in the end we get a clinton anyway...

The following is an article by Paul Krugman of the NY Times, and exactly why Obama has lost my support...again.

The Obama Agenda

By PAUL KRUGMAN

It's feeling a lot like 1992 right now. It's also feeling a lot like 1980. But which parallel is closer? Is Barack Obama going to be a Ronald Reagan of the left, a president who fundamentally changes the country's direction? Or will he be just another Bill Clinton?

Current polls — not horse-race polls, which are notoriously uninformative until later in the campaign, but polls gauging the public mood — are strikingly similar to those in both 1980 and 1992, years in which an overwhelming majority of Americans were dissatisfied with the country's direction.

So the odds are that this will be a "change" election — which means that it's very much Mr. Obama's election to lose. But if he wins, how much change will he actually deliver?

Reagan, for better or worse — I'd say for worse, but that's another discussion — brought a lot of change. He ran as an unabashed conservative, with a clear ideological agenda. And he had enormous success in getting that agenda implemented. He had his failures, most notably on Social Security, which he tried to dismantle but ended up strengthening. But America at the end of the Reagan years was not the same country it was when he took office.

Bill Clinton also ran as a candidate of change, but it was much less clear what kind of change he was offering. He portrayed himself as someone who transcended the traditional liberal-conservative divide, proposing "a government that offers more empowerment and less entitlement." The economic plan he announced during the campaign was something of a hodgepodge: higher taxes on the rich, lower taxes for the middle class, public investment in things like high-speed rail, health care reform without specifics.

We all know what happened next. The Clinton administration achieved a number of significant successes, from the revitalization of veterans' health care and federal emergency management to the expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit and health insurance for children. But the big picture is summed up by the title of a new book by the historian Sean Wilentz: "The Age of Reagan: A history, 1974-2008."

So whom does Mr. Obama resemble more? At this point, he's definitely looking Clintonesque.

Like Mr. Clinton, Mr. Obama portrays himself as transcending traditional divides. Near the end of last week's "unity" event with Hillary Clinton, he declared that "the choice in this election is not between left or right, it's not between liberal or conservative, it's between the past and the future." Oh-kay.

Mr. Obama's economic plan also looks remarkably like the Clinton 1992 plan: a mixture of higher taxes on the rich, tax breaks for the middle class and public investment (this time with a focus on alternative energy).

Sometimes the Clinton-Obama echoes are almost scary. During his speech accepting the nomination, Mr. Clinton led the audience in a chant of "We can do it!" Remind you of anything?

Just to be clear, we could — and still might — do a lot worse than a rerun of the Clinton years. But Mr. Obama's most fervent supporters expect much more.

Progressive activists, in particular, overwhelmingly supported Mr. Obama during the Democratic primary even though his policy positions, particularly on health care, were often to the right of his rivals'. In effect, they convinced themselves that he was a transformational figure behind a centrist facade.

They may have had it backward.

Mr. Obama looks even more centrist now than he did before wrapping up the nomination. Most notably, he has outraged many progressives by supporting a wiretapping bill that, among other things, grants immunity to telecom companies for any illegal acts they may have undertaken at the Bush administration's behest.

The candidate's defenders argue that he's just being pragmatic — that he needs to do whatever it takes to win, and win big, so that he has the power to effect major change. But critics argue that by engaging in the same "triangulation and poll-driven politics" he denounced during the primary, Mr. Obama actually hurts his election prospects, because voters prefer candidates who take firm stands.

In any case, what about after the election? The Reagan-Clinton comparison suggests that a candidate who runs on a clear agenda is more likely to achieve fundamental change than a candidate who runs on the promise of change but isn't too clear about what that change would involve.

Of course, there's always the possibility that Mr. Obama really is a centrist, after all.

