Here are some quick suggestions as to how Obama might avoid going down in history as the man who ruined the Democratic party:
1. Fire Timmy and Larry. Do NOT replace Timmy with a guy like this. No more "Goldman Sachs Democrats"!
2. Address, and apologize for, the atrocity that was election 2008.
3. Bug out of Iraq, NOW NOW NOW.
4. Bug out of Afghanistan, NOW NOW NOW.
5. Task the Justice Department with bringing suit against anyone involved with any financial institution that packaged crap mortgages as Triple-A rated investments. That was fraud, and people should go to jail for it.
6. Institute a stock trade tax, similar to the one we used to have.
7. Use the proceeds of the stock trade tax to institute WPA-style job creation. In every speech, in every White House meeting, repeat this mantra: JOBS JOBS JOBS!
8. Create a new HOLC for mortgage relief. (It's too late for many, but not for others.)
9. Nationalize (temporarily) the too-big-to-fail banks. Fire and prosecute the miscreants.
10. Give a televised speech explaining economic basics: There are reasons why government must operate in the red during recessions. You pay the money back during flush times. Emphasize that the Bush and Reagan presidencies did not pay the money back.
11. The godawful health care reform bill is almost beyond salvage. It should be supported only if it can be amended to allow for state-by-state single payer. If no such amendment appears, give up the whole sorry business and start afresh when possible. If this thing goes through as is, the mandates and fines will make the Democratic party universally despised, insuring total Republican control for decades.
12. Reinstitute barriers between commercial and investment banking.
13. Institute strict regulations on banking. Do not sign any regulatory bill containing the Kanjorski amendment or anything like it.
14. Stop funding Wall Street. Rebuild Main Street. Tell American that we have to start making things again. This will require government investment.
15. Institute protectionist trade policies. Free trade is a myth for suckers. The world is not flat.
16. Link tarrifs to outsourcing.
17. Commit America to a fair and genuinely democratic single-state solution in Israel.
18. Charge Bush and Cheney.
19. Find Doc Brown, hop into his DeLorean, and tell him you want a do-over covering the last ten months.
Feel free to offer a 20th suggestion. Heck, let's get this list up to 25 items.
24 comments:
Thanks for remembering Bush and Cheney. Let's not forget Rumsfeld, Bybee, Yoo, Rice, and Bradbury.
Let's not forget rolling back the imperial unitary executive powers usurped by Bush that Obama has been reluctant to give up. They must be removed from the presidential tool chest.
20. Be fuckin' proud of your African American brothers and sisters and commit your DOJ to fighting civil rights battles on their behalf and on behalf of other minorities. It would be refreshing to hear him talk about how institutional racism continues to destroy people's lives. Just look at what happened in the city of Baltimore which is suing mortgage brokers because they routinely steered African American shoppers with good credit and adequate income into subprime mortgages rather than the prime rate mortgages that they qualified for. Now, with housing values down, they home owners can't refinance when their interest rate jumps and the city is going broke because property taxes aren't getting paid because of the thousands of home owners who have lost their home. That was all about race. They have the audio tapes with people talking about African Americans as gorillas. Obama should have his DOJ go after such abuses and be proud of putting those creeps in jail.
Apparently, ex-cokeheads make lousy Presidents.
21. Work on that speech impediment.
So basically,he should do what he has always done and is so good at...
give a speech
apologize
and play the blame game.
who in his right mind would care saving the dems ?
Your list is what I thought would be on his as a "to do" from the beginning. This guy is just going through the motions of leading as he makes his way around the world, giving useless speeches, and smiling for the camera.
Meanwhile, the nation continues to suffer and the GOP strengthens its hand once again.
What a mess. Just another sorry excuse for a president elected by a narrative and cult worship.
Unbelievable. His inaction is allowing those lousy Bush years to fade into obscurity.
Anon 4:54 -- who in his right mind would NOT care about saving the Dems? The Republicans are going even crazier than usual.
Of course, there's always that romantic dream of a third party...
