On The Real News, Norman Solomon mentioned that a majority of Democratic voters
see Obama as a Godlike figure, which makes it very difficult to talk rationally
with them about some of his policies.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Monday, March 25, 2019 11:48 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Let's Not Whitewash or Mythologize Obama
Barack Obama will most likely go down in history as a "Flat Line"
president. Looking back I ask myself just why Obama made the effort to run at
all? If he truly believed that he could make gains through Compromising with
Republicans, after four years he surely must have gotten the message. Still,
even though the American White banned together to block just about everything
Obama attempted to do, he managed to sell the working class Americans out to
such corporations as the Health Insurance industry.
For 8 years Obama paid his dues, and now is reaping the rewards for being a
"good Lackey".
I wonder if he ever goes back to those folks in Chicago, where he first
expressed such concerns over their well being?
Carl Jarvis
On 3/23/19, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Let's Not Whitewash or Mythologize Obama
Former President Barack Obama speaks at the My Brother's Keeper
Alliance Summit in Oakland, Calif. earlier this year. (Jeff Chiu /
<http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Obama-Utah/a30de0810a0441e3b97
fe14cd
cb00e24/13/0> AP)
With former Vice President Joe Biden seemingly ready to join the
presidential race, a Washington Post reporter recently wrote: "Biden
and his allies picture an election that poses a choice between four
more years of Trump disruption and a chance to restore the Obama
administration."
Ah, the hope of an Obama restoration!
But is a "return to normalcy" truly enough? After decades in which
giant corporations have amassed huge political and financial control
while racial and economic inequities kept widening-and with climate
scientists now telling us that
<https://www.axios.com/un-report-warns-time-is-running-out-global-warm
ing-ac tion-00c54c44-2bca-4ffc-be91-b79a9641eed5.html> planetary
survival requires radical reforms?
And what about the real danger that a return to Obama-style, go-slow
"corporate liberalism" would lead to the next right-wing faux-populist
upsurge, this time commanded by someone far smarter and slicker than Trump?
Given what Trump has done to our country and world, it's no wonder
that many Americans long for Obama. He was not a bigot or insult
artist. His administration was not rocked by major scandal, with top
aides off to prison. He was level-headed:"No Drama Obama." He didn't
deny science.
President Obama was smart, with a vocabulary clearly
<https://www.newsweek.com/trump-fire-and-fury-smart-genius-obama-77416
9> exceeding that of a 4th-grade child. He was hip.
That's what millions of people remember.
I, too, remember all that. But we should also recall the political
substance beyond the pleasant image.
We need to remember the
<https://www.commondreams.org/views/2009/09/24/mystique-free-market-gu
y-obam
a> vacillation-and worse, the
<https://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-cohen/get-ready-for-the-obamago_b
_37045
8.html> opportunism and
<https://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-cohen/hillary-clinton-banks_b_558
4870.h
tml> corporatism. As well as cause and effect: that Obama's tenure
tml> paved
the
way for the rise of Trump.
Progressive analyst Matt Stoller made that case in a
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2017/01/12/democrats
-cant-
win-until-they-recognize-how-bad-obamas-financial-policies-were/?utm_t
erm=.b
c4ec32fba78> well-documented Washington Post column on the eve of
c4ec32fba78> Trump's
inauguration, headlined "Democrats can't win until they recognize how
bad Obama's financial policies were: He had opportunities to help the
working class, and he passed them up." Stoller wrote of the Obama
administration enabling nine million home foreclosures and
anti-consumer corporate mergers, including dangerous consolidation in
health care, partly caused by Obamacare's "lack of a public option for
health coverage." Noting that most new jobs in the Obama years were
temporary or part-time, along with the
<https://www.wsj.com/articles/life-expectancy-for-white-americans-decl
ines-1
461124861> decline in lifespans among whites, Stoller concluded: "When
Democratic leaders don't protect the people, the people get poorer,
they get angry . . ."
Back in 2008, I was delighted when Obama defeated the Clinton machine,
seemingly for good. (If only!) But I wasn't taken in by his "hope" and
"change" rhetoric.
Obama's first presidential run offered reasons to be skeptical-for
example, how he broke records in pocketing Wall Street donations. Once
in office, <https://therealnews.com/stories/cohen0126pt2> those ties
hamstrung his economic policies.
I remember the opportunism of that campaign: How Obama and his team
sought the endorsements of antiwar celebrities in 2007/2008 by saying,
"All of our advisers opposed the Iraq invasion and all of Hillary's
supported it. Why are you on the fence?" And I remember that, as soon
as Hillary was out of the race, Obama chose one pro-war associate
after another, including running mate Joe Biden, probably the single
most important Democrat in
<https://fpif.org/biden_iraq_and_obamas_betrayal/> enabling the Iraq
invasion.