One thing is clear: for Democrats, winning this election should be the easy part. Everything is going their way: sky-high gas prices, a weak economy and a deeply unpopular president. The real question is whether they will take advantage of this once-in-a-generation chance to change the country's direction. And that's mainly up to Mr. Obama.

used to think you understood...taught me right and learned me good...

ain’t your parents america anymore...

there are a few neighborhoods in the capital that have a crime problem (a little thing that tends to happen when you keep people in disgusting poverty while the areas around them are lavishly decorated with useless largesse). there was a time when this would have been tackled with community outreach programs, beat cops walking the streets and neighborhoods banding together. but in the new and improved america of my generation - it is handled like the gaza strip. military-style checkpoints surround these neighborhoods (oddly enough filled with minorities that are not uber-rich). imagine leaving work and trying to get home IN THE CAPITAL OF THE "FREE" WORLD and being surrounded by badges and guns and forced to show proof of residence before you are allowed into your own neighborhood. wake the fuck up people...they are stealing the soul of the nation from us, little bit by little bit. welcome to the new america - gates communities for the haves and martial law for the rest.

and with that in mind, the wall street journal runs an op-ed by another of the moronic "I worship at the alter of milton friendman and would be his lover if he were alive today" democrats entitled "confessions of a pro-trade democrat." although the more appropriate title would be "propoganda for making you poor because I can't actually think for myself, but these are good talking points, even if they only tell a tiny portion of the real story." al from used the opportunity to tell us all that we need to re-embrace "free" market fundamentalist ideology (because we all know how well fundamentalist ideology usually works out) if we want to create "growth." it is the same old bullshit story that anyone that ever bothered to pay attention already knows is dead wrong - "globalization is here to stay...we need to open up markets...poor people around the world will be better off...yadda yadda yadda." only here's the problem - globalization is not here to stay and all one has to do is look to south america. a once booming regional economy of actual strength was crushed thanks to friedman-ites idiocy...and it is finally coming back - when it again embraced socialistic democracy. go figure, it is the same way europe rebuilt itself...the same way germany and japan rebuilt themselves...the same way the fucking united states built itself. globalization is not inevitable and unstoppable - they just really want you to believe the lie so that you don't see who is really to blame..."free" market ideologues that see no problem with "growth" that pushes half the population into less-than-subsistance living. there is a reason that the wealthy need to put up higher and higher gates around their communities...to keep the growing percentages of the population left behind out of view...out of sight, out of mind.

and with that comes the crackdown on immigrants coming over the borders. and they tell us that mexicans coming over here looking for a way to eat are stealing jobs from middle class americans. despite the notion obviously be ludicrous, they use it, and we buy it. the factory in town closed down and you lost your job, your pension, your health care, your home...it was the mexican's fault because he was willing to pick apples for peanuts. only it skips the middle step - the factory shut down because "pro-trade democrats" gave companies incentives to move it to nations without worker protections...and when it got there it paid those workers as if they were expendable, not enough to survive. and so those humans have to go somewhere to try and find a job that will pay them at least enough to eat for the night. and so they come here with the hope that they can build a better future for themselves and their families. only the jokes on them - because this place is headed in the same direction. and so they tell us we need to build more prisons to house people looking for work...because prisons are big business and nothing says america like locking up brown folks for profit.

I was born in the suburbs, never crossed my mind I would not attend college, have a professional degree, work a white collar job...and I have more in common with the guy crossing the river than anyone in the gated community. and so do you...but until we realize this they are going to continue stealing our humanity from us, continue to put profits above all else.

or we could all just move to south america in a decade when their standard of living is head and shoulders above ours...and when we are picking fruit south of the equator maybe we will finally understand.

I'm too tired to smile, or to know that I'm right...

what does that even mean?

as many of you know - I have been slammed as of late...my days and nights spent pouring through countless cases and updates and thousands of pages of records and transcripts trying to right those wrongs that steal a little more of america every day. and so I did not have the time and/or energy to follow the end of the primary season with the vigor I may have liked...but in the process I have realized something very telling about myself and what it may say for america - although I am unsure of what that tell is.

a young black man from a single mother will receive the nomination of the democratic party...a young black man who was born when the democratic party had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the next stage of advancing the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all - even blacks. that same young black man will likely be sworn in as the leader the nation within eight months time.

