Barack Obama at times seems to be the unluckiest person on the face of the earth. He just can't catch a break. Or maybe his bad luck is a result of ignoring his progressive base and scientific evidence and instead trying to negotiate and compromise with congressmen who are financially motivated toward helping banks and corporations more than our own people. When bad events happen that scientists and academics have been warning about for years it is difficult to chalk them up to bad luck.
Take the nuclear accident in Japan. It wasn't but three months ago that Obama was touting nuclear power before congress as a major leg in his clean energy program promising $36 billion in his budget to the industry to design and build new reactors. Unlucky, right? But scientists have been warning for decades about the risks of nuclear power, especially the on-site storage of spent fuel rods which was at the heart of the Japanese disaster. Last month, Obama named Jeffrey Immelt to the President's Economic Recovery Board and then we find out it was GE that designed and built the Japanese reactors. Yesterday we hear that GE is not paying any taxes on $14 billion of profits but is instead receiving a $3.2 billion rebate. And Immelt is the man that is supposed to be investigating how to close corporate tax loopholes?
On March 31, 2010, the New York Times reported that Obama was coming out in favor of offshore drilling. The article said, "The proposal -- a compromise that will please oil companies and domestic drilling advocates but anger some residents of affected states and many environmental organizations -- would end a longstanding moratorium on oil exploration along the East Coast from the northern tip of Delaware to the central coast of Florida, covering 167 million acres of ocean." Not twenty days later, BP's Deepwater Horizon platform explodes in the Gulf of Mexico and causes the largest oil spill in history. Unlucky timing? Not when you realize progressive environmentalists have been warning about the risks of offshore drilling for years.
More recently, Obama did little as state workers in Wisconsin had their collective bargaining rights expunged. Do people really believe that a single janitor can effectively negotiate his wages with a powerful state government without collective bargaining rights? Obama had a chance to use the bully pulpit to explain why collective bargaining is so important in labor negotiations and instead the task was left to Rachel Maddow who performed it brilliantly as she made it the lead story on her broadcasts for weeks. And this in an environment where almost all the benefits from the increased productivity of workers in our country over the last thirty years has gone to the country's top 1%.
Obama is now fighting three wars in Muslim countries, depending on your definition of war. Progressives have warned even before the beginning of the Afghan conflict that such military action might lead to the unintended consequence of inflaming peaceful Muslims against American policy and causing the number of terrorists in the world to increase, not decrease. Wars seem to go on forever in America and no one knows why, but it is clear that only one party benefits from war: the weapons manufacturers and defense contractors like Halliburton who saw its stock price increase six-fold during the Iraq war. It would be a mistake for Obama to be influenced by, or compromise with, defense industry lobbyists, their paid shills in congress or the phony defense policy think tanks funded by defense industry dollars.
Similarly, Obama has stayed relatively quiet as the Supreme Court has chosen to give corporations the same political rights and powers as citizens. Many progressive congressmen turned out to be unlucky in their reelection campaigns as corporate money flooded the 2010 congressional elections. Why doesn't Obama come out strongly in support of publicly financed elections?
On the economic front, Geithner and Summers decided to bail out our largest banks while virtually ignoring the millions of Americans who are struggling with underwater mortgages. Unions have been warning for decades that our middle class was under threat from completely unregulated open trade with low wage countries. Obama agreed to a Republican plan for additional tax cuts for wealthy Americans even though he knew the country was facing record deficits and that the Forbes 400 richest people in America had more wealth than the poorest half of all American families, 150 million people in total. Is it unlucky now that the country continues to struggle with nearly 10% unemployment (the real number is much higher when you include part timers wishing to work full time and those that have given up looking for a job), slow growth forecasts and trillions of dollars of government deficits when your advisors cared more about the profits of Wall Street and their executives' bonuses than the well being of average Americans?
Obama believes that in a representative democracy, to get things done, one needs to be willing to compromise with the opposition. And, it is presumed that a compromise that gets a bill passed is better than doing nothing. Doesn't compromise and moderation typically lead to better solutions to our problems? I am not so sure. It depends on what is motivating the opposition. Compromise with immoral, unscientific or corporate controlled opponents is unacceptable and wrong.