Those hawkish appointees ultimately included Hillary Clinton at the
State Department; they steered Obama to continue-and in some
<https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2017-01-17/obamas-cover
t-dron
e-war-in-numbers-ten-times-more-strikes-than-bush> actions,
<https://www.thenation.com/article/obama-moving-war-terror-africa/>
areas and
<https://www.businessinsider.com/obama-aumf-trump-al-shabab-2016-11>
powers, expand-the
<https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-0315-bacevich-countering-
islami sm-20160315-story.html> ineffective and
<https://theintercept.com/2018/11/19/civilian-casualties-us-war-on-ter
ror/> immoral "War on Terror" inherited from Bush, and passed on to
Trump.
Two days after Obama's 2008 election, I remember how even my small
sliver of hope evaporated when he selected Rahm Emanuel as his chief
of staff-a stridently pro-corporate, pro-war Democrat despised by
progressives since he worked in the Clinton White House and helped
lead legislative campaigns that pushed through the NAFTA trade pact,
the 1994 crime bill, and welfare "reform."
Like Emanuel, Obama's next two chiefs of staff
<https://dailycaller.com/2012/01/10/obamas-third-chief-of-staff-like-f
irst-t wo-got-rich-on-wall-street/> also came out of big finance:
William Daley from JPMorgan Chase and Jacob Lew from Citigroup.
It's well-documented that Obama loaded his
<https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2009/12/henhouse-meet-fox-wall-s
treet- washington-obama/> team of economic advisers with Wall
Streeters. So it's no accident that Wall Street was bailed out rather
than underwater homeowners during
<https://money.cnn.com/2010/01/14/real_estate/record_foreclosure_year/
the biggest foreclosure wave in US history. The inside story ofObama's semi-regular capitulation to economic elites is told in
<https://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/02/books/review/confidence-men-by-ron
-suski nd-book-review.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all> Ron Suskind's book
"Confidence
Men:
Wall Street, Washington, and the Education of a President." Largely
with GOP support-and over the objections of most Democrats in
Congress-Obama
<https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/22/business/international/trans-pacif
ic-par tnership-obama.html> kept pushing the corporate-friendly
Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal until his last months in office.
Obama appointed
<https://www.organicconsumers.org/essays/obama-supports-food-incs-worl
d-domi
nation-and-all-we-get-white-house-garden> Monsanto executives and
nation-and-all-we-get-white-house-garden> allies to
key food and agriculture jobs. While he acknowledged the science of
climate change and talked of the need for action, Obama's tenure
coincided with a boom in U.S. oil
<https://money.cnn.com/2016/07/21/investing/trump-energy-plan-obama-oi
l-boom
/index.html> production and
<https://business.financialpost.com/commodities/energy/america-has-bui
lt-the
-equivalent-of-10-keystone-pipelines-since-2010-and-no-one-said-anything>
lethal infrastructure, and his administration
<https://business.financialpost.com/commodities/energy/america-has-bui
lt-the
-equivalent-of-10-keystone-pipelines-since-2010-and-no-one-said-anything>
fervently promoted fracking worldwide.
His health care reform, which originated with the conservative
<https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2011/10/20/how-a-conservat
ive-th ink-tank-invented-the-individual-mandate/#53822b836187>
Heritage Foundation, expanded health coverage largely by enriching
private insurance firms and Big Pharma, whose
<https://www.propublica.org/article/inside-the-administrations-deal-wi
th-the
-pharmaceutical-lobby-0223> lobbyists were allowed to
<https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/13/internal-memo-confirms-bi_n
_25828 5.html> obstruct cost controls. Obamacare did expand Medicaid
and
<https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/10/29/upshot/obamacare-who-w
as-hel ped-most.html> increase coverage in poor and rural communities
and to young people, but it still left millions uninsured.
