There is nothing worse than to watch bad actors performing a bad script. There is something grating, not unlike finger nails on a black board, to watch two-actors mouthing lines that have no meaning, and worse, delivered without pathos. The president and the speaker are in a grammar (no pre school) production of "These Calamatious Times." A three act play about the foibles of letting idiots run the government.
First, we have the president, Mr. Cool who doesn't seem to want to act until the drama has reached a crescendo. He must have some hubris to sit on the sidelines like some high poetentate waiting for that moment when he can swoop in and with his rhetoric give a rendition of a siren's song and lead the befuddled minor players to a happy ending. His cool, detached, "let's get along" demeanor is nothing short of foolishness. He is not a Shakesperian thespian but a Moliere foil.
Second, there is the speaker, a Sarah Bernhardt drama queen, who thinks that if he repeats the same lie over and over it will be taken as fact. Of course, let's not forget his second in command the ever smiling camera and publicity hound from Virginia. To hear these two talk you would think that their Thorazine only kicked in when Obama was elected. Prior that they sat in their chamber listening to W run this country into a major hole while drooling in a cationic stupor.
Let's forget the senate, they seem to be at least trying.
There is something amiss in this supposedly real world. There are these would be actors prancing about shouting slogans and homilies appropo to nothing. You would think that when they started talking about the super rich – millionaires and billionaires – as job creators they would have at least broke out the seltzer water and whoopee cushions. When they talked about the problem being entitlements (read social security and medicare), you would think they couldn't keep a straight face or at least their noses would have grown, seriously grown.
So, here we are, a stalemate of epic proportions with the only ones who will suffer are the those who have the least say. Something needs to be done.
That is why Aaron Sorkin has got to come to the rescue. We need a more intelligent script. We need someone who understand pathos and human nature. We need someone who can craft for us a chief executive with some hutzpah, someone with the guts to fight the banal cabal. The drama now playing in Washington needs to be canceled. It is not interesting. It is too pathetic. It is quite frankly boring.
Sorkin can spice it up; hell he crafted the West Wing. The last time the government held any interest for the public. Sure Obama can be cast as the president. Boener is a a bad choice but heck looks who is waiting in the wings, a Charlie Sheen like character who chose foolishness and tea party trite positions as his crack. But the drama has to be set. Now, I know those representatives won't play along. They maybe dumb and close minded but they aren't stupid. As soon as they see the ratings, once this president gets a serious script, they will fall in line. Cause there is nothing any of these clowns in Washington won't do to get a good review!
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Obama
It is nice to see the president smiling and golfing with the Republican Speaker of the House. How nice it is to witness the exchanges of pleasantries between key figures in government. As the speaker said, when the president asks, you go. But that only relates to a golfing date, real compromise is, well, left in the mire of political considerations.
Underlying all this civility is the harsh reality that our government is ethically bankrupt and morally inept. While this nation bleeds red ink and sacrifices its youth in the pursuit of a foreign policy that reflects the misjudgments of the previous administration, we are left with a gaggle of elected officials who are opportunists through and through who don't possess a scintilla of the qualities of statesmanship. It would seem all their time and effort are spent with their spin masters to concoct pithy slogans and garner air time. We live in a world where the real issues are jettisoned for political reason, and the common good is lost in the ideology designed to serve not the people but the political hacks who like junkies need cash to further their own greed.
The first two years of the Obama's administration were spent on the banal concept of compromise with a horde of right wingers who vowed to take him down. It would appear that its final two years will be wasted on appeasement to irrational ideologues whose positions are based on rhetoric and bombast. Chaos theory suggests that the most irrational and firm negotiator will gain the upper hand. This seems to be holding true.
When the speaker holds to the position that there will be no new taxes. He is, in effect, suggesting that the more this collective body digs its head in the sand the more likely the problem will disappear. The right would suggest that more debt is not what the American public wants. They refer to what the average American needs to do, but each and every one of us must pay our bills, less the dreaded penalty as high as 25% is added to that bill, -- all the fault of their industry bent legislation. They talk of the future invoking future generations, and underlying all this bombast is a nefarious attempt to rid this nation of any sane and meaningful attempt to insure the fundamental right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
They scream about the health care legislation as if this insurance ridden system we possess has any relevance to the nation's health. They balk at a woman's reproductive health care yet they would expand a drug company's right to introduce dangerous medicines for the cure of menstrual cramps though it might lead to blindness and death (have you really watched the warnings accompanied the ads for medication on TV?). They decried and stopped a public option as socialized medicine, but they now champion Medicare for those currently on it or going into it, yet they want to strip the country of this safety net and replace it with something that will profit the greedy insurance executives bloated with administrative fees. In short, they ignore their culpability in the mess we face, but worse wish to double down on the past failed attempts. The only real solution they have is to expand on the failed polices of allowing the rich to get richer and the poor to serve. They talk of God and country as if they are given their oracles from on high. Their high priests prance around in revolutionary costumes shouting slogans apropos to nothing but ignorance and bigotry. All the while, the supposed champion of the left, Mr. Obama, has jettisoned every campaign promise caving in to every unreasonable demand from the right while saddling up to Wall Street Profiteers in the hope of raising a billion dollars so he can campaign as our learned leader. This politician has the audacity to chastise us on the left as being unreasonable when we cry in anguish at his failed and weak attempts to move a positive agenda.
