Looks like someone is trying to fence their wares and use Truthdig to do it.

These 4 interviews with Professor Cohen are what is being talked about on this thread:

Progressives and the Democratic Party - Part 1:
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=4775

Progressives and the Democratic Party - Part 2:
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=4783

Progressives and the Democratic Party - Part 3:
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=4786

Progressives and the Democratic Party - Part 4:
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=4787

Professor Cohen pretty much covers the whole political spectrum and even tells us what can be done about the Right-Wing’s corporate takeover.

Reform will not happen in 1 year, and not 4 years or 8 years.  It took 40 years for the Conservative Republicans to demise our economy to the degree that the economy is in today, and it will take at least 1/2 that time to return our economy to a level playing field between the populace, liberals, and the elite, conservatives.  But, reform and real change will never happen for the populace with Republicans in office.  The populace will have to keep Democrats in office and keep using the Primary Elections, like the Republicans do, to clean the corruption out of the Democratic Party, so that the populace will be able to get control of the Democratic Party.  It can be done if the populace won’t give up, there can’t be any giving up if we want our country taken back from corporate control.

Sign of what’s to come:

“the strength and the prosperity of the American economy was too evident to
engender concern about the costs”

- Paul A. Volcker, 1990’s when he was Federal Reserve Board Chairman

If Obama ever said “Make me do it” it was probably because he had no idea what
he was talking about because he was reading from a script.  His writers probably
were listening to too many FDR speeches.  Besides he wasn’t addressing the
Democratic Congress at all when he said it.. he was talking to ordinary people
who helped elect him on the grassroots level which is something else. 

Gerard: you think that the Democrats give a hoot about a grass root?  But ever
since the 80’s and the concoction of the DLC the opposite has been true.  Maybe
President O thinks he is down but he put himself in a pickle because anyone who
is elected in office can’t possibly serve the grassroots unless they betray the hand
that fed them in the first place.  He is indebted to Wall Street and that who will
write his speeches from now on.

One stunning omission is this:  Remember Obama saying “Make me do it!” meaning, apparently, “I will need you citizens to back me up so I have power to do what should be done.”
  If he really had meant this, the Democratic Party would have followed through by doing everything they could to keep their grassroots organization together, and to lead local supporters by indicating specifically what they could do and how to do it effectively.
  Since this never happened, I think we can safely presume, sadly, that the early pleas for support were window-dressing for the benefit of popular appeal.
  The kind of policies he has actually promoted have been far from the public’s interest, which is doubly disappointing in view of his “I want you to help me” duplicity.  Of course the Democratic Party shares in this double-speak. The result:  The grassroots disunified and disgruntled, and going nowhere—a vacuum for unprincipled exploitaton.

KidGenius…..

There is something fundamentally wrong with our government as a whole and the best we can do at this point is expose it.

While I think your pseudonym here displays a bit of arrogance, how does that song lyric go…” all the years youve called yourself a genius and I never knew what you meant…” nevertheless I agree with this first statement.

However, exposing and complaining are different and id hope as a journalist you’d understand that.  Stop with your false opinions please, i, like the rest of the world would like to read real intelligent news instead of OpEds.

The opinions of self styled “genius’” notwithstanding exposing or complaining is in the eye of the beholder and the purpose of this site is both enlightmenment and complaint, the real substance lies in the method not the madness.

The fact of the matter is, President obama has his back firmly placed against a wall trying to push a boulder that wont move.  I’m sure it is as frustrating to him as to us, however, we are no saints either and we cave in all the time under pressure.

Another opinion might be that Obama has demonstrated a willingness sown the seeds of his own destruction by accepting so much money from those he so quickly sought to bail out of their own swamp of illegality and excessive greed. His sysiphian task was certainly made much harder by his appointment to his administration of those who are quite certain to push that boulder in opposition to the direction Obama preaches but never seems to practice.

1.) callaconvention.org

2.) fixcongressfirst.org

As bad as I hate it, President Obama made it possible for the Wall Street moguls to be able to mistreat him, possibly he will learn from his mistakes and not be led by the DLC Republicans-Lite.

President Obama needs to learn that his power is in the populace, not Wall Street; when he learns that, he will quit throwing the populace to the Hitleresque Republicans of ResistNet.com and Grassfire.net and start rallying the populace instead of letting these Hitleresque Republican organizations militarily propagandize the populace into thinking that the Obama administration is Hitler and the cause of our economic woes, instead of the Republican Party and their cooperators, that are the actual Hitleresque culprits.

