Don't worry, you can trust me. I'm not like the others.

Banned In China

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Strawman Much


So TPM has a lecture about the nasty liberals who want a conservative in because Obama isn't pure enough, at least according to them, following Digby with a post coming from the same position. Or maybe just skerry republicans can't let them get power post. I'm not sure what to say about this, no really I'm not.

I had decided that Obama's votes on the Wall Street bail out and the PATRIOT Act renewal made him unfit to be president and worthless to vote for, but to be honest I got scared and so ended up working and voting for him in the last week or so of the campaign.

At this point I do think that McCain....................? Well he would not have been better and in some ways probably (maybe?) worse, but the democrats would most likely have opposed his worst policies and prevented them from becoming law. There would still have been some sort of stimulus, and if not we would be in the middle of a world wide depression right now. As opposed to a mere massive recession, with more or less 25% of us under- and unemployed. As opposed to 25% to 45% actually totally unemployed with a total Hoover in office vs. a partial Hoover (which is what we have now).

There is no good answer to this situation. The people who are running for office are not, for the most part, worth voting for. The liberal/progressives in office right now seem more than willing to cave right at the point they are about to win something big. The phrase "snatching defeat from the jaws of victory" comes to mind. Obama clearly does not want to do anything to mess with the people who run this country: the bankers, insurance industry types, and in general those who are the wealthiest 10%.

The attacks from republicans and the tea baggers are because he isn't being subservient enough. And those are the only people who are getting any traction in the MSM. Of course, if Obama was a third of the politician I thought he was he would be getting information from other sources than the oligarchs who now rule. He would know from his early life and his time as a community organizer, but he has chosen to completely throw himself behind the oligarchs/plutocracy, the big money men.

Question: Is there a big check room to go to when you run for office where you check your soul for the period of time you are in public life?

I've said it before: Things are going to have to get a lot worse before they get better, and I can't be sure that once they get a lot worse they will get better. But you know what after a year and a half of Obama and democratic control, I am positive that things are going to get a lot worse. And I am afraid that it is going to be quickly enough that I will live long enough to see it. Crap.

2 comments:

Cujo359 said...

What irked me about that screed in TPM was that Josh Marshall seemed to feel the need to point us all to it. It was so insultingly inane that no one who wasn't already convinced of this author's opinion would have been persuaded. At least, no one should have been.

Anyway, I think you're right. Too many people in this country are slow learners. We're going to have to crash before we can recover, if we manage even after that. I still encounter progressives who insist that having Republicans control Congress next year is going to be worse than what we are seeing now. I feel like asking them what universe they have been living in.

Susan said...

"Partial Hoover." That works on soooooo many levels.