As the fringe right wing, resolute in their assault on the works of Lincoln, Roosevelt, and yes Johnson, hack away on any semblance of a government committed to equality and justice, Obama, ever the cool calm effete snake oil salesman mumbles on and on using rhetoric as a substitute for leadership. He has met the enemy and surrendered and left the left twisting in the wind.
Underlying all this civility is the harsh reality that our government is ethically bankrupt and morally inept. While this nation bleeds red ink and sacrifices its youth in the pursuit of a foreign policy that reflects the misjudgments of the previous administration, we are left with a gaggle of elected officials who are opportunists through and through who don't possess a scintilla of the qualities of statesmanship. It would seem all their time and effort are spent with their spin masters to concoct pithy slogans and garner air time. We live in a world where the real issues are jettisoned for political reason, and the common good is lost in the ideology designed to serve not the people but the political hacks who like junkies need cash to further their own greed.
The first two years of the Obama's administration were spent on the banal concept of compromise with a horde of right wingers who vowed to take him down. It would appear that its final two years will be wasted on appeasement to irrational ideologues whose positions are based on rhetoric and bombast. Chaos theory suggests that the most irrational and firm negotiator will gain the upper hand. This seems to be holding true.
When the speaker holds to the position that there will be no new taxes. He is, in effect, suggesting that the more this collective body digs its head in the sand the more likely the problem will disappear. The right would suggest that more debt is not what the American public wants. They refer to what the average American needs to do, but each and every one of us must pay our bills, less the dreaded penalty as high as 25% is added to that bill, -- all the fault of their industry bent legislation. They talk of the future invoking future generations, and underlying all this bombast is a nefarious attempt to rid this nation of any sane and meaningful attempt to insure the fundamental right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
They scream about the health care legislation as if this insurance ridden system we possess has any relevance to the nation's health. They balk at a woman's reproductive health care yet they would expand a drug company's right to introduce dangerous medicines for the cure of menstrual cramps though it might lead to blindness and death (have you really watched the warnings accompanied the ads for medication on TV?). They decried and stopped a public option as socialized medicine, but they now champion Medicare for those currently on it or going into it, yet they want to strip the country of this safety net and replace it with something that will profit the greedy insurance executives bloated with administrative fees. In short, they ignore their culpability in the mess we face, but worse wish to double down on the past failed attempts. The only real solution they have is to expand on the failed polices of allowing the rich to get richer and the poor to serve. They talk of God and country as if they are given their oracles from on high. Their high priests prance around in revolutionary costumes shouting slogans apropos to nothing but ignorance and bigotry. All the while, the supposed champion of the left, Mr. Obama, has jettisoned every campaign promise caving in to every unreasonable demand from the right while saddling up to Wall Street Profiteers in the hope of raising a billion dollars so he can campaign as our learned leader. This politician has the audacity to chastise us on the left as being unreasonable when we cry in anguish at his failed and weak attempts to move a positive agenda.
As the fringe right wing, resolute in their assault on the works of Lincoln, Roosevelt, and yes Johnson, hack away on any semblance of a government committed to equality and justice, Obama, ever the cool calm effete snake oil salesman mumbles on and on using rhetoric as a substitute for leadership. He has met the enemy and surrendered and left the left twisting in the wind.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
A Break Up Letter to Obama
Dear Barry
Well, it is really hard for me to write this letter. You know, when the going got tough, I was there for you. Reverend Wright couldn't scare me away, nor could that thing Hilary said when she said you were really too inexperienced to be president. I stood by you when the aspersions about you nationality were thrown at you. I was there Barry. You see, I believed in the audacity of hope. I believed that there was a better way to conduct our foreign policy then relying on a volunteer army to wage fool hardy wars to prevent the world from blowing up with weapons of mass destruction. Barry, I really did believe in you and what you had to offer. But surely, you can appreciate that even the most die hard awe struck follower grows weary when you constantly grovel for the attention of those who don't even like you. Barry come on you have got to see that those folks really want you to fail.
You ask why they don't like you.
First, let me say that they are never going to like you because you are way too uppity. You are too cool for those tea baggers, cranky old white men and shrill white women with bleach hair who prefer to hang around rich fat old white men. You can't do anything right even when you are playing a rich white man's game like golf. Barry, I know you are only half black but you are smart enough to remember that old miscegenation laws that classified those with only a tenth part in the blood. You really don't think those recent strolls down memory lane in the south praising that antebellum period was just a dress up party. Barry, a lot of white folks just don't like black folks and a lot of them can be found in the disloyal opposition. Fact is fact.