KidGenius wrote:
“Obama i believe is a strong president.  i also believe, we’ll start seeing more of his strength evolve as time goes on.”
_____________________________________________________

Keep dreaming and enjoying your wishful thinking.
Since his election more than a year ago, everything Obama did or didn’t do, in addition to all the people he selected for key positions, all that, belies that nonsense you wrote.
Obama is a weak president who lack leadership, who is completely beholden to Wall St. and big money corporations.
If you already cann’t see that, then remove those blinders from your eyes or stop taking that stuff that is clouding your awareness.

He had a chance for change and he blew it BIG time!  First with the WS bail out;
followed by cutting off funding to Acorn; followed by the surge in Afghanistan;
followed by watering down the health care bill;  followed by pushing nuclear
power; and it just goes on and on… let down after let down.  By the way none of
this is what the people want.  It just goes to show that you can’t be on both sides
at the same time.  And it is clear that their are the two sides:  the people and the
elites.  And it is also clear that they have completely different interests and that a
war is being waged.  Hell, if you want to take it to it’s logical conclusion I’d say
Obama should be accused of treason.

hello. i love this country! a year of disappointments, questions about control, people questioning why? fat cats beholden to themselves (not alike corporate oil shareholders): rhetorically posturing a devil in Republican or Democratic clothing. there are problems coming to a head, in this country; for a change: and that restores my hope. it is finally here. hope and change. i hope, i can be inspired, to open my own business soon; because tax corrections: will take the place of burdensome small business disincentives. hopefully businesses will be placed on level competitive playing fields with global markets. i want to join the self absorbed masses, working to improve our standard of living. those fat cats own us, and our children; and everything is tilted pretty far into their favor. most people coming out of college are employed to maintain their wealth. i still have a chance to sweat for my own profit, and enable myself to afford the evolving toys for compensation. and if i am successful, by owning my own land: i can help whomever i choose. government and fat cats need to stop leeching, a disproportionate amount of dollars from small business, or i (along with many others), will refuse to take the business risk. i have hope, that our country will continue along this course of change: away from over taxation, away from capitalism in politics, away from unfair trade policies, away from the failures of present government: and continue the surge for change, that is rising across this beautiful nation. i have never trusted what a man says whom makes his living using his mouth. Hitler was a good public speaker. name calling rhetoric does not enact change. when we change, our government will change; and we have changed. our government is slow, but we are motivated to move it in the right direction: for a prosperous middle class reemerging; to support our lower classes. fat cats: be prepared to invest in Americans! once government represents the will of the people: we will be full speed ahead. i hope we continue to change government.

@KidGenius

I would remind you of something FDR said about Social Security while campaigning before the program was passed.

“You have to make me do it.”

And Obama only digs the hole deeper.

  In their arrogant pandering to fill the campaign coffers, it seemed never to occur to them that by betraying and demoralizing the base might lose them elections.

  They must think we are really stupid—but at least we know whose side Obama is on. Not ours.

mr sheer,

This, like most of your blogs does a lot to blow hot smoke, but does little or nothing to help the situation.  There is something fundamentally wrong with our government as a whole and the best we can do at this point is expose it.  However, exposing and complaining are different and id hope as a journalist you’d understand that.  Stop with your false opinions please, i, like the rest of the world would like to read real intelligent news instead of OpEds.

The fact of the matter is, President obama has his back firmly placed against a wall trying to push a boulder that wont move.  I’m sure it is as frustrating to him as to us, however, we are no saints either and we cave in all the time under pressure.

Instead of the complaints, you should use your talents to rally your readers instead of getting them all worked up over a topic that has literally been business as usual for at least the last 30 to 40 years. 

May I remind you and the reader base that Carter couldn’t do anything about it and Clinton was almost a 1 term president because both being as idealistic as they were when entering office, were in fact waging war with a Goliath they completely underestimated.

Obama i believe is a strong president.  i also believe, we’ll start seeing more of his strength evolve as time goes on.  Do not over simplify this unusually complex problem either.  There are a lot of responsible community and regional banks that work well under the current system and any law that is passed will also affect them as well.

This also goes without saying, you people only see failure which is hardly the case.  President Obama, in one year has already proven to be much better president than we’ve had for a long time…let me reiterate ONE YEAR.  Let the man do his frigging job and take your complaints back to grade school where they belong.

@Creeper:
“If we hadn’t started a stupid war for absolutely the WRONG reason we would probably have a lot more money in our country!”

Exactly. Though I appreciate your heartfelt loyalty to and your desire to see it through, I would pose the following questions to you

-Have either of the wars that Bush started ended?

