me up and brought me in to fight back. But Obama's betrayal of me-- and all of those who worked so hard to get him elected-- is unforgivable. I have never felt so seduced and abandoned, so disenfranchised .
Bush compelled me in. Obama drove me out.
Elect Democrats in 2012 and take back the country
Dispair is not an option
Dispair may not be an option, but pretenting that Obama in '12 will bring a progressive or liberal agenda back are complete fools...get a clue!
Given the choice between a Republican corporatist and a Democratic corporatist, I'll choose the former every time - because at least with them, the entire Democratic Party would be unified against their corporatism. With Obama a registered Dem, he can count on the majority of Dems to support him regardless of his behavior.
We were bamboozled. Nothing has happened to Mr. Obama. What's happened hashappened to us. We now know what we didn't know before: Obama's Opportunism comes in an eloquent package.
Prof. Westen says: "But with his deep-seated aversion to conflict and his profound failure to understand bully dynamics - in which conciliation is always the wrong course of action, because bullies perceive it as weakness and just punch harder the next time - he has broken that arc and has likely bent it backward for at least a generation."
On the contrary, Mr. Obama understands "bully politics" very well. He has exploited these dynamics as a means to support his own messianic image oh himself. I believe Mr. Obama is not conflict averse but rather, "above the fray" with the kind of self-aggrandizi ng ego that sees itself as (conveniently) "better" than mundane politics. The Bully is Obama's perfect foil - a counterweight to his own now-revealed opportunistic manipulations that parade as "balance."
Prof. Westen does us a great benefit by reminding us that, as disappointing as Obama is - as a man and as a president - he is NOT typical. There are good people and dedicated, ethical polticians... REALLY! Obama may have burdened MKL’s “arc of justice" but he cannot break it - he's too much of a light-weight.
Obama was always a part of the agenda, not an upstart who would shake up the system. We no longer have "leaders" who are not part of that long term agenda to change the control of this country, turning it over to private ownership and reducing the population to powerless individuals being led into a future unknown.
Reagan's administration developed all this and it developed further as the years passed, blossoming under George W. Check carefully and you will find that no president was randomly elected, without the approval of genuine power players, and Obama is on that list.
I noticed the Inaugural speech as being less inspiring than his campaign speeches, and I figured it was for two reasons...one, he was speaking to entire country and world, those who liked him and those who didn't. But, more importantly, he couldn't come out swinging like FDR, who was white and didn't have FOX News screaming about his illegitimacy 24 hours a day. Ask yourself what the consequences of that could have been. Some of us won't stop holding our collective breath until after someone is inaugurated in Jan. 2017.
Finally, was anyone paying attention to what happened on 7/25/11? I'm sure President Obama was. He asked the American people that Monday night to contact their Congress if they agreed with him, their President. The American people crashed the D.C. system with their calls and emails.
Liberals are disappointed and right-wingers are still crazy. But, the majority of Americans understand and admire the President.
Also globalization has changed the game. It is much harder for national governments to have an impact on their national economies. Obama is facing a capital strike right now with corporate interests sitting on mounds of cash they refuse to invest. The say it’s because of uncertainty; many of us think they are waiting for a Republican President and what they see as a more favorable investment climate—more tax cuts etc.
There are so many more constraints on Obama than there were on FDR. This is not meant as justification of Obama’s tepid responses, but let's be fair about what he’s dealing with.
Karen
www.the-next-stage.com
The only real answer for America is truth. And truth is gone, destroyed, the enemy.
Without truth there is no trust.
Without trust there is no nation.
After 8 years of radicalism perpetrated by "W" on this nation, a big correction was called for. The scale NEEDED to tip to the other side and to right some of the wrongs on the previous misadministrati on. Instead, Obama chose a bland middle path that was impossible (given the fact that his opponents in Congress know only the word "NO") but also because it was not a true correction. The People wanted CHANGE, not namby pamby, nicey nicey bland middle-of-the-r oadness. It was time for an infusion of true Democratic principles back into the discourse. And instead, he turned right and placated the very side whose "principles" screwed us in the first place.
I had a pitty party with my friends last night...cried over pizza and beer. Now we're actively preparing to replace our congressman and if there's a better Democrat to run against Obama that might be good to but have your "pitty party" then stop whining and get out there and join your Central Committee, chair a fundraiser...bu t STOP whining!
he had it first two years and extended Bush cut for the rich - to get his billions for re-election propaganda?
Obama militarism is like Bush - no end to it. Chance that we, US will bomb Syria or/and Iran are almost 100% under Hillary AIPAC.
We have to get rid of Republicans, Teas and Blue Dog Dems. It was the Blue Dogs that didn't give Obama help. Max Bacus is a Blue Dog and he has got to go. He's the one who didn't allow consumer groups in the Health Care committee hearings. The California Progressive Causus has passed a resolution to look for a progressive Dem to compete with Obama for the Democratic Nomination. that's why I say, quit whining and complaining and get involved in your local Democratic Central Committe and get to work. Freedom isn't Free you know.