Second, you don't appreciate how much you have hurt me when you turn your back to me or even worse offer me only a plate at the kid's table and not in the formal dinning room. What? You don't understand! Did you forget when you were campaigning you talked about our national shame about health coverage? Didn't you realize that what I thought I was buying was a broad and sweeping change which included a public option so we could finally corralled those claim-denying insurance companies and make it possible for folks to live free of that fear of a catastrophic illness? Funny, if that legislation that was passed had a public option, all those court cases would have not been possible. Do you think that insurance lobby knew that when the bill was being drafted? They are really sharp when it comes to escape clauses.
But Barry, it is those damn wars that have gotten the best of me. You seem to be doing what John McCain wanted to do but that doesn't help you at all with him, does it? And now there is Libya – another step on a slippery slope to who knows what. Don't you get it Barry that when you do what someone who doesn't like you wants you to do and they are still angry and disappointed it is you and now what you do.
I guess whoever is advising you is telling you how you can get re-elected if you follow some basic plan about moving to the center. I guess there is no one talking to you about integrity and keeping your word. I guess you thought your smile and quick wit would win the hearts and minds of those who just don't like you. But Barry you were so wrong. I am afraid you are going to find yourself in no man's land. A disappointment to those who cared and a failure to those who you tried to win. Governing, Barry, is sometimes about compromise but mostly it is about leadership and integrity. It is one thing to do something because you have to, but when you do it side up to those who don't like you; then, Barry it time for the jilted to move on.
Well, it is really hard for me to write this letter. You know, when the going got tough, I was there for you. Reverend Wright couldn't scare me away, nor could that thing Hilary said when she said you were really too inexperienced to be president. I stood by you when the aspersions about you nationality were thrown at you. I was there Barry. You see, I believed in the audacity of hope. I believed that there was a better way to conduct our foreign policy then relying on a volunteer army to wage fool hardy wars to prevent the world from blowing up with weapons of mass destruction. Barry, I really did believe in you and what you had to offer. But surely, you can appreciate that even the most die hard awe struck follower grows weary when you constantly grovel for the attention of those who don't even like you. Barry come on you have got to see that those folks really want you to fail.
You ask why they don't like you.
First, let me say that they are never going to like you because you are way too uppity. You are too cool for those tea baggers, cranky old white men and shrill white women with bleach hair who prefer to hang around rich fat old white men. You can't do anything right even when you are playing a rich white man's game like golf. Barry, I know you are only half black but you are smart enough to remember that old miscegenation laws that classified those with only a tenth part in the blood. You really don't think those recent strolls down memory lane in the south praising that antebellum period was just a dress up party. Barry, a lot of white folks just don't like black folks and a lot of them can be found in the disloyal opposition. Fact is fact.
Second, you don't appreciate how much you have hurt me when you turn your back to me or even worse offer me only a plate at the kid's table and not in the formal dinning room. What? You don't understand! Did you forget when you were campaigning you talked about our national shame about health coverage? Didn't you realize that what I thought I was buying was a broad and sweeping change which included a public option so we could finally corralled those claim-denying insurance companies and make it possible for folks to live free of that fear of a catastrophic illness? Funny, if that legislation that was passed had a public option, all those court cases would have not been possible. Do you think that insurance lobby knew that when the bill was being drafted? They are really sharp when it comes to escape clauses.
But Barry, it is those damn wars that have gotten the best of me. You seem to be doing what John McCain wanted to do but that doesn't help you at all with him, does it? And now there is Libya – another step on a slippery slope to who knows what. Don't you get it Barry that when you do what someone who doesn't like you wants you to do and they are still angry and disappointed it is you and now what you do.
I guess whoever is advising you is telling you how you can get re-elected if you follow some basic plan about moving to the center. I guess there is no one talking to you about integrity and keeping your word. I guess you thought your smile and quick wit would win the hearts and minds of those who just don't like you. But Barry you were so wrong. I am afraid you are going to find yourself in no man's land. A disappointment to those who cared and a failure to those who you tried to win. Governing, Barry, is sometimes about compromise but mostly it is about leadership and integrity. It is one thing to do something because you have to, but when you do it side up to those who don't like you; then, Barry it time for the jilted to move on.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Inside Job and A Liberal's Lament
Why It Is So Hard To Be A Liberal
It is so hard to be a liberal in this world of greed and duplicity even though time and documentaries usually prove our deepest concerns were spot on despite what the Fox mad hatters might say in rebuttal. Yes, we, liberals, are a loyal and consistent block who are called upon to be at the ready to support those causes designed to make our world more egalitarian, more just, more compassionate. We are always hugging trees believing in some way that we must treat Mother Nature as if she were, in fact, our maternal progenitor. Probably, that particular interest is half native American myth and scientific findings. We go back to the earliest days when this country was first arising out of the colonial rule of an anarchistic geopolitical world. Patrick Henry was our iconic voice, “Give me liberty or give me death.” A no compromise commitment to the cause of freedom found a place in the collection of merchants and farmers, many of them slave owners who were only to ready to give themselves liberty with nary a thought for those working their land.