I see Obama's opposition motivated by four forces;
We must stand up to the immorality of government representatives doing the bidding of big banks and corporations that is so damaging our country. We cannot compromise. We must expose it for what it is and hope the American people are smart enough to recognize that it threatens their jobs, their homes and their future. He can start by insisting that money in politics is wrong, that corporations do a fine job maximizing value in the economic marketplace, but their singular focus on profits makes them a terrible force in the political arena where they lack the empathy, moral perspective and broad sense of community needed to decide the greater issues of justice, fairness and opportunity for all.
Obama runs a very real political risk by ignoring his progressive base. It is hard to imagine anyone emerging from the left who is more popular with progressives than Obama, even if someone as capable as Elizabeth Warren chose to run against Obama in the Democratic Party primary. But that is not the real risk Obama faces by ignoring his progressive base. For Obama to win, his base must be incredibly energized and they must turn out to vote. The economy is not going to magically turn around before election day and it looks like the Republicans will be very highly motivated. Obama won the electoral college vote in many states in 2008 because progressives and young people and blacks and Latinos and women and gays and teachers and union members and environmentalists and people concerned with the corrupting influence of lobbyists and corporate money in politics turned out in record numbers. If they choose to stay home in the next presidential election, it may prove to be a very unlucky day for Barack Obama.
John R. Talbott is a bestselling author whose new book is entitled, How I Predicted the Global Economic Crisis*: The Most Amazing Book You'll Never Read. Progressives should realize how one of their own predicted this whole mess we are in while libertarian and conservative economists completely missed it. You can read more about the new book at www.johnrtalbott.com.
Rev. Chuck Currie: President Obama Offers Moral Vision, Faith Leaders Must Press For More
We need a "Clean Sweep" certifying candidates refusing special interest & corporate money and promising to vote for constituents' needs; and we need to prohibit campaigns longer than 12 weeks (cf. UK) and underwrite TV ads so congress doesn't vote to please businesses and special interests who fund their campaign ads.
1) Media should ask what will the government lose in lost taxes from unemployed people? What will US corporations lose in sales when huge numbers of people cannot buy their products?
2) We need to throw out this congress for making laws that allow GE and other corporations pay little or no taxes; what would those taxes, if paid, do to reduce the deficit?
3) What is the daily cost to taxpayers of the wars we are fighting? If we ended one of these occupations entirely what amount would go into the US treasury and reduce the deficit?
4) Social Security would not be in trouble if those earning over $160,000 paid SS tax on their greater earnings. Why doesn't congress raise the $160,000 ceiling to $500,000 or similar? Almost no one knows about this injustice.
5) Hedge fund managers taxed at 15%, the capital gains rate, instead of 34.5% cause how much loss to the treasury?
6) Legalize, decriminalize and tax marijuana sales to save 50billion trying to keep it out; tax revenues would be huge.
7) If corporations are now like individuals why don't they have to pay the AMT tax?
LMF
http://www.religiondispatches.org/dispatches/sarahposner/4444/
I don't like the idea of government money funding religious proselityzing either, nor do I like the idea of tax exempt status for religious organizations unless they stop telling their congregations how to vote. In fact, I have a problem with government funding advocacy groups, but no problem with government funding programs that deliver the advocated services. Unfortunately, the left self-destructed in 2010. We should try to avoid doing that again.
"Your conclusion is only true after you prove that religion is only moral."
I'd have better credibility if I wrote sensible sentences.
Obama can declare that he will not accept any campaign donations from any corporation or special interest group. That he will only accept small amounts from American citizens. He would probably win by a landslide. Republicans don't have that option. They would lose by historical proportions because there aren't enough rich people to give 5-100 dollar contributions. They can ONLY win by the help of a few large contributors.
If Obama did such a thing, that act alone would be worth tens of trillions of dollars of ads. In fact no other ad would be necessary. And after re-election Obama wouldn't be beholden to any corrupt corporation, special interest, Wall Street, etc........ He would just be beholden to the people of America. And then maybe we could get something done for the "people" for a change.
If not now, when?
