The Mighty Ship of State has foundered on the icy coast of a Land
called Hades. The fat rats have abandoned the Ship, heading for their
Off Shore Banks, while the ship's orchestra gathers on the tilting
deck and begins playing, "God Bless America!"
And the S O S goes out into the dark, stormy blackness. But there is
no answer.
Carl Jarvis
On 1/9/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
The Nation should have included this in their wonderful issue this week.
They included a variety of opinions but perhaps Dr. Cornell West was a bit
too much for them. He reflects my thoughts and feelings, however.
Miriam
West writes: "What a sad legacy for our hope and change candidate - even as
we warriors go down swinging in the fading names of truth and justice."
Barack Obama. (photo: Olivier Douliery/ABACAUSA.com)
Pity the Sad Legacy of Barack Obama
By Cornel West, Guardian UK
09 January 17
Our hope and change candidate fell short time and time again. Obama
cheerleaders who refused to make him accountable bear some responsibility
Eight years ago the world was on the brink of a grand celebration: the
inauguration of a brilliant and charismatic black president of the United
States of America. Today we are on the edge of an abyss: the installation
of
a mendacious and cathartic white president who will replace him.
This is a depressing decline in the highest office of the most powerful
empire in the history of the world. It could easily produce a pervasive
cynicism and poisonous nihilism. Is there really any hope for truth and
justice in this decadent time? Does America even have the capacity to be
honest about itself and come to terms with its self-destructive addiction
to
money-worship and cowardly xenophobia?
Ralph Waldo Emerson and Herman Melville - the two great public
intellectuals
of 19th-century America - wrestled with similar questions and reached the
same conclusion as Heraclitus: character is destiny ("sow a character and
you reap a destiny").
The age of Barack Obama may have been our last chance to break from our
neoliberal soulcraft. We are rooted in market-driven brands that shun
integrity and profit-driven policies that trump public goods. Our
"post-integrity" and "post-truth" world is suffocated by entertaining
brands
and money-making activities that have little or nothing to do with truth,
integrity or the long-term survival of the planet. We are witnessing the
postmodern version of the full-scale gangsterization of the world.
The reign of Obama did not produce the nightmare of Donald Trump - but it
did contribute to it. And those Obama cheerleaders who refused to make him
accountable bear some responsibility.
A few of us begged and pleaded with Obama to break with the Wall Street
priorities and bail out Main Street. But he followed the advice of his
"smart" neoliberal advisers to bail out Wall Street. In March 2009, Obama
met with Wall Street leaders. He proclaimed: I stand between you and the
pitchforks. I am on your side and I will protect you, he promised them. And
not one Wall Street criminal executive went to jail.
We called for the accountability of US torturers of innocent Muslims and
the
transparency of US drone strikes killing innocent civilians. Obama's
administration told us no civilians had been killed. And then we were told
a
few had been killed. And then told maybe 65 or so had been killed. Yet when
an American civilian, Warren Weinstein, was killed in 2015 there was an
immediate press conference with deep apologies and financial compensation.
And today we still don't know how many have had their lives taken away.
We hit the streets again with Black Lives Matter and other groups and went
to jail for protesting against police killing black youth. We protested
when
the Israeli Defense Forces killed more than 2,000 Palestinians (including
550 children) in 50 days. Yet Obama replied with words about the difficult
plight of police officers, department investigations (with no police going
to jail) and the additional $225m in financial support of the Israeli army.
Obama said not a mumbling word about the dead Palestinian children but he
did call Baltimore black youth "criminals and thugs".
In addition, Obama's education policy unleashed more market forces that
closed hundreds of public schools for charter ones. The top 1% got nearly
two-thirds of the income growth in eight years even as child poverty,
especially black child poverty, remained astronomical. Labor insurgencies
in
Wisconsin, Seattle and Chicago (vigorously opposed by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, a
close confidant of Obama) were passed over in silence.
In 2009, Obama called New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg an "outstanding
mayor". Yet he overlooked the fact that more than 4 million people were
stopped-and-frisked under Bloomberg's watch. Along with Carl Dix and
others,
I sat in a jail two years later for protesting these very same policies
that
Obama ignored when praising Bloomberg.
Yet the mainstream media and academia failed to highlight these painful
truths linked to Obama. Instead, most well-paid pundits on TV and radio
celebrated the Obama brand. And most black spokespeople shamelessly
defended
Obama's silences and crimes in the name of racial symbolism and their own
careerism. How hypocritical to see them now speak truth to white power when
most went mute in the face of black power. Their moral authority is weak
and
their newfound militancy is shallow.
The gross killing of US citizens with no due process after direct orders
from Obama was cast aside by neoliberal supporters of all colors. And
Edward
Snowden, Chelsea Manning, Jeffrey Sterling and other truth-tellers were
demonized just as the crimes they exposed were hardly mentioned.
The president's greatest legislative achievement was to provide healthcare
for over 25 million citizens, even as another 20 million are still
uncovered. But it remained a market-based policy, created by the
conservative Heritage Foundation and first pioneered by Mitt Romney in
Massachusetts.
Obama's lack of courage to confront Wall Street criminals and his lapse of
character in ordering drone strikes unintentionally led to rightwing
populist revolts at home and ugly Islamic fascist rebellions in the Middle
East. And as deporter-in-chief - nearly 2.5 million immigrants were
deported
under his watch - Obama policies prefigure Trump's barbaric plans.
Bernie Sanders gallantly tried to generate a leftwing populism but he was
crushed by Clinton and Obama in the unfair Democratic party primaries. So
now we find ourselves entering a neofascist era: a neoliberal economy on
steroids, a reactionary repressive attitude toward domestic "aliens", a
militaristic cabinet eager for war and in denial of global warming. All the
while, we are seeing a wholesale eclipse of truth and integrity in the name
of the Trump brand, facilitated by the profit-hungry corporate media.