Skipping ahead, our leanings and our causes were eloquently expressed in Lincoln's words at Gettysburg, where a great man could only stomach the ravages of war if it were only in the cause of furthering those noble aspirations that lead to the country in the first place. Muckrakers delved into the horrendous practices of those who cared little if they profited from selling poison to add even more to their hordes of wealth. The liberal tradition was a force that brought about changes needed to keep a progressive nation on a trajectory toward the noble goal of transforming the body politic into a system that is utopian, with a keen eye that utopia is only a goal and that the real achievements are realized when that which is wrong is corrected piecemeal. A kind of step by step approach to improve the conditions under which humans live and die.
Liberals are known to be active citizens. We never miss an opportunity to express ourselves and our belief. Primaries are our arena where we possess a modicum of control over the direction of our party – unlike the indifferent majority of Americans who will stay home secure in their nests as long as their favorite shows are not interrupted and their paychecks continue to flow. This is not to raise us liberals above our fellow citizens but to show the contrast between those actively pursuing a dream, and those who are enjoying what they have.
Politicians know our behavior all too well. The mind bending, mind probing psychologists who have shifted the campaigns from a discussion of issues to a selling of a brand have long been in the forefront of shaping what a campaign is all about. Thus, those who actively participate, the activists, are the first cohort to get “the message” of the person seeking office. In this instance, the candidate with the help of pollsters (really little more than psychological gnomes – gremlins, if you please) craft the words of the candidate to sell the person to the awaiting activists.
I can only speak from the left of this world. Thus the Democrat most likely to win in the primary is the one who speaks to liberal issues. As a group and to the one, we liberals are gullible people. We buy lock, stock, and barrel any candidate who appeals to our sense of rightness. Oh how we swoon when we hear the words we want to hear. If you re-examine Obama's campaign speeches, you see he was playing the chords of our concerns, much as a virtuoso harpist goes through a complicated composition. When he talked, this liberal and many others of my ilk, could close our eyes and see the cherubs flowing above his head while our giants iconic leaders of the past materialize in his many references. Alas, like a hapless sot who awakens after a night of foolhardy revelry head and body wracked with the pain of afflictions, we soon discover we didn't get what we wanted. We got what we had. And if perchance we raise our voice and shout, “hey that's not what we had been promised,” we are told that 1) we don't understand and 2) we are unrealistic and even more not relevant. Thus, we are cast aside like putrid offal, while our knight in shinning armor rides under the banners of moderation and mainstream.
Why all this recrimination? Having just viewed “An Inside Job,” it is clear that the new boss is just like the old boss (I used the tidbit from a Who song before but it is seems to be what it is). While the masterminds of the fiscal meltdown continue with their avaricious ways free of any fear of suffering any consequence to their illegal and immoral actions, the people of this country scrape and crawl out of the fiscal hole that was allowed with deregulation by those whose reckless behavior was designed to make them obscenely rich. While these so called too big to fail financial snake oil salesmen continue to receive obscene compensation packages and tax breaks, we can only sit and watch and be satisfied with the meager crumbs that fall from the mouths of distended moguls whose mere breath sway the course our ship of state. Which brings me to the thugs who roll out of Wall Street into government only to roll back, like a snow ball being rolled in wet snow, though their growth is money. Is it no wonder the dollar is in the tank, when a double talking, double dealing CEO from Merrill Lynch can accumulate hundreds of millions of them while the average Joe has to give away the treasury to get unemployment insurance? And now of course, the ship of state is on a course to get the president re-elected and we liberals will need to be satisfied with the hope we can hold on to our castle no matter how humble it maybe, while the top one per cent ponder beach front property in Boca Ratan or a desert oasis in Palm Springs – hell why not both. We are sure to hear in the state of the union a few phrases that will tug at our heart strings but the vast majority of the president's speech is all a smoke screen for the top one percent huddled in some exclusive back room laying out the strategy that will allow them to continue to plunder this nation wealth.
It is so hard to be a liberal in this world of greed and duplicity even though time and documentaries usually prove our deepest concerns were spot on despite what the Fox mad hatters might say in rebuttal. Yes, we, liberals, are a loyal and consistent block who are called upon to be at the ready to support those causes designed to make our world more egalitarian, more just, more compassionate. We are always hugging trees believing in some way that we must treat Mother Nature as if she were, in fact, our maternal progenitor. Probably, that particular interest is half native American myth and scientific findings. We go back to the earliest days when this country was first arising out of the colonial rule of an anarchistic geopolitical world. Patrick Henry was our iconic voice, “Give me liberty or give me death.” A no compromise commitment to the cause of freedom found a place in the collection of merchants and farmers, many of them slave owners who were only to ready to give themselves liberty with nary a thought for those working their land.
Skipping ahead, our leanings and our causes were eloquently expressed in Lincoln's words at Gettysburg, where a great man could only stomach the ravages of war if it were only in the cause of furthering those noble aspirations that lead to the country in the first place. Muckrakers delved into the horrendous practices of those who cared little if they profited from selling poison to add even more to their hordes of wealth. The liberal tradition was a force that brought about changes needed to keep a progressive nation on a trajectory toward the noble goal of transforming the body politic into a system that is utopian, with a keen eye that utopia is only a goal and that the real achievements are realized when that which is wrong is corrected piecemeal. A kind of step by step approach to improve the conditions under which humans live and die.
