In his hastily called press conference today Obama gave a very slick defense of his compromise with the Republicans on taxes.
It has not escaped me that the extra x00 billion dollars we will borrow to pay for it will be just another excuse for attacking important social programs. It is a part of the "starve the beast" strategy that is being used in a long standing and vicious class war against the American people.
Obama is a skillful shepherd but we are not all sheep.
Showing posts with label Obama. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Obama. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Dear President Obama
I am 85 years old and my stake in the left-right political battle of the sound bites is minimal. But I do care very much about the struggle for a productive, humane and relatively stable society.
At this time, I find your contribution to that struggle to be minimal. I am of course not utterly shocked by the discrepancy between campaign rhetoric and actual performance. All the same, I cannot recall any previous instance when an administration spat in the faces of its most energetic supporters so publicly and unrepentantly.
If press sec Gibbs does not speak for the President then he should go. If he does, then this administration should not last beyond its present term.
Why? Because cutting deals with the very people who are bleeding the country white will not do what is necessary. It just prolongs the misery. Some battles are worth fighting even when the first battle is lost.
You just don't seem to get it.
I do not have the resources of the bankers or big pharma and my personal decision will have no significant effect on the next elections but I intend to do what is right in my own eyes.
Whatever I can contribute will be given solely to those progressive organizations who have not abandoned the fight for genuine change in Washington.
At this time, I find your contribution to that struggle to be minimal. I am of course not utterly shocked by the discrepancy between campaign rhetoric and actual performance. All the same, I cannot recall any previous instance when an administration spat in the faces of its most energetic supporters so publicly and unrepentantly.
If press sec Gibbs does not speak for the President then he should go. If he does, then this administration should not last beyond its present term.
Why? Because cutting deals with the very people who are bleeding the country white will not do what is necessary. It just prolongs the misery. Some battles are worth fighting even when the first battle is lost.
You just don't seem to get it.
I do not have the resources of the bankers or big pharma and my personal decision will have no significant effect on the next elections but I intend to do what is right in my own eyes.
Whatever I can contribute will be given solely to those progressive organizations who have not abandoned the fight for genuine change in Washington.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
My Compliments, Alexander Cockburn
A while ago, I sent you a note including this.
- - - it is time to consider things more soberly. Let me focus on just your final dart: about the president "trying to pass off as 'healthcare reform' a gift to the insurance industry of 30 million new customers, to be required by law to pony up insurance premiums and then be cheated."
At the time, I advised you that the bill was not yet in final form. Well time has passed and it is beginning to smell like a sellout of considerable proportions even though still not finalized. In its present form, the Senate bill looks like a mockery written for the insurance industry by its own lobbyists and a number of bought Senators.
At the same time, the Senate has defeated a proposal to permit the re-importation of American pharma products in order to lower the costs to the American people. Both of the Democratic Senators from my state, New York, voted against it. I have not yet received their explanations. However, there was a deal between the Obama administration and the pharma industry early this year. What the administration got was their promise of a pittance to close half of the "doughnut hole" in the Medicare part D package and to refrain from opposing the health care reform bill. Since then the pharma prices have been increased by about 9 percent but the administration, it seems, remains faithful.
The congressional attempts at financial reform will very likely contain enough loopholes to keep the big banks happy. Washington has not changed. Money talks and the government will not protect the public from more of the traditional fleecing.
The president is courting catastrophe. The people who made their small contributions to his campaign, who rang doorbells for him, and who spent hours on the telephone for him will not return in 2010 or 2012 unless he wakes up and works to make good his campaign pledges. His fruitless attempts at bipartisanship are not perceived as leadership. His obsession with passing a health care bill, any bill, as soon as possible is much like taking a helicopter to board the Titanic. The Democratic party may be split.
I'm sorry to have to say these things but I value objectivity.
- - - it is time to consider things more soberly. Let me focus on just your final dart: about the president "trying to pass off as 'healthcare reform' a gift to the insurance industry of 30 million new customers, to be required by law to pony up insurance premiums and then be cheated."
At the time, I advised you that the bill was not yet in final form. Well time has passed and it is beginning to smell like a sellout of considerable proportions even though still not finalized. In its present form, the Senate bill looks like a mockery written for the insurance industry by its own lobbyists and a number of bought Senators.
