A Red Tide Swamps the US Political Landscape

The polls had it right.  Last night, Republicans swept to control in the Senate, picked up governor seats in blue states, and increased their control of the House of Representatives.  The Democrats' get-out-the-vote effort failed to overcome the dark money, the voter suppression laws, and their own inadequate and defensive explanations of their policies.  Republicans controlled the political debate much as they have since Obama took office: "Everything bad is Obama's fault.  Everything good he had nothing to do with."  For their part, Democrats, from Obama on down, failed to energize their base. The nation will need to live with the result: the most extreme right-wing Congress we have ever had.

Jeff Schweitzer, blogging at the Huffington Post, has one of the best analyses of the election that I've seen.  In his post, "The Price of Failure and Rise of Extremism: How Democrats Blew It", he writes: "the depth, intensity, and institutionalized hypocrisy of the political right has taken our country on a new course; conservatives are writing a new chapter...on cynicism, deceit and delusion. As we contemplate our world dominated by Republicans controlling the House and Senate, we must therefore consider life in the face of deep hypocrisy. Mitch McConnell, with a straight face and no apparent appreciation for irony, said that voters should install a Republican majority in the Senate because his party would 'be able to bring the current legislative gridlock to a merciful end.'...This story highlights the major failure of the left. Democrats have not defined the agenda or narrated the story. This capitulation creates a void of reason such that absurdities like McConnell's claim can take hold without everybody doubling over in laughter. Like frightened children Democrats run from Obama's record, as defined by the right, rather than championing his amazing successes as defined by fact."

One thing is certain.  Before the members of the 114th Congress take their seats in January, Senate Democrats need to push through as many of the 156 pending Federal judicial and executive branch nominations as they can.  Failure to do so will ensure Republican control of the judiciary and make Obama's last two years even more difficult and unproductive than the past four have been.  Hey Mitch, this may be a good place to start showing how intent you are to end gridlock.

What do we have to look forward to from this extremist Congress and a ham-strung moderate President in the next two years?

Some things are clear.

There will be cuts to domestic programs, increases in military spending, tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, and, if Obama and Congressional Democrats don't go along with their radical agenda, a government shutdown or two.   Any progress on the environmental front will need to come from executive action. The War Powers Act as applied to the Middle East will not be changed and there will be no debate on the current bombing campaign.  Obama will not be able to get any progressive or even moderate appointments to the Federal judiciary through Congress.  One "good news" item: Social Security will not be privatized anytime soon.

Some things are not as clear.

Will Obama have the votes to resist neo-con-inspired congressional actions, such as increasing sanctions on Iran and funding for sectarian wars? Will he have the courage to pursue justice for the Palestinians and the courage to achieve a just Palestinian-Israeli peace?   Will he be able to close Guantanamo, that continuing insult to America's self-proclaimed adherence to the rule of law?

What changes will be made to the Affordable Care Act? Democrats should retain at least 45 Senate seats and Obama still has the veto.  So total repeal will be impossible.  However, Congressional Republicans can certainly reduce the number of people covered by the ACA - by removing the employer requirements and redefining full-time employees, by removing the penalty for non-coverage, and by reducing or ending subsidies for those earning too much to qualify under the Medicaid expansion.

Will Obama take executive action to progress immigration reform?  Will the Republicans threaten impeachment if he does so?  Will any action at all be proposed by Congress other than increased militarization of the US-Mexico border?  Republicans did not need the Latino vote to win these midterms and Obama's deportation policies were not something that would energize Latino voters.

How extensive will changes to Medicare be?  Along with Social Security and the Affordable Care Act, it remains one of the prime examples of what a Democratic Congress and President can accomplish.  That makes it a target for the extremists who now control the Republican Party - no matter how successful and well-liked it is.

Perhaps the best comment I heard during my GOTV calls in the weeks before the election was from a Kentucky voter.  He could not understand how anyone but "the 1%" could ever vote Republican, how people could continually vote against their own economic interests.  He mentioned that Kentuckians were hearing almost nothing about McConnell's opponent, Alison Lundergan Grimes, and a lot about Obama.  That strategy played very well in the South.  Later in my calls that evening, I spoke to another Kentuckian - an older woman, who was going to vote for McConnell because she was "tired of the handouts."  I thought of asking her which handouts in particular she opposed but realizing how thoroughly Republican myths have taken hold, I refrained.

This is the richest nation the world has ever seen.  We have one of the lowest tax rates, one of the highest levels of income inequality, and one of the least generous social safety net programs in the developed world.  To say we cannot afford to meet the basic needs of the most vulnerable in our society or to provide medical care for all is a lie.  But it is a lie that has become deeply ingrained in the political dialogue of the nation over the past three decades - a lie that has no place for "the common good" and promises more and more to those that have the most.

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War or Peace in Syria?