Liberals are known to be active citizens. We never miss an opportunity to express ourselves and our belief. Primaries are our arena where we possess a modicum of control over the direction of our party – unlike the indifferent majority of Americans who will stay home secure in their nests as long as their favorite shows are not interrupted and their paychecks continue to flow. This is not to raise us liberals above our fellow citizens but to show the contrast between those actively pursuing a dream, and those who are enjoying what they have.
Politicians know our behavior all too well. The mind bending, mind probing psychologists who have shifted the campaigns from a discussion of issues to a selling of a brand have long been in the forefront of shaping what a campaign is all about. Thus, those who actively participate, the activists, are the first cohort to get “the message” of the person seeking office. In this instance, the candidate with the help of pollsters (really little more than psychological gnomes – gremlins, if you please) craft the words of the candidate to sell the person to the awaiting activists.
I can only speak from the left of this world. Thus the Democrat most likely to win in the primary is the one who speaks to liberal issues. As a group and to the one, we liberals are gullible people. We buy lock, stock, and barrel any candidate who appeals to our sense of rightness. Oh how we swoon when we hear the words we want to hear. If you re-examine Obama's campaign speeches, you see he was playing the chords of our concerns, much as a virtuoso harpist goes through a complicated composition. When he talked, this liberal and many others of my ilk, could close our eyes and see the cherubs flowing above his head while our giants iconic leaders of the past materialize in his many references. Alas, like a hapless sot who awakens after a night of foolhardy revelry head and body wracked with the pain of afflictions, we soon discover we didn't get what we wanted. We got what we had. And if perchance we raise our voice and shout, “hey that's not what we had been promised,” we are told that 1) we don't understand and 2) we are unrealistic and even more not relevant. Thus, we are cast aside like putrid offal, while our knight in shinning armor rides under the banners of moderation and mainstream.
Why all this recrimination? Having just viewed “An Inside Job,” it is clear that the new boss is just like the old boss (I used the tidbit from a Who song before but it is seems to be what it is). While the masterminds of the fiscal meltdown continue with their avaricious ways free of any fear of suffering any consequence to their illegal and immoral actions, the people of this country scrape and crawl out of the fiscal hole that was allowed with deregulation by those whose reckless behavior was designed to make them obscenely rich. While these so called too big to fail financial snake oil salesmen continue to receive obscene compensation packages and tax breaks, we can only sit and watch and be satisfied with the meager crumbs that fall from the mouths of distended moguls whose mere breath sway the course our ship of state. Which brings me to the thugs who roll out of Wall Street into government only to roll back, like a snow ball being rolled in wet snow, though their growth is money. Is it no wonder the dollar is in the tank, when a double talking, double dealing CEO from Merrill Lynch can accumulate hundreds of millions of them while the average Joe has to give away the treasury to get unemployment insurance? And now of course, the ship of state is on a course to get the president re-elected and we liberals will need to be satisfied with the hope we can hold on to our castle no matter how humble it maybe, while the top one per cent ponder beach front property in Boca Ratan or a desert oasis in Palm Springs – hell why not both. We are sure to hear in the state of the union a few phrases that will tug at our heart strings but the vast majority of the president's speech is all a smoke screen for the top one percent huddled in some exclusive back room laying out the strategy that will allow them to continue to plunder this nation wealth.
Friday, December 24, 2010
Blessing I Don't Think So
Counting our Blessings
Prior to conjuring up things we should do but never do (New Year Resolutions), I guess it is appropriate that we count our blessings. I have in this blog bemoaned the actions of our once great president castigating him for being everything from an inexperienced boob to an inveterate campaigner. And I was quick to point out the glaring “cave-ins.” Well I guess some would say a serving of crow is in order. But not so fast. I am not ready to relent and call the recent gains great strides forward.
First, the biggest winner in the past two years were the fat cats. I am not talking about people holding a job. I am talking about those who sit on the top of this economy and continue to grow richer and richer while the average Joe struggles to make it or even hold on to his job. When you hear the president bore you with his successes, please recite the mantra “at what cost.” That tax cut was indicative of how things go in this country. They get a huge chunk of the pie and we get the crumbs. I often wonder just how much the rich need and then I thought of old Scrooge McDuck and then I get an inkling that there is never enough. So the country goes into hock with China while the super rich scour the yachting magazine for a newer model, and the average Joe gets unemployment. What a country!!
So Obama will say we got a health care program, but not with a public option. The funny thing about that result is that a public option would have canceled out any potential law suit. You have to wonder if the insurance industry purposely got that provision kicked out so they could mount a legal challenge through their emissaries. But that would mean they were devious, not those honorable folks. And we don't need a soothsayer to divine what our illustrious Supreme Court Justices will rule, do we?
The first responders got their bill, watered down, but you have to wonder if those pompous conservatives talking about the deficit were shamed into voting. Gays got their right to join the military. Big deal! It was so long in coming that it was absolutely absurd to count it as anything but something that was long over due. But not too fast, the military has to study it.