In one lengthy, link-filled sentence, journalist Nathan J. Robinson
<https://www.currentaffairs.org/2019/03/the-obama-boys> summarized the
progressive critique of Obama:
He deported
<https://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/08/trump-deportations-behind-o
bama-l
evels-241420> staggering numbers of immigrants, let Wall Street
evels-241420> criminals
<https://theintercept.com/2016/07/12/eric-holders-longtime-excuse-for-
not-pr osecuting-banks-just-crashed-and-burned/> off the hook, failed
to take on (and now proudly
<https://www.apnews.com/5dfbc1aa17701ae219239caad0bfefb2>
boasts of support for) the fossil fuel industry,
<https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-saudi-security/obama-administr
ation-
arms-sales-offers-to-saudi-top-115-billion-report-idUSKCN11D2JQ> sold
arms-sales-offers-to-saudi-top-115-billion-report-idUSKCN11D2JQ> over
$100 billion in arms to the brutal Saudi government,
<https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/24/world/asia/killing-of-americans-de
epens- debate-over-proper-use-of-drone-strikes.html> killed American
citizens with drones (and then made
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWKG6ZmgAX4>
sickening jokes about it), killed lots more non-American citizens with
drones (
<https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2014/01/yemenis-seek-justi
ce-wed ding-drone-strike-201418135352298935.html> including Yemenis
going to a
wedding) and then
<https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/07/05/do-not-believe-the-u-s-governmen
ts-off
icial-numbers-on-drone-strike-civilian-casualties> misled the public
icial-numbers-on-drone-strike-civilian-casualties> about
it, promised '
<https://www.propublica.org/article/trying-to-get-records-from-most-tr
anspar
ent-administration-ever> the most transparent administration ever' and
ent-administration-ever> then
was '
<https://archives.cjr.org/behind_the_news/cjp_report_on_us_press_freed
om.php
worse than Nixon' in his paranoia about leakers, pushed ahealth care plan based on
market-friendly
<https://healthjournalism.org/blog/2017/02/looking-at-the-conservative
-herit age-of-some-core-aca-features/> conservative premises instead
of aiming for single-payer, and showered Israel with both public
support and military aid even as it systematically violated the human
rights of Palestinians.
Yes, Obama faced intense Republican obstruction in Congress. But it
wasn't Mitch McConnell who stacked the Obama administration with
corporatist appointees
<https://www.commondreams.org/views/2011/07/24/obama-not-caving-corpor
ate-in
terests> and policies.
In pure math, Obama's tenure was
<https://fair.org/home/wapo-warns-dems-that-progressive-policies-could
-bring -them-many-victories/> a boon to the GOP-Democrats lost their
big majorities in the U.S. House and Senate and
<http://www.ncsl.org/research/about-state-legislatures/partisan-composition.
aspx#Timelines> nearly 1,000 state legislative seats, while the 50
governorships shifted from a sizable Democratic margin to strong
Republican majority.
My point is simple: It's not good enough to "restore" Obama-ism. Look
at the recent pattern of presidential history: When corporate-beholden
Democrats win the White House and implement cautious, status-quo
policies while inequality worsens, two things happen: 1) Right-wing
Republicans quickly take back Congress, and 2) An even more dangerous
GOP president follows.
The last two Democratic presidents gave "hope" a bad name. First, Bill
Clinton, "the man from Hope (Arkansas)," and then Barack Obama, whose
iconic campaign poster featured the word. Both made it difficult for
their successor to be a Democrat.
To break this hopeless cycle, what's needed is the election of a
progressive president who will fight to radically shift power and
wealth away from the corporate 1 percent toward a multi-racial
coalition of the 99 percent and toward environmental sanity. Bernie
Sanders would fit the bill. So might Elizabeth Warren. But tepid
Democrats who preach moderation and bipartisanship-and seek to restore
<https://abcnews.go.com/ABC_Univision/Politics/obama-considered-modera
te-rep ublican-1980s/story?id=17973080> Obama-era incrementalism-never
will.
The outcome in 2020, as in the last presidential election, may well
hinge on Midwestern voters and two essential questions: 1) Will youths
and people of color be
<https://democraticautopsy.org/voter-participation-and-the-party/>
inspired enough to turn out in big numbers for the Democratic
candidate? 2) Will working-class whites swing back to the Democrats?
I learned a bit about white, working-class voters in the "Rust Belt"
while co-producing a new documentary movie, "
<http://www.whitepinepictures.com/project/the-corporate-coup-detat/?v=
7516fd
43adaa> The Corporate Coup D'Etat," on the simultaneous, 40-year rise
43adaa> in
both economic inequality and corporate political power. Our film team
interviewed corporate-loathing Ohioans who'd voted for Obama, chose
Bernie over Hillary in the Democratic primary, and then flipped to
populist-sounding Trump in the general election as an alternative to
the dreaded status quo.
Winning back these voters-and inspiring voters of color and youth-will
require a Democratic nominee who is a forward-looking, progressive
populist.
While it's true that "any Democrat is better than Trump," reverting
back to the Obama era is a return to a status quo that stopped working
for millions of voters long ago.
<https://www.truthdig.com/author/jeff_cohen/> Jeff Cohen
Jeff Cohen is director of the Park Center for Independent Media at
Ithaca College. He co-founded the online activism group
RootsAction.org in 2011 and founded the media watch group FAIR in
1986. He.