Just when you thought US military intervention in Syria was getting less likely and perhaps diplomacy would win out in the end, there's this from the Washington Post:
The CIA has begun delivering weapons to rebels in Syria, ending months of delay in lethal aid that had been promised by the Obama administration, according to U.S. officials and Syrian figures. The shipments began streaming into the country over the past two weeks, along with separate deliveries by the State Department of vehicles and other gear — a flow of material that marks a major escalation of the U.S. role in Syria’s civil war.

Then, today, on one of the morning news shows was a discussion of how we could be assured that the chemical weapons would be secured and destroyed.  The lead-in was so insane (paraphrased, I think,  a member of the "intelligence" community - "it's a scam") that I didn't bother to listen to it.  So let's hope that the Obama administration is not going to continually move the goal posts on this issue, declare non-compliance, and then violate international law by bombing Syria.  We don't need another $4 trillion war in the Middle East.  You would think that the neocons have been totally discredited by now but somehow they are still yapping and still have their supporters in Congress.  

Unbelievable as it may seem, Russian president Putin seems to have gotten it right in an Op-Ed in the New York Times.  In it, the Russian president says a military strike at Syria "would increase violence and unleash a new wave of terrorism," and "could undermine multilateral efforts to resolve the Iranian nuclear problem and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and further destabilize the Middle East and North Africa." [USA Today, Sept.12] 

Putin's complete op-ed, in which he also cautions against American exceptionalism, can be found at this link to The New York Times article.

A destabilized Syria will provide Al-Qaeda and other jihadist groups with a new base from which to operate.  Bombing Syria in violation of international law will result in still more civilian casualties as well as destabilize the country.  The only real answer is that both the Western powers supporting the rebels and Russia and Iran supporting the Assad government in this civil war must stop the flow of arms to both sides, force them both to the peace table, enact an immediate and indefinite cease fire, and provide massive amounts of humanitarian, not military, aid to the suffering people of Syria.  Any other approach will be counterproductive, ineffective, and, ultimately, tragic.

Sunday Round-Up - June 16, 2013

This is the weekly selection of news and opinion from sources outside the US mainstream media.  Today we look at the government's prosecution of Bradley Manning, Obama's meeting with Chinese President Xi, and the progress towards reaching the UN's Millennium Development Goals.  Sources are TomDispatch (recent winner of Utne Reader's 2013 media award for best political coverage), Xinhuanet, and Le Monde Diplomatique.

The Prosecution of Bradley Manning

In a June 11 post on TomDispatch , human-rights lawyer Chase Madar takes on the "dystopian secrecy" of the post 9/11 era in the government's prosecution of Bradley Manning.  Manning, the Wikileaks source within the US Army, potentially faces decades of jail time if convicted. Speaking of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, Madar writes: "Both wars of occupation were ghastly strategic choices that have killed hundreds of thousands, wounded many more, sent millions into exile, and destabilized what Washington, in good times, used to call 'the arc of instability.' Why have our strategic choices been so disastrous? In large part because they have been militantly clueless. Starved of important information, both the media and public opinion were putty in the hands [of] the Bush administration and its neocon followers as they dreamt up and then put into action their geopolitical fantasies." Transparency in foreign relations is a good thing, argues Madar, and "what gets people killed, no matter how much our pols and pundits strain to deny it, aren’t InfoSec breaches or media leaks, but foolish and clueless strategic choices."  Madar contrasts the military's flexibility on rape and sexual assault and on the killing of foreign civilians with the strictness that they use in dealing with declassifying so-called classified information. He concludes that "the young private’s act of civil defiance was in fact a first step in reversing the pathologies that have made our foreign policy a string of self-inflicted homicidal disasters."

US - China Cooperation

On June 13, Xinhuanet reported on comments from a senior Chinese lawmaker on the recently concluded meeting between President Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping.   Referring to the historic summit as an important moment for China and the United States, Fu Ying, chairperson of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the 12th National People's Congress, spoke to the Washington-based think tank Brookings Institute. "One of the most important messages coming out of this summit is their commitment to working together to build a new model of relationship for the two countries to head for partnership, not for conflict as some had feared," she said. "We hope it will lead to many years of working together with excellent results coming on the way." The Xinhuanet article concludes: "During the summit at Annenberg estate, both Xi and Obama reaffirmed their commitment to seeking to build a new type of great-power relationship that features win-win cooperation based on mutual respect and benefit, so as to avoid the repetition of the zero-sum game usually seen in history between a resident power and an emerging one."