And before we get all pumped up with successes, let us remember that the wars continue. Young men die and get wounded while those we are supposedly saving plot ways to steal our money and cooperate with those who are our mortal enemies.
A recent cover of AARP had George W on the cover. He has no regrets, well maybe a few. It is amazing that in this crazy world we live in, a man can screw up royally and go on to be portrayed as a regular guy. While he smiles, the misery his policies generated continues. So on this Christmas, I will skip counting the blessings and focus on the glaring things that need attention. It seems to me we are witnessing the decline of this nation. And we the great mass of humanity who long for a better way are left with a system that continues to focus on those who don't need it at the expense of those who do. If this tax cut is such a great stimulus, how come it hasn't worked?
So my New Year's resolution is to stop being such a boob and take things at face value. I have already started. No more TV news, no more presidential press conferences, no more Obama and White House e-mails. No more BS.
Prior to conjuring up things we should do but never do (New Year Resolutions), I guess it is appropriate that we count our blessings. I have in this blog bemoaned the actions of our once great president castigating him for being everything from an inexperienced boob to an inveterate campaigner. And I was quick to point out the glaring “cave-ins.” Well I guess some would say a serving of crow is in order. But not so fast. I am not ready to relent and call the recent gains great strides forward.
First, the biggest winner in the past two years were the fat cats. I am not talking about people holding a job. I am talking about those who sit on the top of this economy and continue to grow richer and richer while the average Joe struggles to make it or even hold on to his job. When you hear the president bore you with his successes, please recite the mantra “at what cost.” That tax cut was indicative of how things go in this country. They get a huge chunk of the pie and we get the crumbs. I often wonder just how much the rich need and then I thought of old Scrooge McDuck and then I get an inkling that there is never enough. So the country goes into hock with China while the super rich scour the yachting magazine for a newer model, and the average Joe gets unemployment. What a country!!
So Obama will say we got a health care program, but not with a public option. The funny thing about that result is that a public option would have canceled out any potential law suit. You have to wonder if the insurance industry purposely got that provision kicked out so they could mount a legal challenge through their emissaries. But that would mean they were devious, not those honorable folks. And we don't need a soothsayer to divine what our illustrious Supreme Court Justices will rule, do we?
The first responders got their bill, watered down, but you have to wonder if those pompous conservatives talking about the deficit were shamed into voting. Gays got their right to join the military. Big deal! It was so long in coming that it was absolutely absurd to count it as anything but something that was long over due. But not too fast, the military has to study it.
And before we get all pumped up with successes, let us remember that the wars continue. Young men die and get wounded while those we are supposedly saving plot ways to steal our money and cooperate with those who are our mortal enemies.
A recent cover of AARP had George W on the cover. He has no regrets, well maybe a few. It is amazing that in this crazy world we live in, a man can screw up royally and go on to be portrayed as a regular guy. While he smiles, the misery his policies generated continues. So on this Christmas, I will skip counting the blessings and focus on the glaring things that need attention. It seems to me we are witnessing the decline of this nation. And we the great mass of humanity who long for a better way are left with a system that continues to focus on those who don't need it at the expense of those who do. If this tax cut is such a great stimulus, how come it hasn't worked?
So my New Year's resolution is to stop being such a boob and take things at face value. I have already started. No more TV news, no more presidential press conferences, no more Obama and White House e-mails. No more BS.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Obama and Liberals
Love is so Fleeting
To hear the president's latest condemnation of the liberal wing of the party, you would think that we were nothing but ungrateful slobs who haven't the slightest idea of how hard he has worked for the things he said he was going to do. Hmmm. Do we really need to get pedantic and delineate all that he didn't do? I don't think so. It might be easier to say, he gave us absolutely nothing, nothing at all save speeches and explanations of how what he did do was the best he could do. Hmmm, sounds like a good ad.
Well, if he is so disenchanted with us liberal types, why don't he return all our contributions to his campaign no matter the amount. I promise to spend mine immediately on some useless imported junk, which should spike the gross national product, and help this dismal economy by employing another person in a substandard retail job.
The problem he is having with us liberals is that we looked behind the curtain. Suddenly the sonorous voice once so powerful and promising is little more than the utterances of a pup of a politician who pompously goes about listening to those who thought his candidacy was a joke. From the generals to the economic advisers, he followed the path blazed by W and his henchmen. For two years, the country listened and the only thing we got was what we heard. He talks of what can be done, but he didn't do anything. After two years, we still had the wars (bigger than ever), the unemployment rate higher and higher, inflation more and more, a health care law that few understand, in short, all we got was words. Then the election, which showed just what the people thought of his administration. Now, it wasn't the liberals who lost the election, hell we didn't get anything. So it must have been him and what he did or what he didn't do. Oh, it is so hard to confront one's failures.
So, I guess liberals need to re-group and find a new leader for our causes. The president is on a trajectory that will lead him to one term. It wasn't the middle that embraced him and propelled him beyond the “also-rans” in the primaries, heck they were with Clinton. If he thinks that the middle and those who follow Fox News are going to embrace this pitiful attempt at appeasement, he is delusional. The arrogance displayed in his penchant remarks about the politics of the country is but another example of hubris. The man who told us we were the ones who made a difference is now telling us we are irrelevant. Fox news and the middle, which is as amorphous and undefinable as “normal,” will jettison him and his ideas in their attempt to go back to a time that never existed.