What a sad legacy for our hope and change candidate - even as we warriors
go
down swinging in the fading names of truth and justice.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid. Error! Hyperlink reference not
valid.
Barack Obama. (photo: Olivier Douliery/ABACAUSA.com)
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/09/barack-obama-legacy-pr
esidencyhttps://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/09/barack-obama-l
egacy-presidency
Pity the Sad Legacy of Barack Obama
By Cornel West, Guardian UK
09 January 17
Our hope and change candidate fell short time and time again. Obama
cheerleaders who refused to make him accountable bear some responsibility
ight years ago the world was on the brink of a grand celebration: the
inauguration of a brilliant and charismatic black president of the United
States of America. Today we are on the edge of an abyss: the installation
of
a mendacious and cathartic white president who will replace him.
This is a depressing decline in the highest office of the most powerful
empire in the history of the world. It could easily produce a pervasive
cynicism and poisonous nihilism. Is there really any hope for truth and
justice in this decadent time? Does America even have the capacity to be
honest about itself and come to terms with its self-destructive addiction
to
money-worship and cowardly xenophobia?
Ralph Waldo Emerson and Herman Melville - the two great public
intellectuals
of 19th-century America - wrestled with similar questions and reached the
same conclusion as Heraclitus: character is destiny ("sow a character and
you reap a destiny").
The age of Barack Obama may have been our last chance to break from our
neoliberal soulcraft. We are rooted in market-driven brands that shun
integrity and profit-driven policies that trump public goods. Our
"post-integrity" and "post-truth" world is suffocated by entertaining
brands
and money-making activities that have little or nothing to do with truth,
integrity or the long-term survival of the planet. We are witnessing the
postmodern version of the full-scale gangsterization of the world.
The reign of Obama did not produce the nightmare of Donald Trump - but it
did contribute to it. And those Obama cheerleaders who refused to make him
accountable bear some responsibility.
A few of us begged and pleaded with Obama to break with the Wall Street
priorities and bail out Main Street. But he followed the advice of his
"smart" neoliberal advisers to bail out Wall Street. In March 2009, Obama
met with Wall Street leaders. He proclaimed: I stand between you and the
pitchforks. I am on your side and I will protect you, he promised them. And
not one Wall Street criminal executive went to jail.
We called for the accountability of US torturers of innocent Muslims and
the
transparency of US drone strikes killing innocent civilians. Obama's
administration told us no civilians had been killed. And then we were told
a
few had been killed. And then told maybe 65 or so had been killed. Yet when
an American civilian, Warren Weinstein, was killed in 2015 there was an
immediate press conference with deep apologies and financial compensation.
And today we still don't know how many have had their lives taken away.
We hit the streets again with Black Lives Matter and other groups and went
to jail for protesting against police killing black youth. We protested
when
the Israeli Defense Forces killed more than 2,000 Palestinians (including
550 children) in 50 days. Yet Obama replied with words about the difficult
plight of police officers, department investigations (with no police going
to jail) and the additional $225m in financial support of the Israeli army.
Obama said not a mumbling word about the dead Palestinian children but he
did call Baltimore black youth "criminals and thugs".
In addition, Obama's education policy unleashed more market forces that
closed hundreds of public schools for charter ones. The top 1% got nearly
two-thirds of the income growth in eight years even as child poverty,
especially black child poverty, remained astronomical. Labor insurgencies
in
Wisconsin, Seattle and Chicago (vigorously opposed by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, a
close confidant of Obama) were passed over in silence.
In 2009, Obama called New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg an "outstanding
mayor". Yet he overlooked the fact that more than 4 million people were
stopped-and-frisked under Bloomberg's watch. Along with Carl Dix and
others,
I sat in a jail two years later for protesting these very same policies
that
Obama ignored when praising Bloomberg.
Yet the mainstream media and academia failed to highlight these painful
truths linked to Obama. Instead, most well-paid pundits on TV and radio
celebrated the Obama brand. And most black spokespeople shamelessly
defended
Obama's silences and crimes in the name of racial symbolism and their own
careerism. How hypocritical to see them now speak truth to white power when
most went mute in the face of black power. Their moral authority is weak
and
their newfound militancy is shallow.
The gross killing of US citizens with no due process after direct orders
from Obama was cast aside by neoliberal supporters of all colors. And
Edward
Snowden, Chelsea Manning, Jeffrey Sterling and other truth-tellers were
demonized just as the crimes they exposed were hardly mentioned.
The president's greatest legislative achievement was to provide healthcare
for over 25 million citizens, even as another 20 million are still
uncovered. But it remained a market-based policy, created by the
conservative Heritage Foundation and first pioneered by Mitt Romney in
Massachusetts.
Obama's lack of courage to confront Wall Street criminals and his lapse of
character in ordering drone strikes unintentionally led to rightwing
populist revolts at home and ugly Islamic fascist rebellions in the Middle
East. And as deporter-in-chief - nearly 2.5 million immigrants were
deported
under his watch - Obama policies prefigure Trump's barbaric plans.
Bernie Sanders gallantly tried to generate a leftwing populism but he was
crushed by Clinton and Obama in the unfair Democratic party primaries. So
now we find ourselves entering a neofascist era: a neoliberal economy on
steroids, a reactionary repressive attitude toward domestic "aliens", a
militaristic cabinet eager for war and in denial of global warming. All the
while, we are seeing a wholesale eclipse of truth and integrity in the name
of the Trump brand, facilitated by the profit-hungry corporate media.
What a sad legacy for our hope and change candidate - even as we warriors
go
down swinging in the fading names of truth and justice.
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