 

Millennium Development Goals

In a supplement to its June issue, Le Monde Diplomatique reported on the mixed results towards reaching the Millennium Development Goals adopted by the UN General Assembly in 2000. The eight goals to be achieved by 2015 are "to (i) eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, (ii) achieve universal primary education, (iii) promote gender equality and empower women, (iv) reduce child mortality, (v) improve maternal health, (vi) combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, (vii) ensure environmental sustainability and (viii) develop a global partnership for development." The intent is to reach specific targets by following an action plan and measuring progress. Progress towards the goals is measured relative to 1990. The article by Philippe Rekacewicz notes that "India and China have made considerable headway [towards reaching the goals], while sub-Saharan Africa has stagnated or regressed."

Rekacewicz then reviews the three health goals in some detail. Goal 4 is "to reduce child mortality by two thirds. According to figures published by the UN Development Programme (UNDP), it fell by a third between 1990 and 2010, which is not fast enough....Only around 10 out of the 70 countries concerned are likely to achieve the two-thirds reduction by 2015. " Goal 5 (maternal health - reducing maternal mortality by 75%) has shown very slow progress: "In 2010 some 287,000 women died in childbirth (85% of them in sub-Saharan Africa and southern Asia), compared with 550,000 in 1990." Goal 6 ("combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases") has three separate targets:

• Check the spread of HIV/AIDS. The rate of increase has slowed but as of 2010 the number of people living with the virus was still rising.
• Provide access to antiretroviral treatments to all who need them by 2010. In 2010 6.5 million people received treatment compared to a worldwide total of over 30 million. But, Rekacewicz notes, "On the positive side, since 2005 the wider availability of treatment has significantly reduced mortality."
• Combat the great endemic diseases, such as malaria and tuberculosis. Progress is being made on malaria - "World Health Organisation (WHO) figures show that the number of declared cases of malaria fell by 50% between 2000 and 2010 in 40 of the 100 countries where the disease is found." But the long-range outlook for malaria is somewhat pessimistic due to a lack of sufficient funding and "the emergence of drug-resistant strains in a growing number of Southeast Asian and sub-Saharan African countries". On a more confident note, the spread of tuberculosis "could be halted by 2015, in line with the development goal."

With less than three years to go before the 2015 deadline, many of the targets will not be achieved. The UN is trying to launch "accelerated action programmes" but, the article concludes, "if the institutions and states which pledged special contributions do not keep their promises, these efforts will come to nothing."

Sunday Round-Up - May 26, 2013

This is the weekly selection of news and opinion from sources outside the US mainstream media. Today we look at Secretary Kerry's Israeli-Palestinian peace effort, the German press's dawning understanding that austerity "may not be working" in Europe, Pope Francis' comments on the world's poor, the NRA convention, Obama's counter-terrorism speech, and preparations for the Syrian peace talks. Sources: Haaretz, Der Spiegel, Pravda, Opera Mundi, Mother Jones, and Al Jazeera.

Kerry and the Israeli-Palestinian Peace Talks

Haaretz reported Friday that US Secretary of State John Kerry, in the Middle East for the fourth time in two months had "considered holding another round of talks with two sides on Monday, but said now is not the right time....'Netanyahu and Abbas have to take a week or two to make some difficult
decisions that would allow peace talks to resume', Kerry said before his departure. He urged both sides to exhibit leadership in order for that to happen." Kerry made clear (again) the US position on the Israeli settlements on Palestinian land: "construction must end." A senior Israeli official was quoted as saying "we are prepared to launch direct negotiations with the Palestinians immediately."

 

 

 

 

[Map is from Wikimedia Commons.]

 

 

German Media on the Euro-recession

The German magazine Der Spiegel reported on the increasing number of German newspapers acknowledging that the austerity policies put in place by the European central banks and supported by Merkel's government "may not be working." Charles Hawley writing in the May 16 post of Spiegel Online points to France's "new membership in the recession club as just the latest indication that the current strategy may not be working." The German business daily Handelsblatt comments on the austerity measures: "That one slides into a recession at the beginning is part of the plan. But the fact that it is lasting so horrifically long leads one to suspect that Europe's path is making the Continent sicker rather than healthier." While the center-right Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung focusses on France's situation and asks "where are the ideas or the visions for how the EU can exist in our highly competitive world?", the left-leaning Die Tageszeitung notes that "alternative models for how to stimulate Europe's economy and fairly tax wealth exist only on paper and must be finalized."