Here, tabby! See the nice bell? Let's get it round your neck...
Yeah, Santa is going to slide down your chimney with Hillary in his sack and the preceding 8 months will turn out to have been one of those bad dreams.
The Major T. J. Kongs in the Dem party are going to ride this the whole way into the ground.
In other words don't hold your breath waiting for this crowd to morph into FDR Democrats, that wing of the party in dead.
Not one of your suggestions (except maybe #1 -- Obama seems to like scapegoats) will ever be given even a glancing thought by Obama. It isn't in his nature to tell the money men to go to h#ll & do the right thing.
Fire Arne Duncan. He is the worst single pick of the entire administration, and his privatization policies are wrecking havoc on public school districts around the country. Obama is showing himself to be the most anti-public education president in this nation's history, way worse than George W. Bush.
anon, I think you may be right. But this is a post about what SHOULD be done, not about what WILL be done or what SHOULD HAVE BEEN done.
It is instructive, from time to time, to address the "should" issue. Doing so allows us to define with greater precision our goals and values.
Withdraw from free trade agreements, especially with China. Impose tariffs on foreign goods. Start producing products in the US.
I don't care if I can no longer buy a crappy lawn mower from China that will break after one summer for 99 dollars. I really don't.
My suggestion on how "Obama might avoid going down in history as the man who ruined the Democratic party"
Impeach the jerk.
Obama is Bush's third term [on steroids]
22. Mandatory minimum wage increase to a living wage. - can be done incrementally as the JOBS JOBS JOBS return, but people have to be able to support themselves and their families without having to have 2 or 3 jobs.
23. End the war on drugs. It doesn't work and we spend too much time and money on jailing people for drug use. Move toward legalization and taxation of drugs and use the money to fund rehabilitation services. (with that, make it so that if someone gets caught driving while under the influence of drugs/alcohol, they loose their license permanently)
I would add to lori's #20 to have the DOJ actively pursue discrimination based on race, sex, sexuality, age, and the other protected categories.
Can Obama save his presidency?
NO!
There are a number of "other" things that haven't surfaced yet which will have an affect on Obama. Wait and everyone will be surprised.
Marty Didier
Northbrook, IL
When I looked at the title of this post, I thought it was going to end with an answer to the question posed there. That answer being "No."
I doubt, at this point, that anything is going to get this guy a second term.
>>Tell American that we have to start making things again.
I've been saying for a long time that we've almost forgotten how to innovate in America, except for coming up with ways to screw us lower classes and pick our pockets so that the elites can buy more houses, yachts, and Picassos.
They're entitled, after all.
Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com
Here's my Number 20:
Quit.
Well Joseph you've really outdone yourself here. If he would just do those basic things, basic things I bet the country would start recovering both in economic and social terms pretty darned quick.
Really, if we as a people would just start doing the right things we could eliminate most of our problems as they are self inflicted anyway. If we could just replace corruption and greed with humanity and kindness things would be soooo much better.
I know I am way to the left of most people but I see no reason that we can't have a wonderful infrastructure, complete health care for everyone, education for everyone, and housing for everyone. The US is supposed to be about freedom. How about freedom from poverty, freedom from suffering, freedom from unecessary disease and death? We can do this. We really can. Getting our jobs back should be the #1 priority as it is the easiest road to achieving our goals.
ah...another inspired post here at CF. ain't gonna happen. Not one bit of it. Oh well...
Admit you gamed the primaries, took foreign money, and really are in over you head. Bow out and appoint Hillary as the President.
Sophie, there's this thing called the Constitution which says that if Obama bowed out, the presidency would go to Joe Biden.
McChrystal is a war criminal. Stop listening to him. Fire him. This is probably included in bug out of Afghanistan thing.
>>Anonymous said...
>>Here's my Number 20: Quit.
That's more likely to happen than any implementation of Joseph's list.
Obama gets bored easily, and he's already showing the signs of not liking to be faced with a bunch of tough decisions every day.
He just may not run again.
Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com
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