You may want to check out Roger Ebert's most ambitiously political blog post. He argues that the tide of history runs against the Republican party. Although I agree with all of his points, I do not agree with his bottom-line conclusion. His argument does not take into account three factors:
1. The decisive role played by propaganda. Our current propagandists are so skilled they could convince a substantial number of people that running headlong into a brick wall cures headaches. They could convince a substantial number of people to trim their nails with chainsaws. They could convince a substantial number of people that they will become wealthy if they burn their paychecks.
2. Regional electoral advantage. Alas, this problem is built into the Constitution: The institutions of the Senate and the electoral college give Republicans an unfair advantage.
3. The failure of the Democratic party. I have not given up on the Democrats. There are probably 70-something decent dems in Congress right now, and that number represents a good start -- certainly a better start than starting over. The eternal pipe dream of a new party makes me either laugh or grimace, depending on mood. But there is no denying that Obama has failed, although more Americans must understand that Obama failed because he embraced the Republican party's "Wall Street ueber alles" value system. The failure of his "GOP-lite" governance has diminished the Democratic brand.
Ebert offers no defense of Obama per se, although he does note that polls show that Americans favor Obamacare (which has not really been implemented yet). Our President has become the elephant in the room -- and the familiar metaphor has seldom been so amusing.
By the way: Did you know that Barack Obama is the all-time number one recipient of donations from Rupert Murdoch's News Corp?
Eventually, liberals must learn to say of Obama the same thing that I've said all along: This man does not represent us.
4 comments:
So, if there are around 70 decent Democrats in congress, why don't one or two of them step forward to challenge Obama?
I'm registered Independent, btw.
No loyalty to the Dems at all, and certainly none to the evil (and I use that word advisedly) Republicans.
Party loyalty seems to me to carry a lot of the blame for the way things are going so badly wrong here. So many USA-ans treat politics as some kind of team sport...."my team right or wrong".
That, in tandem with the corporate media brainwashing their audiences has a lot to answer for.
After the abysmal failures and subsequent loss of the House that Nancy Pelosi was elected Minority Leader says all that is needed about the current state of the Democratic party.
Those seventy good Democrats went along to get along.
Awesome catch on the Murdoch donations, Joseph. Too funny...can't wait to use it on an Opologist.
btw, that last article you linked was a treasure. It's nice to find another lone voice in the woods.
Some more choice quotes from it, to entice more people to read it through:
http://michael-hudson.com/2011/07/the-euthanasia-of-industry/
-snip-
The Republicans also haven’t called to cut back Social Security to pay Wall Street. That’s the Obama-Geithner position. It’s put Democratic Congressional leadership in a bind, because they have difficulty opposing a president even though he’s moved to the right of the Republican Party.
I warned about this already in 2008 before Mr. Obama took office.
-snip-
The silver lining for the Republicans winning in 2012 would be that the Democratic Congress would find its backbone again, once it’s in opposition. It would say “No” to the Republicans trying to push the policy that Mr. Obama is now trying to push. But it can’t say no to Mr. Obama. That’s why his presidency is turning out to be such a disaster.
Actually there are more like 100-120 decent D's in the House but they are under fierce assault from both the dementia that is the House Repub majority and from sell-out louts in their own conference. Not to mention the bitter fruits of Citizens United which means that long incumbent Ds in relatively safe seats will still have to raise over $1m to fend off Rove's reactionaries next year. The good news is that neither the public employee unions (the $ vein for prog Ds), enviros or Dem-controlled state legislatures in blue states seem much weakened by the 2010 onslaught of the oligarchs. Maybe all we need is Russ Feingold coming to the party...
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