 

The Pope, the Chancellor and European Youth

[Link to the Washington Post article on the rally at St. Peter's]

Pope Francis met with Angela Merkel, Germany's leader, recently selected again by Forbes magazine as the world's most powerful woman and "a leader largely identified by Europe’s economically suffering citizens as a champion of debt reduction, including painful austerity across much of the continent." The timing was exquisite. They met right after a 200,000 strong rally in St. Peter's square at which Pope Francis said “If investments, the banks plunge, this is a tragedy, if families are hurting, if they have nothing to eat, well, this is nothing, this is our crisis today.” Francis said his church “opposes this mentality” and pledged that it will be dedicated to “the poor people.” After the meeting, Merkel "joined the pope in expressing concern about the many victims of Europe’s economic crisis."  In a May 20 article Der Spiegel noted the particular hardships of the young people in Europe during the recession. With unemployment above 23%, the youth of Europe are in danger of becoming "a lost generation."  Unemployment is even worse in Spain (upper 50's%) and Greece (over 60%). Although almost nothing has been done either in the South or the North, the continually escalating unemployment numbers appear to have had an impact at last: "Suddenly Europe is scrambling to address the problem. Youth unemployment will top the agenda of a summit of European leaders in June. And Italy's new prime minister, Enrico Letta, is demanding that the fight against youth unemployment become an 'obsession' for the EU."

Guns, Kids, and the NRA

The United States' idolization of guns is covered in a May 15 Pravda article on the NRA's 142nd annual convention in Houston, Texas. Noting the attempt to appeal to young people, the article relates several cameos from the gun show at the convention, including this one: "Nearby, Sandy holds a small rifle. Pointing to the ceiling, concentrating. Closing one eye. Breathe. Shoot. Reload. The trebuchet is pink, small, looks like a toy. It has a plastic butt, but the metal pipe is black. Sandy smiles. At age four, she and her father, Eric, are choosing their first rifle. In a few months a birthday and, consequently, they will be able to bring the "gift" home....A rifle exactly like the one Sandy has caused a tragedy on April 30, in Cumberland County, State of Kentucky. A five year old boy shot his twin sister by accident, killing her. The gun had been given as a gift a year earlier." Frightening, huh? The article (translated from the Portuguese language "Opera Mundi" where it originally appeared) concludes: "The end of the first day of the convention in Houston is reached, participants are ready to sleep armed to the teeth. Like the rest of the U.S."

Obama's Counter-Terrorism Speech

David Corn in a May 23 post in MotherJones sees a glimmer of hope for civil liberties in President Obama's speech on counter-terrorism policies. Obama made the speech a day after the Administration admitted to the killing of four US citizens by drones. I'm not sure I see as much of a glimmer of hope as Corn does but at least it's better than what probably would have happened under a Republican administration. The President placed new restrictions on the use of drones and talked again about the necessity of closing Guantanamo. Corn admits that "Obama is not renouncing his administration's claim that it possesses the authority to kill an American overseas without full due process" and "not declaring an end to the dicey practice of indefinite detention or a conclusion to the fight against terrorism". But he concludes: "Obama, at the least, is showing that he does ponder these difficult issues in a deliberative manner and is still attempting to steer the nation into a post-9/11 period.." Two of the more positive highlights from the speech:

• The call for an end to "the post-9/11 authority to wage war Congress granted the president: 'I intend to engage Congress about the existing Authorization to Use Military Force, or AUMF, to determine how we can continue to fight terrorists without keeping America on a perpetual war-time footing."
• The unreasonableness of the Congressional restrictions on closing the Guantanamo prison: "These restrictions make no sense. After all, under President Bush, some 530 detainees were transferred from Gitmo with Congress’s support. When I ran for President the first time, John McCain supported closing Gitmo. No person has ever escaped from one of our super-max or military prisons in the United States. Our courts have convicted hundreds of people for terrorism-related offenses, including some who are more dangerous than most Gitmo detainees." Obama is appointing " a new, senior envoy at the State Department and Defense Department whose sole responsibility will be to achieve the transfer of detainees to third countries" and he is lifting the restrictions on detainee transfers to Yemen (86 of the 166 still imprisoned are from Yemen).

Syrian Peace Talks

More than 80,000 people have been killed in the Syrian conflict since the March 2011 uprising. 1.5 million have fled the country. On May 21, Al Jazeera reported that "Syria's opposition and government are preparing to take part in an internationally-sponsored peace conference, according to Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations-Arab League mediator....Meanwhile, Moaz al-Khtaib, the former president of the Syrian National Coalition, said the opposition is open to negotiating with the government of President Assad. At a meeting of Syrian opposition groups in Spain on Tuesday, Khtaib said the opposition forces have no objection to a political solution to the conflict."   Several days later (May 24), the NYT reported that a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman had stated that the "Syrian government has agreed to participate in an international peace conference coordinated by Russia and the United States."

 

A Good Start On Gun Violence

President Obama unveiled the recommendations from the Joe Biden-led commission formed to reduce gun violence in the wake of the massacre in Newton, Connecticut.  In what has been called "the biggest gun control push in decades", the President urged Congress to reinstate the assault weapons ban, tighten up and close loopholes in background checks, and pass a new Federal gun-trafficking law.  In addition, he announced "23 steps he intends to take immediately without congressional approval. These include improving the existing system for background checks, lifting the ban on federal research on gun violence, putting more counselors...in schools and better access to mental health services." [Reuters]  I didn't even know there was a ban on federal research on gun violence.  It is a really sad statement on the power of the gun lobby and arms dealers in our political process.