I am not amazed. but what does that say? it isn't like I ever could even begin to fathom the realities of historic racism in this nation - I grew up in hillary's old stomping grounds and was so assured of attending college I applied to all of one. I am young, I was born well after the civil rights era* and was lucky enough to be part of the generation known more for loafing than anything else.

so what does it say that I am not amazed that a young black man is going to be our president? does it speak well for our youth? or does it speak to just how different of a reality a white guy from the suburbs lives as opposed to a black kid in the city? or is it simultaneously a sign of how far things have come, and how incredibly far is still left to travel.

in the end all I can figure is that the years I have spent in new mexico, the people I have met, known and come to call friend (for some of you, "friend" remains a grossly inadequate nomenclature) have left a profound impact. for that reason, as much as I may bitch when the snows have melted, I would not change it for anything.

and still, I'm stuck with the same questions - what does that say about this world? this country? this place? myself?

remember this, no matter what someone did: that they once were just a kid at breast and in bib, in blanket and crib. so just reach inside yourself and find the part that still needs help, find that part in someone else - and you'll do good.



* I am always perturbed by the term "civil rights era" - it seems to me that it serves only as an indicator of a time past...and I refuse to admit that civil rights are becoming a thing of the past, something that only previous generations concerned themselves with.

Seeing Bobby Kennedy in Barack Obama...

The following is a column by James Ridgeway of Mother Jones.


Seeing Bobby Kennedy in Barack Obama
Forty years after RFK's assassination, Barack picks up where Bobby left off.

James Ridgeway
June 05, 2008

It would be easy to make too much of the similarities between Robert F. Kennedy, who died on the night when the Democratic presidential nomination came within his grasp, 40 years ago today, and Barack Obama, who has just firmly taken hold of it. The times are different, and so are the men. But then again.

Hope, like greatness, is a thing some men have thrust upon them. They emerge as repositories for the finer yearnings of a confused and bitter nation, a mirror in which we see ourselves reflected not as the people we are, but as the people we would like to be—and may, because of them, inch slightly closer to becoming. Whether or not they are worthy of such faith is, in the end, less important than the fact that they inspire us to be more worthy ourselves.

This is why it's a mistake to dismiss Obama as being "only" inspirational. Despite the example set by our current president, competence is not all that difficult to come by in Washington, DC. (In fact, our permanent civil service could get most things done much more effectively without any political leadership at all.) But someone who can make us believe that this country of ours might actually pull itself together and become a little bit more compassionate or a little bit more just, someone who encourages us to dedicate ourselves to that goal rather than to just lowering our taxes or paying less for gasoline—that's something found far more rarely inside the Beltway.

For my generation, I suppose that someone was Bobby Kennedy, though I'm not sure I realized it at the time. On the war, there wasn't much difference between Kennedy and his rival on the left, Eugene McCarthy. They both wanted to get us out of Vietnam. VP Hubert Humphrey may have been the insider candidate, but he came out of the highly progressive Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (as did McCarthy, and late Senator Paul Wellstone), and hewed to a liberal platform that would seem radical by the standards of today's post-Democratic Leadership Council Democratic Party. By contrast, Bobby Kennedy, in many ways, had only recently evolved into a true progressive. And some saw Kennedy, who got into the race only after Lyndon Johnson lost the New Hampshire primary, as an opportunist who was strong on rhetoric but short on substance.

Even Kennedy's most visible virtue, his deep concern for the poor, had its problems. The Kennedy poverty program, run by Sargent Shriver and taken up by Lyndon Johnson after Jack Kennedy's assassination, quickly became a pork-barrel operation. In Chicago, for example, millions of federal dollars were pumped into Mayor Richard Daley's machine. None of the programs were conceived to threaten the status quo, which made them too tame for a lot of activists in the late 1960s. They were bootstrap projects, where the government would provide the poor with job training, education, and health care to help them elevate themselves to a point where they could jump off into the middle class. For the most part, this never happened.

Two parts of the poverty program—Head Start, the program for young children, and Neighborhood Legal Services, which provides free legal assistance to low-income residents—did prove lasting and truly valuable. And some funds managed to filter through to the likes of Saul Alinsky, the legendary community organizer on the South Side of Chicago who advocated confrontation with the Daley machine, and encouraged his groups to engage in civil disobedience if need be. (Alinsky himself, however, knew how to work the system when he needed to. He reminded me of an old-school labor organizer—talking tough but in the end always willing to cut a deal in the back room. And I can remember radicals attacking him for his lack of revolutionary fervor, in the same way, incidentally, they attacked Ralph Nader, who was seen as a patsy for the legal profession. "A guy has to be a political idiot," Alinsky scoffed at radicals back then, "to say all power comes out of the barrel of a gun when the other side has the guns."