The corporations control elections, pay for elections, own and control the media, and are the source of funding for both political parties.
Until we reform the way we fund elections, make it illegal for corporations to donate, and reform the way elected officials go from Congress straight into a lobbying job ( a delayed financial reward), any policy that the corporations do not like- whether it is progressive or not- is effectively dead.
Progressives who ignore the simple fact that campaign finance reform most come first are wasting their time. Make no mistake, it will also be the hardest thing to accomplish becasue the corporatists and incumbents of both parties have it made with the present system and they will do whatever it takes to fight meaningful campaign finance reform. If a real effort is made, it will get more ugly than anything we have seen yet.
I have a progressive and quite liberal perspective about issues, but I see nothing wrong with being "Centered". I know personally how things go when I speak or act when I'm not feeling centered.
I've gone through the whole gamut of emotions about the current state of politics..several times swearing "I'll never vote again, screw 'em all." Reading many of these comments has helped me to realize that that is precisely the response the Rovebots are looking for, so thanks for helping me to see the light. I believe that we Democrats would see more progress if we made a collective and individual effort to stay "centered."
People may not, but I do. Here's how the interview might go:
Powerful state government guy: OK, Mr single janitor without collective bargaining rights, we can offer you $0,05/hr and no benefits.
Mr single janitor without collective bargaining rights: Golly, powerful state government guy, I can get Mr powerful private enterprise guy down the street to pay me $10.00/hr with benefits.
Mr powerful state goverment guy: Why, that's impossible Mr single janitor without collective bargaining rights. You're just a single janitor without collective bargaining rights.
Single janitor without collective bargaining rights: Maybe so, Mr powerful state government guy, but so many people are so overqualified to be single janitors without collective bargaining rights, that we're in big demand on the private market. So I'm sorry, but you'll just have to scrub your own toilets. I'm outta here.
And that's the name of that tune.
However, I don't go along with the idea that our dear elected officials should initiate such practices. They should be applied purely as defensive after others initiate them. Traditional economics may not understand how to price labour when there are billions of unemployed in the world, but individual employers and their employees certainly do.
What you might characterise as an unfair wage, some poor SOB in the slums of Beíjing might view as a bonanza. If said SOB in the slums of Beijing can do the job as well and as quickly for ten times less than a Great American Worker, then why on earth would an employer opt for the latter. And why on earth would the latter expect an employer to act otherwise?
The only reason I can think of is racism: little brown people belong in mud huts; Great American Workers belong in McMansions. Can you think of any other reason?
Yes, I agree. And if our janitor is an enterprising guy or gal who decides that he or she doesn't like working under those conditions, then he or she will look around for a different way to make money. There are, after all, more ways under the sun to make an honest buck, euro, or yen, than working as a single janitor without collective bargaining rights.
But what incentive does a single janitor with collective bargaining rights have to improve himself and to offer his employers something of more value if he can just keep on working as a janitor for $10.00/hr with benefits when he's really only worth $0.05/hr without benefits on the free market? And consider this: not all single janitors without collective bargaining rights are created equal. Some do their job better, faster, and with less overhead than others. Those are the janitors who will be filling the $10.00/hr with benefits positions. The others would do well to look for occupations in which they, too, can be superior performers.
No?
All the solutions of the political factions in this country (and the world) require to live as enemies to our Earth. As long as power and materialism drive these groups as they have since the 1930's things will get worse.
And no matter how much we try to filter the white-noise, there's a constant din of hyper-critical C.R.A.P. (Conservative Rhetoric And Propaganda) that seeps through the conscience. They're elite pros at the game, I'll give 'em that. Take for example that Kerry was tagged as "the most Liberal" in 2004, and then in 2008 Obama was given the moniker. Ewwww--he's toooo Liberal. *rolleyes* Amazing they do it, but more astonishing is that they get away with it. So, yes...President Obama is a Centrist (at least he's governed that way). But the meme is this is a center-right country, so the center is by that definition too far Left, Radical, Socialist, etc.
Are there things he's done I'm not thrilled about? Yes. But imagine for a minute if he had been afforded the same level of cooperation and support that Shrub had. After all, it's still "in a time of war!"