The proposals are a good start but will need to be pushed against the fierce opposition of the NRA and their supporters in Congress.  As a sign of things to come, the NRA, in one of its most despicable ads in years, attacked Obama for proposing gun control legislation while his daughters were being protected by the Secret Service.  The legislative proposals will also soon be competing for legislative attention with the debt ceiling negotiations and the automatic budget cut discussions ("the sequester"). 

The rabid reaction of the pro-gun wing of the American public to these modest proposals gives one cause to fervently hope that the laws are enacted with all due haste.  Anyone who can react so bizarrely should probably not have access to assault rifles and armor-penetratrating ammunition.  In fact there is no reason on earth why any Joe Average Citizen should own high capacity weapons.  But such is the level of fear stoked by the gun lobby and the fear-and-hate-mongering crowd that those I would consider normally sane people argue that there should not be an assault weapons ban in the United States.  The fact that we are having a debate on this at all is shameful.  No other developed country would even consider allowing such armaments in the hands of ordinary (and sometimes deranged) citizens.  Then again no other developed nation has a death penalty.  But that's for another time.

Will Congress pass the required legislation including the much-needed assault weapons ban? (I'm talking to you, House of Representatives majority, filibuster-abusing Senate Republicans, and gutless pro-gun Democrats.)   Or will we let the deaths of innocents again be in vain?  We'll need to keep the pressure up over the next weeks and months if there is to be any chance at all for comprehensive reform.

I wish I could agree with former Republican Congessman/now MSNBC political commentator Joe Scarborough that either Republicans get in touch with reality on this issue or they will lose control of the House.  On Andrea Mitchell Reports today, Scarborough "laid out what he saw as the GOP's two choices in the House of Representatives. 'They can either pass a comprehensive gun control package right now and shape it under Speaker Boehner, or they can wait two years when they lose the majority and have Nancy Pelosi write that bill...there are no other choices.' " [Huffington Post]  Unfortunately, with the post-2010 gerrymandered Congressional districts providing a majority of safe districts for Republicans, Scarborough's projection appears to be unrealistic. 

So convinced are they of the "safety" of  their Congressional districts, some Republican strategists are proposing changes to the way Electoral College votes are counted.  Several Republican-controlled swing states that voted for Obama in 2012 are considering proposals that would award an electoral vote to the winner of  the Congressional district. The primary objective is to allow a Republican to win the Presidency in 2016.  Perhaps because they think they waited too long with their voter suppression laws (the "strategy" for 2012), they are getting an early start for 2016.   [Mother Jones]

Kudos to the State of New York for passing the toughest gun control legislation in the country this week.  But state laws can only do so much - it's a short hop down I-95 to areas where guns can be purchased more easily. 

As for the Second Amendment, if the Supreme Court cannot figure out how to parse subordinate clauses (as in "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State"), maybe it's time to repeal this albatross from the eighteenth century.  Let's just hope the right wing bozos on the Court don't overturn New York's tough new gun law before then. 

Hate and Other Groups

Lost amidst the political news of the past couple of weeks - the never-ending Republican primaries, Rush Limbaugh's loss of advertisers, the Republicans ridiculous and fact-free blame game on rising gas prices, the contradictory general election polling numbers that reverse direction weekly - was a sobering report from the Southern Poverty Law Center.  Per their website, the SPLC "monitors hate groups and other extremists throughout the United States and exposes their activities to law enforcement agencies, the media and the public." 

The number of active hate groups identified by SPLC in 2011 rose slightly to 1018, continuing a decade-long trend.  But what was really eye-catching was what the SPLC called the "stunning" incease in the number of so-called "Patriot" and militia-type anti-government groups.  Since the wrath of these groups is directed towards the government and not towards an ethnic, racial, religious or other minority group, SPLC does not list these as hate groups per se but gives them  a separate category.  Now here's the math: in 2008 there were 149 of these groups; in 2011 there were 1274.  Hmm, I wonder what caused the rise in these groups...well, they may or may not be haters but they sure don't like somebody.  

I wonder if the motorcycle rider that I encountered on the highway just after Obama's election became a member of one of these groups.  I was driving home from work when a leather-jacketed, bearded, sunglassed rider raced up to the side of my car.  He apparently noticed my "Obama '08" bumper sticker.  At first I thought he wanted to share the moment of hope that all the rest of the world was feeling with the ouster of the Republicans and with the end of the era of "W" and the neocons.  I gave him a thumbs up when he pointed at my car. But then he started gesticulating, waving his fist, screaming something - all at 65 mph on a motorcycle.  He was positively nuts - whether with anger or hate I don't know.   Fortunately, he didn't lose control of his bike and when he realized I wasn't going to continue our "discussion", he roared off towards the setting sun. 

