TJ in Boulder Utah
Boulder, UT
A major reason that The United States of America was catapulted to the top of the heap in terms of military and economic power was that profiteers of all kinds have historically, been given free rein to rape the natural resources of North America and then the World. This, along with overwhelming military and economic dominance over the shattered economies of Europe and Asia after WWII.
The rise of Corporate power is only another manifestation of the "ruling classes" asserting their will on a relatively ignorant and powerless populus. Just as the robber barons of the 1800s bought off government, corporations today buy our representatives with bribes that are thinly disguised as "campaign contributions". The media, for the most part is also controlled by these monied interests. And, now with a Supreme Court that is controlled by so called conservatives we have Corporations being given the right to funnel even more money to their favored Lobbists (oops! I mean elected representitives).
I like President Obama and wish we lived in the world that he envisioned, of "Hope & Change" though understanding and bipartisanship. But, unfortunately he has yet to really get his own message. Our only Hope is for him to take a radical approach to changing our current form of govenment and give up on the moderation of a fantastical bipartisanship. He should give up any plan for a second term and just start naming names and truely "kicking a$$" rather than using such statements as a rhetorical device. We also can't just count on the POTUS to do what has to be done. I understand the Tea Party movement functioning out of an overwheming sense that the People no longer control what happens in America. Unfortunately, this frustration has been coopted by the same forces that want to block meaningful reform and control of those that are creating our problems. We The People actually have to demand change; perhaps starting with real campaign finance reform. (Oh, where are you John McCain? - Oops! another political sell out.)
I am NOT hopeful. It seems we will only change in a crisis. And, since one seems to appear every 3 - 4 months, people seem to be exhausted and appathetic. If what has been happening during the last year can't spur us to action, what will?
We need leadership. That's why we voted for Obama. Time is short.
The hour is late.
20.6.10
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1 comment:
...hopes for Obama are misplaced. They are exhorting the wrong president. He is not even close to being either TR, much less FDR. If one really wants Obama to change and become an activist, liberal president, one must start with his economic team and call for the resignations of both Summers and Geithner, who are the core members of Obama's pro-big business stance and who have pushed even the stolid Paul Volker into the job of official window dressing manager. Obama hasn't fired either Wall Street insider because they solidify his relationship with Wall Street and the rest of the corporate power elite, and he didn't get angry at BP until very late partly because he got a large donation from BP, one of his biggest corporate supporters after Wall Street. Without the huge public outcry about his leave-it-up-to-big-business attitute toward BP, it seems unlikely that he would even have made any strong demands for an escrow fund, since he still hasn't ordered enough research staff into the Gulf. Most of the research on how much oil is escaping and on how it behaves underwater, both crucial to our knowledge of the disaster and future prevention, are still underfunded and mainly left up to a consortium of university researchers.
The president must also ask Salazar to resign, but without the resignations of his top economic advisors, there is simply no hope of getting a robust demonstration of the ability of the government to do things right and to do them for ordinary people. Obama's covert role in killing the public health insurance option and his opposition to passing a new Glass Steagall Act and bills to limit the size of big banks and regulate derivatives without leaving big loopholes, and so on are clear evidence that he believes corporations are basically able to reform themselves if they get a few gentle nudges from the government. He basically believes in trickle-down economics and is a deficit hawk who has formed a commission that is sure to make proposals about cutting Social Securlty benefits. Asking Obama to make an about-face and preach to the American people about the virtues of a dynamic public sector is not realistic. Without the resignation of the president's core advisors, the role of government in promoting social and economic change will simply not happen with this WH. Unless, that is, the president's base learns how to put more sustained heat on the president, since the possibility of not being reelected is one of the few things he will respond to. It's time for the Dem base to make itself heard.
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