At the same time, the Senate has defeated a proposal to permit the re-importation of American pharma products in order to lower the costs to the American people. Both of the Democratic Senators from my state, New York, voted against it. I have not yet received their explanations. However, there was a deal between the Obama administration and the pharma industry early this year. What the administration got was their promise of a pittance to close half of the "doughnut hole" in the Medicare part D package and to refrain from opposing the health care reform bill. Since then the pharma prices have been increased by about 9 percent but the administration, it seems, remains faithful.
The congressional attempts at financial reform will very likely contain enough loopholes to keep the big banks happy. Washington has not changed. Money talks and the government will not protect the public from more of the traditional fleecing.
The president is courting catastrophe. The people who made their small contributions to his campaign, who rang doorbells for him, and who spent hours on the telephone for him will not return in 2010 or 2012 unless he wakes up and works to make good his campaign pledges. His fruitless attempts at bipartisanship are not perceived as leadership. His obsession with passing a health care bill, any bill, as soon as possible is much like taking a helicopter to board the Titanic. The Democratic party may be split.
I'm sorry to have to say these things but I value objectivity.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Obama's Pragmatism
President Obama has annoyed many Americans (including me) by reversing his previous decision to release more photographs of American abuse of military captives. On second thought, I believe this exception to a policy of transparency is sound.
Politics is the art of the possible. Very few principles are absolute, not even freedom of speech. We are not permitted to shout "fire" in a crowded theater.
1913
Reasonable people will screen every policy choice on the basis of cost/benefit analysis, taking all relevant factors into account. This is pragmatism.
Making important policy decisions solely on the basis of previously declared "principles" is ideological Russian roulette. America is not a suicide pact, although extremists would have it so.
The political danger for Obama is not that he is pragmatic but that he may become just too full of himself. As many have said, "the only thing I can't resist is temptation." He will be wrong now and then because cost/benefit analysis depends upon many fallible judgments. That can't be helped. Being seduced by sycophants and euphoria is something else: powerful and deadly hubris.
Is he still innocent of hubris? Probably not and it is better to call him on it now than to let it develop further. At the recent White House Correspondents' dinner he told the audience that his first 100 days were so successful that he would finish his second 100 days in 72 days. That's a good piece of satirical humor but then he added that on the 73rd day he would rest.
That last part fails the test of pragmatism. It does not add substantially to the joke but it steps on the toes of a great many Bible lovers. In the days of the prophets it might have gotten him stoned to death. One does not have to be a Biblical fundamentalist to see that the humorist is being carried away by his own cleverness. It should have been edited out.
Obviously, there are many more substantive issues on which President Obama can and will be criticized. On the other hand, the character of the man who occupies the office of the president is very important and it should never be above criticism.
Politics is the art of the possible. Very few principles are absolute, not even freedom of speech. We are not permitted to shout "fire" in a crowded theater.
1913
Reasonable people will screen every policy choice on the basis of cost/benefit analysis, taking all relevant factors into account. This is pragmatism.
Making important policy decisions solely on the basis of previously declared "principles" is ideological Russian roulette. America is not a suicide pact, although extremists would have it so.
The political danger for Obama is not that he is pragmatic but that he may become just too full of himself. As many have said, "the only thing I can't resist is temptation." He will be wrong now and then because cost/benefit analysis depends upon many fallible judgments. That can't be helped. Being seduced by sycophants and euphoria is something else: powerful and deadly hubris.
Is he still innocent of hubris? Probably not and it is better to call him on it now than to let it develop further. At the recent White House Correspondents' dinner he told the audience that his first 100 days were so successful that he would finish his second 100 days in 72 days. That's a good piece of satirical humor but then he added that on the 73rd day he would rest.
That last part fails the test of pragmatism. It does not add substantially to the joke but it steps on the toes of a great many Bible lovers. In the days of the prophets it might have gotten him stoned to death. One does not have to be a Biblical fundamentalist to see that the humorist is being carried away by his own cleverness. It should have been edited out.
Obviously, there are many more substantive issues on which President Obama can and will be criticized. On the other hand, the character of the man who occupies the office of the president is very important and it should never be above criticism.
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