And maybe that setting sun is an apt anlaogy for what is happening demographically in this country.  The time of total white male ascendancy is over.  That is a frightening thought to many.  Sure there are desperate attempts to retain power - witness the organized attack on voting rights, to exclude immigrants from the American dream - witness the draconian anti-immigrant laws, and to deny that the US can possibly have a President who is not white - witness the "birthers".  But the trend towards an increasingly diverse American society is clear and inevitable.

The sad part about the SPLC report is that we don't have to be so divisive and fearful.  We don't have to sink into the "us vs. them" sewer that's been a prime cause of humanity's problems for millenia.  I obviously wasn't there but I get the impression that during the Depression, people pulled for one another and understood that they were all in it together.  Maybe we can get back to that spirit of common humanity and decency in the midst of difficult times.

Here's a link to Obama's speech on election night 2008.  Like I said it was a time of hope.  Listen to the first 5 minutes or so of the speech and ask yourself "what did this guy ever do to engender such rabid opposition?"  I'll close with two excerpts from the speech..

"If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer."

"It's the answer that led those who've been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day."

We should all be able to live with these sentiments.

Channelling TR

President Obama traveled to the small Kansas town of Osawatomie today and channelled Teddy Roosevelt who, a hundred years ago gave a stirring speech in the same community for a "square deal" for the American people. 

Speaking to the audience at the local high school, Obama said “I’m here in Kansas to reaffirm my deep conviction that we are greater together than we are on our own.  I believe that this country succeeds when everyone gets a fair shot, when everyone does their fair share, and when everyone plays by the same rules.”  He received a warm reception and enthusiastic applause in the very red state of Kansas.  The chances of Obama winning Kansas in 2012 are, as we used to say, between slim and none.  It was obviously meant as a national speech and began to define his 2012 campaign.  The speech, described by the Christian Science Monitor as "combative", took Republicans to task for their opposition to the extension of the payroll tax cut, their attempts to dilute or defund the financial industry regulations passed in the last Congress, their opposition to increased taxes on the wealthiest Americans and their opposition to the American Jobs Act. 

A good start...and one which needs to be pounded home every day from now until next November.  Obama may win the election for the Presidency but if Congress is still controlled by Republicans, none of these speeches will matter.  The Republicans in the Do Nothing 112th Congress have had as their main objective denying Obama a second term rather than solving the problems the country faces.  It's time to turn these misguided legislators out of office.  They have stood in the way of nearly every possible solution to the jobs crisis in this country...but somehow they have managed to convince people that the sad state of the economy is all Obama's fault.  According to the right-wing extremists now in control of the Republican Party, all we need are fewer regulations and lower taxes on the rich and let the free market solve our problems.  That formula has never worked and never will. 

Obama's Short(falls) List

A friend suggested a while back that this blog rant against Democrats as well as Republicans.  That's been pretty hard to do on a regular basis given the consistently outrageous behavior of Republicans.  But I'm willing to give it a shot.

My friend also said that he had voted for neither Obama nor McCain in the 2008 election.  His comment on Obama was that he was too "green" (in the experience sense not in the environmental sense) to be president.  He may well have been right.  Obama appears to have been bullied by everyone from freshman Congressmen to the medical industry to the military to Benjamin Netanyahu and the so-called "Israel lobby".  Maybe he is naive or maybe he really has been a centrist all along.  In any case, the change we can believe in didn't happen.   Yes the 111th Congress had some pretty decent accomplishments but they were shoved out in 2010.

So without further ado, here are the top 10 disappointments of the Obama Presidency.

10.  Not requesting Harry Reid to change the filibuster rules in the Senate.  This procedure ensures that the party that wants government to fail or do nothing will always win - even if they control just 40 of the 100 seats.  It has no place in a democracy.   

9.  Allowing the most reactionary elements in our country to control the political conversation.  A year or so after the election, I saw a cartoon on the wall of a local business.  Obama was dressed as Steve Urkel and looking at a graph with a seriously down-sloping line.  The comment from the cartoon Obama-Urkel was "Did I do that?"  No, actually you inherited the biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression from your predecessor and it's proving a major challenge.  Maybe it's because Obama thought himself the Great Compromiser, maybe it's because he realized too late that the fear-mongers and haters were out to ruin his Presidency, maybe Democrats just don't know how to respond to lies and distortions...whatever the reason ...he failed to make the case for his policies.  This led to the 2010 election bloodbath and the Democratic majority was lost.

8.  Continuing Bush-era policies against civil liberties developed during the new Age of Fear and taking it a step further by approving unnecessary (Bin-Laden, who could have been easily captured for trial as a war criminal) and unlawful (Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen) assassinations.   As noted by Glenn Greenwald in Salon.com , "No effort was made to indict [al-Awlaki] for any crimes [and]...no evidence (as opposed to unverified government accusations) was presented of his guilt."