-Has the Consitution and the rule of law been restored?

-can American citizens still be declared terrorists or enemy combatants and summarily held without charge or assassinated?

-Has Guantanamo been closed?

-Have war-profiteers stopped benefitting from Iraqi, Afghan and American blood?

-Have any of our war criminals been brought to justice?

-Have any of the Bush era police-state measures been reversed.

-Have we seen an independent prosecutor appointed to investigate the road to war or how we conducted those wars, the surveillance state, or the high financial crimes against our our country?

-Have we seen any charges for anti-trust violations?

-Have any of the CEOs of these major banks so much as resigned?

-At the very least, has Obama discussed any of the above listed greivances publicly or taken his attempts to resolve them to the bully-pulpit and garner support from the American people?

And finally, would we be in this mess if conservatives had held Bush’s feet to the fire instead of backing him no matter what?

The answer to all of these questions is a resounding no.

I appreciate solidarity. Honestly I do. But the first question I have to ask is what am I standing in solidarity with?

We have seen almost nothing of substantive value from the Democrats for the better part of 20 or 30 years. The failed health care debate should be a wake up call to us all as an illustration that they have been coopted by corporate influence. It’s time to end the “lesser of two evils” rationalization for maintaining a broken, or dare I say hostile, two-party system. It’s time to defect from the Democratic party, who’ve had increasing power since the 2006 congressional party swap and done nothing.

the-creeper, February 11 at 3:17 am

After all what Obama did or didn’t do in the last year and the people he selected for key positions, it is glaringly obvious that Obama is Bush 3.
So, when someone comes and says that Obama was in office only one year and we should give him more time, then I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
“The-creeper” either was asleep all last year or he is a TROLL for the DLC.

the-creeper, February 11 at 3:17 am

Of all the comments regarding valid criticisms of our president this “hes only been in office for———(six months, nine months, one year, two years , three years)” is simplistic and basically holds no water.

I don’t think we’re going to see much in the way of a real crackdown from Obama.  The bankers and funny money schemes and scams fund all the politicians social engineering programs, including the next big one… the move towards more worldly or at least regional governments and institutions.  The military/security complex also feasts off of the Fed printing press, so why would anyone with any power really go after these people?  I don’t expect much more than rhetoric from Obama.  Tell your kids… why be a scientist or engineer when you probably won’t get to solve real problems cause most of the funding is for cybersecurity or bombs or government book keeping.  Just suck up to the system and get a piece of the pie or go into finance and make up some bullshit financial “instrument” leveraged by the capital generated from those doing real work into gigantic profits insured by your government minions.  Why study real things… study the Carry Trade or derivatives, or how to look good in front of the camera pushing people’s buttons to get elected and take more power for yourself.

I mean, as much as I appreciate talking with all of you, I’m under no illusion that what I’m doing here is practicing ‘democracy.’ Nope. Like all of you, I’m venting to be heard. Personally, I think Howard Zinn’s take of democracy fit best. he believed that it only ever worked when people went out and agitated and disrupted the system to such a degree that it was forced to address their grievances. Sitting here typing on Truthdig until election day will not do it. That too, is a choice.
**********
I couldn’t agree with you more, No_Man’s_Land. What we should be doing here is discussing our strategy for, not restoring, but establishing democracy in America for the first time, while turning the country in a powerfully progressive direction.

I think we’re clearly at a rare turning point in history and we all have to get into this fight, or there will be no tomorrow worth living in for ourselves, our children, or their children.

So, Obama’s not “The One.” So what? He might be pushed to the left by a growing, noisy progressive movement, while with the other guys… you know, forget it.

That is the task before us, as I see it. Build the movement, challenge centrist and right-wing Dems in the primaries with real progressive candidates, and generally organize people to get the message out there. Our power is actually amplified now because everything is in flux. We just have to BELIEVE, no one else can do that for us.

Tragically, Mr. Scheer has accurately characterized Obama’s lame and half-
hearted attempts, first at healthcare reform and now financial markets/industry
regulation.  I still WANT to believe that Obama is simply having trouble finding his
way, stumbling a little given the overwhelming number of overwhelming issues
and problems his administration has had to confront this past year.  However I
find myself no longer moved by his stirring rhetoric given how little real ‘change’,
even action of any significance, comes after the speech is done.  Yes Congress is
dysfunctional but the administration’s handling of healthcare reform is so
emblematic of their calm and passionless ‘leadership’ of reform….leading to no
reform at all.
Now we have the President sternly lecturing a bunch of riverboat gamblers to
‘clean up their act’.  Wow! That is bound to lead to big changes!