But.....SEN. MAX BAUCUS IS NOW ON THE COMMITTEE OF 12! THIS DEVELOPMENT SHOULD BE A BIG 'RED-FLAG' TO ANYONE WHO WANTS TO SAVE FDR "NEW DEAL" SAFETY NET PROGRAMS.
Thanks for less-than-nothi ng, Harry Reid.
2000- Gore LOSES Florida to Bush after 97 thousand votes go to Ralph Nader’s 3rd party and Bush WINS Florida and election
UNDER BUSH:
Economic collapse
Housing market collapse
Labor market collapse
Banking system is dysfunctional
OBAMA ELECTED:
Save US auto industry
Fair Pay act-Equal pay for equal work
Restored scientific integrity in government
Ended Bush stop of embryonic stem cell research
Children's Health care-insured 11 million
Ended don't ask don't tell
Phase out unneeded F-22 fighter
Ended stop-lose-soldi ers can’t be kept longer than enlistment
Restarts nuclear nonproliferatio n talks
Sotomayor and Kagan to Supreme Court
Funding for student loans and pell grants
Tax credit for 95%
Extended unemployment benefits,
etc,etc.
DO NOT LET 2000 HAPPEN AGAIN!!!
VOTE FOR OBAMA AND DEMOCRATS IN 2012
TAKE BACK THE HOUSE AND KEEP THE SENATE
Think & VOTE.
Thank you all, keep us in the right direction, but not to the point of self destruction.
Stop Whining...!!!
This is not a dictatorship...
Money bills originate in the House of Representatives
Then go to the Senate
Get a clue people...
People who didn't come out in 2010 are to blame, not Obama
They let baggers in and now more BS to clean up
All those who call for a 3rd party...do us a favor
DON'T VOTE...You and Ralph Nader gave us Bush...
That didn't cause many problems,did it?
Nader DID NOT give us Bush in 2000 - a stolen election, chicken/dem senators - including someone named Gore, (On January 6, 2001, a joint session of Congress met to certify the electoral vote. Twenty members of the House of Representatives , most of them Democratic members of the Congressional Black Caucus, rose one-by-one to file objections to the electoral votes of Florida. However, according to an 1877 law, any such objection had to be sponsored by both a representative and a senator. No senator would co-sponsor these objections, deferring to the Supreme Court's ruling. Therefore, Gore, who presided in his capacity as President of the Senate, ruled each of these objections out of order..) and the US supreme court GAVE US BUSH...
Don't criticize progressives for "whining" - we were lied to, we compromised our values/belief systems by working very hard to get a fraud in power...we have every right to be very angry and to call truth truth...how about us demanding that most dems admit that they are really repub lights? – they certainly are not progressive or liberal in any way shape form
I think it is very important that we do more than just add our comments here. We need to write to the President and our representatives and tell them how we feel about their behavior. I sent a letter to President Obama yesterday telling him how I felt and asking him to be a progressive or announce that he will not seek a second term. If he receives millions of letters, it will have an impact.
Obama is only concerned about We the people come November 4th, 2012.He could have raise the debt ceiling by using the fourteeth amendment and the people would have been behind him. But his main donors, Goldman Sachs, wants cuts in entitlements.
Obama doesn't care about you the people. You can't give him the money he wants. He only wants your votes later on.
I don't need "daddy" to tell me what is right...
or what I should do...
The republican/ t-baggers are the cause of the current
economic, labor market, housing, banking collapse...
with help from clinton's free-trade agreement and the removal
of the "up-tick" rule-by republicans- which would have stopped short seller trading in 2008...
With the help offered to the baggers by you, Obama will be
defeated...
For me...I passed my civics classes...If O. had pressed the case against the criminal banksters and those that condone torture..NOTHIN G to help regular people would have gotten done...He would still be stuck in a quagmire of political BS.
Elect Democrats in 2012...take back the House, keep the Senate and Obama and press our case in the second term...
If not...good luck to us all..because we will need it...
We need a third party, to clean up the political process and reestablish a democracy that serves the public rather than the corporations and the uber-rich. This won't happen by swinging back and forth from "hope"-ful Democrats to "No Deal" Republicans.
After decades of dutiful loyalty to Democrats, I've faced the fact they have abandoned progressive values, they have abandoned the people of America, and it's just all electioneering theater now. I've registered with the Green Party. And if you want to send your elected officials a message, don't petition and email and march and blog -- they don't care about any of you; they know you'll hold your nose again and vote for the "lesser of two evils." Go register Green Party. A few million of those registration shifts and they'll start paying attention. If the Greens put up a candidate, vote for him/her! If they don't, write in Nader. Tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them what you want to tell them, and tell them what you've told them. Then things will "change."
Still we hear someone complaining that Nader spoiled it
for us, and make sure not to vote for someone like Nader.