7.  Taking until YE 2011 to get out of Iraq (McCain and Romney: please shut up).  The troops could have been easily and methodically withdrawn within 6 months of his becoming President.  Based on misinformation and lies and abetted by a complacent media (remember how thrilled these idiots were to be "embedded" with the troops), this war of the Neo-Cons was totally unjustified.  It elevated Iran, a fundamentalist Islamic state, to be the major player in the Middle East with Iraq as its puppet.  Well done, Bushie.

6.  Agreeing to a stimulus package that, in the end, was too small.  While it had a signicant impact, it was not anywhere near large enough to prevent the "jobless recovery".  See also #3 and #4 below. 

5.  Spending all of his political capital after the election on health care and getting only a half-loaf solution.  It may have been worth it if he got a single-payer solution (the one sure way to reduce health care costs) but this was not even on the table.  See also #3 below.

4.  Appointing Wall Street players and Bush-era advisors to his economic team.   These were the clowns that got us into the mess in the first place.  His focus on the deficit when 16% of Americans are either unemployed or underemployed is self-defeating.  At a time when bold Keynesian moves are needed, the Administration settles timidly for half-measures.

3.  A) Thinking he could compromise with Republicans and B) not controlling the Red Dog Democrats.  Democrats held 60 seats and controlled the House when Obama became President.  Instead of FDR (or even LBJ) style arm twisting, he let a small minority of Democrats combine with Republicans to dictate the policies of his Administration.  When the stated aim of the opposing party is to limit you to a one-term Presidency and their media minions are hoping for you to fail, you do not compromise.  You call them out and fight.

2.  Failing to achieve a Palestinian - Israeli peace accord.  After a good and somewhat even-handed start (for example, his 2009 speech in Cairo), he was manhandled by the right-wing Israeli President and AIPAC.  Instead of doing what is right to get the two sides to the table - namely insisting on an immediate settlement freeze in the occupied territories, he fell victim to domestic politics, the Israel lobby and their right-wing Republican and Christian fundamentalist allies.   His failure to support Palestinian statehood at the UN was one of the major low points in his administration.  While not the only issue that energizes Muslim fundamentalists, the Occupation remains a key factor in the antagonism against us.  I guess Americans for Peace Now will just have to raise more money to get its progressive Jewish voice heard above the right-wing babble.

1.  Escalating the war in Afghanistan.  The war is no more winnable or justifiable than was Vietnam.  The surge has not worked but our money and blood continue to flow in that "graveyard of empires".   The so-called "war" on terror should have been a police action not a war.  Terrorism is prevented by detection not by war.

Having said all that, unless he is challenged by a progressive Democrat (yeah, I know, fat chance), he remains the least bad option for 2012.  Hopefully enough of his 2008 base will be inspired enough by this bland reality to go to the polls.  (I mean can you imagine a Rick Perry presidency?)  For all the talk of the importance of "independents", if the Democratic left doesn't show up next November, Obama will lose. 

Worst of Both Worlds

Well, the global stock markets have responded to the "debt deal" with a quick downward slide.  The Dow is continuing its plunge - now down 850 points over the past 8 days. 

The basic fact in all this is that the US debt was never really the problem.  This  totally unnecessary crisis was created in whole cloth by Republicans.  While the Republicans, led by their extremist right-wing, held the country hostage over the debt ceiling, no action was taken to solve the real economic problem - jobs.  And now with "The Deal" taking huge amounts of government money out of the economy, there is little hope that jobs will be created any time soon.  And until jobs increase, there will be no growth in the US economy.  Enter the double-dip recession.

Obama's encouraging Business to create jobs and Congress to send him a jobs bill is a little like asking the burglars for whom you just opened the door to your home to help you with your gardening. Fat effin' chance.  Let's face it - supply-side economics is in the driver's seat and it just doesn't work.  Politically, Republicans will win both houses of Congress and the Presidency in 2012 if the economy doesn't improve.  There is absolutely no political incentive for them to cooperate.  So much for the effectiveness of the the Compromiser-in-Chief.

As usual Paul Krugman provided some excellent insight into The Deal in an August 1 NY Times article.  After analyzing how The Deal fails on so many levels and is bound to lead the country into further economic problems, he concludes:  "What Republicans have just gotten away with calls our whole system of government into question. After all, how can American democracy work if whichever party is most prepared to be ruthless, to threaten the nation’s economic security, gets to dictate policy? And the answer is, maybe it can’t."

They Just Don't Get It

The bargain struck by Obama and the Republicans averted a financial market disaster but at a price to the nation's well-being. 