By the by, Ronald Reagan was never anything but a B actor. It is likely that his term office will someday be judged for what it was, a period of years presided over by a man suffering from senility and Alzheimer. Obama, like Carter, will fall to the forces of his own character. He should realized that the election of 2010 was not about what the democrats did, but what he didn't do. He let the other side, which wasn't the loyal opposition, remember the “you lie” comment and the drone of a justice shaking his head, frame the arguments, and we Americans like a good explanation, even it is completely false. We must remember Mencken's observations, No one ever went broke underestimating the stupidity of the American Public. Obama has gone over to the dark side, and no amount of his rhetoric or admonishments can make the body politic anything than what it is – a reactionary world of “know nothings” who will get what they really want, his defeat in 2012. He should have stuck to his guns and gone after what he said he was going to rather than following whatever he was following. We thought we had in him a leader, one who would alter the course of history. All we go was another politician who was trying to keep his job by reading tea leaves. Perhaps he wanted us liberals to keep drinking his brand of kool-aid, but something is happening here Mr Jones, and you don't know what it is.
To hear the president's latest condemnation of the liberal wing of the party, you would think that we were nothing but ungrateful slobs who haven't the slightest idea of how hard he has worked for the things he said he was going to do. Hmmm. Do we really need to get pedantic and delineate all that he didn't do? I don't think so. It might be easier to say, he gave us absolutely nothing, nothing at all save speeches and explanations of how what he did do was the best he could do. Hmmm, sounds like a good ad.
Well, if he is so disenchanted with us liberal types, why don't he return all our contributions to his campaign no matter the amount. I promise to spend mine immediately on some useless imported junk, which should spike the gross national product, and help this dismal economy by employing another person in a substandard retail job.
The problem he is having with us liberals is that we looked behind the curtain. Suddenly the sonorous voice once so powerful and promising is little more than the utterances of a pup of a politician who pompously goes about listening to those who thought his candidacy was a joke. From the generals to the economic advisers, he followed the path blazed by W and his henchmen. For two years, the country listened and the only thing we got was what we heard. He talks of what can be done, but he didn't do anything. After two years, we still had the wars (bigger than ever), the unemployment rate higher and higher, inflation more and more, a health care law that few understand, in short, all we got was words. Then the election, which showed just what the people thought of his administration. Now, it wasn't the liberals who lost the election, hell we didn't get anything. So it must have been him and what he did or what he didn't do. Oh, it is so hard to confront one's failures.
So, I guess liberals need to re-group and find a new leader for our causes. The president is on a trajectory that will lead him to one term. It wasn't the middle that embraced him and propelled him beyond the “also-rans” in the primaries, heck they were with Clinton. If he thinks that the middle and those who follow Fox News are going to embrace this pitiful attempt at appeasement, he is delusional. The arrogance displayed in his penchant remarks about the politics of the country is but another example of hubris. The man who told us we were the ones who made a difference is now telling us we are irrelevant. Fox news and the middle, which is as amorphous and undefinable as “normal,” will jettison him and his ideas in their attempt to go back to a time that never existed.
By the by, Ronald Reagan was never anything but a B actor. It is likely that his term office will someday be judged for what it was, a period of years presided over by a man suffering from senility and Alzheimer. Obama, like Carter, will fall to the forces of his own character. He should realized that the election of 2010 was not about what the democrats did, but what he didn't do. He let the other side, which wasn't the loyal opposition, remember the “you lie” comment and the drone of a justice shaking his head, frame the arguments, and we Americans like a good explanation, even it is completely false. We must remember Mencken's observations, No one ever went broke underestimating the stupidity of the American Public. Obama has gone over to the dark side, and no amount of his rhetoric or admonishments can make the body politic anything than what it is – a reactionary world of “know nothings” who will get what they really want, his defeat in 2012. He should have stuck to his guns and gone after what he said he was going to rather than following whatever he was following. We thought we had in him a leader, one who would alter the course of history. All we go was another politician who was trying to keep his job by reading tea leaves. Perhaps he wanted us liberals to keep drinking his brand of kool-aid, but something is happening here Mr Jones, and you don't know what it is.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Time For Real History
Well, two years since that fateful election, when liberals of every stripe heralded the golden age of democracy. A man of mix races rose above the hatred and bigotry of a nation and proclaimed a new era of American politics. The faces in the crowd as he gave his first speech as President elect were painted with awe and wonder. Even an icon, such as Oprah, stood there among the masses (probably the first time in a long time) with tears in her eyes. Black and white, old and young, we were united. But as Obama's words echoed and then faded, the right with their vicious accusations, half truths, and outright lies began their spin operation. The Republicans in congress were chastised for going along with the idiotic and criminal Bush Administration. Yet they held steadfast in their belief that in the end spin not action would rule the day. They were right.