He might have shown us over the decades how much integrity he has, but that doesn't mean anything to people who are ill informed or paid shills. Who pays these people to keep the real patriots out of the system? Corruption money? Everyone has his price. Does Nader? See the documentary "Ralph Nader: an unreasonable man" and get an idea about where integrity comes from. Make sure to see it to the very end where they show how much good and necessary legislation was passed by this man and his organization and you'll see why we should have bucked the system a decade ago and got a third party in the mix. We might have lost one election but the powers that be would have had their work cut out for them trying to corrupt another whole party.
I've joined the Green Party. They have the right values; now we have to build them up to have the power of numbers.
I've been reading Nader's books; he is an incredible intellect, historian, activist and human being, and we were lucky he would even run -- and the voters threw him away. He could have made this country such a better place, for all -- families, communities, businesses, everyone.
Ben Franklin, when asked what kind of government the Constitutional Convention had given us, said, "A republic, if you can keep it." Now we see what he meant....
Mr. Obama seemed like a pretty white cap. Sarah bin-Palin was more like an oil slick. Michele Bachmann's a toxic chemical spill.
Whether benign or malign, leaders merely hint at the direction of the powerful currents below.
Invisible, yet determinative, currents have names such as "the mode, means and relations of production," "hegemonic ideology," "overarching technology."
No leader can reverse them, but strong, humane organizations can modify their effects.
Though a genuine 3rd-party alternative could give electoral politics some meaning in the USA, you might at least gather together as: environmentalis ts; peace activists; anti-poverty coalitions; women; aboriginal peoples; farmers and consumers; cultural organizations; and what's left of the one-proud trade union movement and take back the Democratic Party.
The T-baggers showed what can happen when the margin overwhelms the mainstream. In the case of the GOP, it's a disaster for principled conservatives. For the authentic Democrats, it could mean redemption.
Let's focus on the third party. Difficult -- but do we have a choice?
Five words will say it all: "all foam and no beer!"
What happened to Obama is that he is in thrall to Wall St., the plutocratic corporatocracy and the Pentagon. The arc of his presidency has been to serve them at the expense of the now vanishing working and middle classes.
Obama wants to govern from the middle and be above partisanship, but he was elected to clean house and straighten up the place. The Democratic sweep of 2008 was entirely partisan, but, turns out, the Dems couldn’t make it happen. And now, with his silent partner, the GOP, Obama has proven that he has stealthily adopted the Bush neo-con agenda in both foreign and domestic policy matters. And that is what happened to a guy who never really wanted a fight.
Barack Obama, 2012: "Give up hope of anything other than stagnation." "Yes, we can!" has given way to "Maybe we can't!"
If the man had an ounce of integrity he would have declined to accept that unearned Nobel Peace Prize pending the actual performance of action that promoted peace. To use his acceptance speech as a platform for justifying military aggression insulted the Prize Committee and all previous honorees, including Dr. Albert Schweitzer, Dr. Martin Luther King, the Dalai Lama, and Nelson Mandela.
I just hope he has to really depend on Social Security and Medicare in a few years, and they won't be there, because of his cowardice.
Also, apparently, to become a Democrat, you have to turn in your balls.
Hasn't Drew Weston been paying attention? Actions speak louder than words. It doesn't matter what the President has said. He's a stealth repugnican. If you want to know what he believes on any given issue, just ask john boner. The answer will be the exact same. The only difference is that boner will tell you up front - well, sort of.
Four commentaries:
Too much hate.
Roosevelt quote "they are unanimous in
their hate for me--" and later
"Americans hate government"
The difference between Europe and America
is, that in Europe the politicians disagree with each other and the people
disagree with government, where as,
in America the republicans and the democrats in congress hate each other and the people hate government.
Too much stupidity.
The Americans are stupid!
Don´t forget that they voted for Busch
the second time, and don´t forget that
they seriously have considered Palin, Bachman and Donald Trump as presidential candidates.
Too much Obama.
Say after me:
Nobels peace prize,
Guantanamo,
treatment of Bradley Manning,
taxcut for the rich.
Poor America!
The healing process would start with people like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
He sold out our Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare benefits rather than to rally the people against the reactionary Tea Baggers. In short Obama conducted himself like the true corporatist that he is.
Solution? The time is ripe for organizing and building an alternative to the two party trap we currently have.
A party that will not accept corporate bribes and one that will advocate and defend our civil liberties and rights along with our Constitution. Are YOU ready to help out with this?
Do you notice how so many of us point to Obama to get something done? This was the purpose of assassinating individuals like King, Malcolm X, John Lennon, the Panthers, and other radical groups in the sixties.
We must forget Obama and empower ourselves like their doing in Egypt, Israel, London, and countless other places in the world.
Who declared that a George Bush or a Barack Obama had the God given right to
run unopposed by anyone else in his party?
RSS feed for comments to this post