Once again the compromiser-in-chief was outmaneuvered by the right wing and came away with nothing other than a debt ceiling increase that will keep the country running through the 2012 elections.  Good for Obama and the Republicans.   Good for the wealthy and corporations. 

Not good for the working class, the middle class, seniors, the unemployed, women and children who will be asked to shoulder the burden of the deficit reduction. 

Not good for the economy as Obama will have no ability to grow jobs by public works programs.  Not good for the economy because the totally discredited supply-side economics which haven't worked in 30 years continue not to work:  manufacturing level is now at its lowest level in two years and the Dow is down 46 points as I write this.  Basically the manufacturing data trumped the debt agreement.

It didn't have to be this way.  Obama could have invoked the 14th amendment and gotten a "clean" debt ceiling increase - just has been done for the past four decades.  Or he could have taken the trickle-down theorists to task - why not raise the income taxes on the wealthy and corporations and then provide income tax credits and payroll tax holidays to those who actually create jobs in the USA?  If trickle down/ supply side economics works then surely they should have no objection.  In the meantime we could use the increased tax revenues to provide more to those in our country who really need it and stop the continuing redistribution of national income to the wealthiest.  Half of our income goes to the wealthiest 10 percent.  Believe me - they can afford the increased taxes and still not go "mansionless".

Outrageous

With the Republicans threatening to induce a major global economic disaster by not raising the debt ceiling unless their extremist and unfair demands are met, Obama is showing signs of weakening in his defense of the social safety programs including Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid.  Apparently, these programs are now "on the table" in the debt ceiling negotiations.  Also, apparently, the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy are still "off the table".  This is an outrageous affront to the middle class, the elderly and the poor. 

Instead of addressing the jobs issues that are at the heart of the ongoing economic crisis, the politicians are wrangling over a debt ceiling increase that was executed without controversy SEVEN TIMES during the Bush administration.  This is politics pure and simple.  If the President were a Republican, we would not be having this debate. 

Warren Buffett in a CNBC interview stated that the the Republican-controlled Congress is "trying to use the incentive now that we're going to blow your brains out, America, in terms of your debt worthiness over time."  In May, Buffett stated at a Berkshire Hathaway shareholder's meeting that if the Congress failed to raise the debt ceiling, it would constitute "the most asinine act" in the nation's history. 

Katrina vanden Heuvel offered a solution in a recent Nation column: "Invoke Section 4 of the Fourteenth Amendment, which says that 'the validity of the public debt of the United States … shall not be questioned.' This constitutional option is one that the president alone may exercise."

It will be interesting to see how this shakes out...in the meantime, the Republicans should be held accountable for the ensuing crisis if the US defaults on its debts.  And Obama should be held accountable if he caves in to the extremists of the right - especially if the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy are not also part of the solution. 

Going the Wrong Way

While the news cycle has been covering the turmoil in Egypt (Mubarak apparently has just left Cairo), there have been some domestic developments and non-developments that warrant mention. 

Congress has not done anything to address the unemployment rate and increase jobs.  Jobs creation in January was lower than expected.  Much of this was likely due to the severe weather.  Meanwhile, the House Republicans have done nothing on a jobs bill, contenting themselves with their ever-erroneous whining about the negative impact of government spending. 

House Republican budget proposals  (Note 1) have, as expected, shifted the burden of deficit reduction to women, children and the poor while simultaneously eliminating jobs creation programs.
(1) Apologies for the above link - it contains the self serving comments of the Republican chair but it effectively shows their priorities.  For a good analysis of how these changes affect society's most vulnerable see the WonkRoom post at this link) :
- Changing House Rules to allow for unlimited, unfinanced tax cuts (i.e., pay as you go only applies to spending cuts)
- Cutting $2 billion from jobs training programs
- Cutting $1.1 billion from community health centers
- Cutting $1 billion from high speed rail, effectively eliminating  numerous jobs
- Cutting $758 million from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), which amounts to about a 6 percent cut to a program providing food assistance to low-income women and their infants.
– Cutting $210 million from Maternal and Child Health Block Grants, which amounts to about a 33 percent cut in a program giving low-income pregnant women, mothers and their children access to health care.
– Cutting $27 million from the Poison Control Center, which would essentially eliminate a program supporting local poison control centers and funding a hotline directing residents to their local poison control office.

Meanwhile the Obama Administration has moved to cut home heating subsidies to the poor by $2.5 billion and revise the rules on mortgages.  The latter would require higher down payments and start to eliminate the role of Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae, the traditional entry to home ownership for the middle class.  Meanwhile, Obama's 2011 most recent foray into jobs creation has been to ask the Chamber of Commerce to (pretty please) step up to the plate and create jobs. 

Are these people all crazy or what?

Here's the Obama - Biden plan for the economy.  It's somewhat outdated but would be interesting to see how effective they will be in prioritizing and implementing the remaining elements of this.