Obama with the delusion only a naïve foolish young man could harbor believed that compromise and reason would bring about the changes he so fervently championed in the campaign. Oh, Brother, he was as wrong as wrong could be.
Obama, we were told was a student of history especially Lincoln. A Team Of Rivals, a historical account of the man, was mentioned so often it was as if Obama was channeling Lincoln. But reality has a pernicious way of dashing hope and replacing it with despair. The failures of Obama's first two years is a study in the fruitless attempt to make politicians anything other than what they are– a collection of self aggrandizing, thieving, self centered ideologues whose only intent is to feather their own nests, collectively and individually. To even think, that reason, logic, and compromise can produce meaningful laws is ludicrous. Yet with all the persistence of a deranged man walking streets of a crowded New York City Street carrying a sign board, the great mixed hope continued his pursuit of the impossible. Ah! A modern day Don Quixote, suitable for a play or a novel but hell to witness when one's fate is in the hands of a mad man, as honorable as his intentions maybe.
So here we are in Chapter 2, the list of failure range from the sad dismissal of equal rights for gays to die honorably to an economy that is well in the tank. While we still squander billions and billions on fruitless wars helping both allies (which they are only in name) to avowed enemies. So, our president went to visit the troops, well, he should have had the troops visit him in the White House. And he should have singled on gays who had served honorably and awarded them a commendable service award and make it known as commander-in-chief, he honored those who served honorably. Maybe, even to trump John McCain, single out a few who had given their life. He should order the generals to obey his order that all service men and women have rights guaranteed under the constitution or discharge them. And if the McCain and the rest of those gay bashing hypocrites want to fight – he should set a time and date near the Lincoln Memorial and see if they really want to fight. Then and only then would he be reaching back into the storied pages of the history of this country. That should be the first fight, the first time the new “no compromise” president starts acting like a leader. Fight after fight should follow, maybe even a duel to get the historical context true to form.
This nation was never a bastion of logic and reason. It has always operated from the gut. There are no niceties in American politics. There is the only knock down drag them out way of doing things.
The future looks bleak. The Republicans had stated nothing will be done till the tax bill includes the upper 2 per cent. I suggest Obama call their bluff. Let the congress appear as foolish as they really are. Trying to appease this sorry coterie of reactionary fools is like trying to make sense out of Sara Palin's pronouncements. It is time, well it is well past time, to draw the line in the sand. It is time to stop this “rock star” approach to politics and get in the ditch and fight like there is no tomorrow. Because if things progress as these “no-nothings” want, there will be no tomorrow only sad yesterdays that were so destructive.
Obama with the delusion only a naïve foolish young man could harbor believed that compromise and reason would bring about the changes he so fervently championed in the campaign. Oh, Brother, he was as wrong as wrong could be.
Obama, we were told was a student of history especially Lincoln. A Team Of Rivals, a historical account of the man, was mentioned so often it was as if Obama was channeling Lincoln. But reality has a pernicious way of dashing hope and replacing it with despair. The failures of Obama's first two years is a study in the fruitless attempt to make politicians anything other than what they are– a collection of self aggrandizing, thieving, self centered ideologues whose only intent is to feather their own nests, collectively and individually. To even think, that reason, logic, and compromise can produce meaningful laws is ludicrous. Yet with all the persistence of a deranged man walking streets of a crowded New York City Street carrying a sign board, the great mixed hope continued his pursuit of the impossible. Ah! A modern day Don Quixote, suitable for a play or a novel but hell to witness when one's fate is in the hands of a mad man, as honorable as his intentions maybe.
So here we are in Chapter 2, the list of failure range from the sad dismissal of equal rights for gays to die honorably to an economy that is well in the tank. While we still squander billions and billions on fruitless wars helping both allies (which they are only in name) to avowed enemies. So, our president went to visit the troops, well, he should have had the troops visit him in the White House. And he should have singled on gays who had served honorably and awarded them a commendable service award and make it known as commander-in-chief, he honored those who served honorably. Maybe, even to trump John McCain, single out a few who had given their life. He should order the generals to obey his order that all service men and women have rights guaranteed under the constitution or discharge them. And if the McCain and the rest of those gay bashing hypocrites want to fight – he should set a time and date near the Lincoln Memorial and see if they really want to fight. Then and only then would he be reaching back into the storied pages of the history of this country. That should be the first fight, the first time the new “no compromise” president starts acting like a leader. Fight after fight should follow, maybe even a duel to get the historical context true to form.
This nation was never a bastion of logic and reason. It has always operated from the gut. There are no niceties in American politics. There is the only knock down drag them out way of doing things.
The future looks bleak. The Republicans had stated nothing will be done till the tax bill includes the upper 2 per cent. I suggest Obama call their bluff. Let the congress appear as foolish as they really are. Trying to appease this sorry coterie of reactionary fools is like trying to make sense out of Sara Palin's pronouncements. It is time, well it is well past time, to draw the line in the sand. It is time to stop this “rock star” approach to politics and get in the ditch and fight like there is no tomorrow. Because if things progress as these “no-nothings” want, there will be no tomorrow only sad yesterdays that were so destructive.
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