Saul Alinsky believed that power flowed up from the streets and was there for the taking, if only people believed they could do so. By 1968, Bobby Kennedy had taken up the idea of "decentralization" (in part, as an alternative to welfare), championing a new Community Action Program (not unlike a more radical model advanced by Students for a Democratic Society), which would allow federal anti-poverty projects—and funds—to be run by the populations they served.

Maybe that had something to do with what began to happen during Bobby Kennedy's brief presidential campaign, when he went out into the streets in the spring of 1968. Or maybe it was just something about the man. My friend Jack Newfield, the late Village Voice reporter, used to say that Kennedy was more priest than politician. Newfield often accompanied Kennedy during a campaign that took him to Indian reservations, into Appalachia, through Brooklyn's Bedford Stuyvesant or East L.A., to small gatherings with family farmers, to classrooms where he sat down and talked with children as if they were actual human beings. Newfield recalled that on a trip through Watts a few days before RFK's death, "He said to me, 'I want you to see what I see. And I see this ecstasy in the eyes of blacks and Mexican Americans.'" The television cameras saw it, too, as they followed him to places they usually wouldn't dream of going, and millions of Americans in their living rooms saw it. You can still see it today, in the old footage—as he walks or rides through the urban streets, people reached out to touch him as they would a talisman, as if the touch alone would empower and dignify them.

Next page: "As he lay dying on the floor of the Ambassador Hotel kitchen pantry..."

As he lay dying on the floor of the Ambassador Hotel kitchen pantry, his head was cradled by a Mexican American busboy. The previous day the same busboy, Juan Romero, had delivered room service to Kennedy. "He shook my hand as hard as anyone had ever shaken it," Romero later said. "I walked out of there 20 feet tall, thinking, 'I'm not just a busboy, I'm a human being.' He made me feel that way."

People like to talk about populism and change, but in the world of gritty American politics, where parties are locked in a petty and intractable clench, change seldom takes place. The people around Kennedy felt he was on the leading edge to a new world. Yet the actual policy changes Bobby Kennedy proposed were modest—for the most part, slightly better versions of the kinds of plans for jobs, health care, or environmental protection that Democrats are still floating today. His approach, however, was something else. When doctors asked Kennedy who was going to pay for improved medical care, he replied, "You will." He told corporate executives they had a moral responsibility to the citizenry. He insisted leaders take responsibility for their actions. George W. Bush is not his type of guy.

In a speech given a few days after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and two months before his own, Kennedy said:

We know what we must do. It is to achieve true justice among our fellow citizens. The question is not what programs we should seek to enact. The question is whether we can find in our own midst and in our own hearts that leadership of humane purpose that will recognize the terrible truths of our existence.

We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of others. We must admit in ourselves that our own children's future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.

Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in our land. Of course we cannot vanquish it with a program, nor with a resolution.

But we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.

Surely, this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.

Barack Obama's speechwriters must have studied this speech and others like it. Yet it means something—even if it does not mean everything we would wish—that words and sentiments like Bobby Kennedy's sound plausible coming from the lips of Obama, as they would from few other politicians I can think of.

Obama is no populist, either, in any meaningful sense of the word; his proposals for change are modest, and his movement about as thin as Bobby Kennedy's. He is a shrewd politician, appealing to the grassroots but also willing to deal with powerful corporate interests, just as Kennedy dealt with the machine politics of Mayor Daley and his ilk, knowing that he could not win without them. But Obama has something close to the same sense of public duty that Bobby Kennedy had. And somewhere inside his chest there seems to be a beating human heart, which is something we haven't had in the White House for a good long time.

On this generation of Americans falls the burden of proving to the world that we really mean it when we say all men are created free and are equal before the law. All of us might wish at times that we lived in a more tranquil world, but we don't. And if our times are difficult and perplexing, so are they challenging and filled with opportunity. - Robert F. Kennedy