“Avoid the necessity of those overgrown military establishment, which under
the form of government are inauspicious to liberty, and which are to be
regarded as particularly hostile to Republican Liberty.”  - George Washington
[farewell address]

“I hope we shall… crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed
corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of
strength and to bid defiance to the laws of our country.”  - Thomas Jefferson
[November 12, 1816]

“we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether
sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.” - Eisenhower

——————————————————————————————-
“Real change comes only when people form a movement so large that
Washington has no choice but to listen… It’s the only way to change the
nation.” - John F.Kerry

“the best enforcers are engaged citizens”  - Thomas Friedman

“the United States is like a giant boiler.  Once the fire is ignited under it, there
is no limit to the power it can generate”  - Winston Churchill

The fatal flaw in Samson’s suggestion about the supposed salutary effects of “independent candidates” on democrats “twenty years” hence, is that there’s no way in hell this charade can keep going another twenty years.  Even two, at this point, is pretty optimistic.

For some of us, though, that’s the “Good News.”

HokaHey!

I would like to commend the 54 congress member who had the tumerity to stand up to AIPAC.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/135841

If anyone needs to be reelected it is them.

“The left” has two choices in this 2010 election year.

1.  Stay home.  If they do this, the Obama will suffer defeats in these mid-terms.  The bad news is that the credit for these defeats will not go to the left. Instead, the corporate media will spin this as the backlash from the teabaggers.

2.  Run independent candidates.  What the left really needs to do is to run independent campaigns in all the CLOSE races.  Then, when Obama’s Democrats get the defeats they deserve, there can be no question that it was the year of the “Pissed Off Progressives” that sunk Obama during the mid-terms.

We can’t afford to stay home.  But if we compete with our own candidates, we can teach the Democrats such a lesson that they won’t take the left for granted for another 20 years.

When a news network has to constantly promote that they are ‘fair’ and ‘balanced’, then it is quite likely that they are neither.

When a politician has to constantly promote that they are for ‘change’ and ‘hope’, then it is quite likely that they are for neither.

Paul Wellstone never had to stand under a giant banner that read ‘CHANGE’ for everyone to know where he stood.

Obama had to stand under a giant banner that read ‘CHANGE’ because he’d never really fought for change in his political career.

truedigger3

In case you haven’t noticed, Obama’s based has deserted him and most likely the Dems as well. Its no longer about Dem or Repub. Its about democracy vs corporate dictatorship—and the corpos are winning.

Take to the streets or kiss it all goodbye…

Mr. Scheer and the Democrats have always overstated the amount of ‘grassroots’ contributions Obama received.  Opensecrets.org did a study, and found it was about 1/3rd of his money.

Since Obama set a new overwhelming record of raising $750 million (the old record was Bush at around $375), this means about $250 million came in from the grassroots.  (They studied contributions of under $200).

This means $500 million of ‘big contributions’ came into Obama’s accounts.  To put that another way, Obama raised more in ‘big contributions’ alone than the Bush/Cheney financial steamroller of 2004 got in all contributions.  A lot more.

Anyone who was paying attention knew Obama was bought long before the election.  To understand this, go back to 2007 and read the early stories that came out after the fundraising totals were revealed for each quarter.

Obama started the 2008 campaign with the label that he was only running to establish himself for a 2012 run.  What changed that and what made him the only contender to Hillary’s inevitability was the flood of corporate money that came in.  And when you read those 2007 news articles, the main source of that money was Wall Street.

Obama was always Wall Streets boy.  And anyone paying attention could have known this before the last election.  For those that got fooled, please learn from this and learn to spot the corporate money behind candidates.

Hint:  The candidate with the money to buy lots of TV ads is NEVER your friend.

This is a very bullshitting, obfuscating and misleading article. Obama was and still is Wall Street’s man through and through. Rhetoric and calling the banksters “fat cats” will not change that fact. They know it is just theatrics to please the so called progressives. Talk is cheap but actions are what really count.
Obama has put Wall St. and big money corporations above anything else, above the economy and above the middle class and that is his assigned role to play.
The next three years will be full of painful surprises for the middle class, starting with “reforming” Social Security and Medicare!.
So, please don’t play dumb and say “Wall St. will take Obama to the woodshed” to teach him a lesson. Obama knows his material very well and is perfoming brilliantly. He will be doing stuff that W Bush or any other Republican president would not have dared to do. And why not?! He still has the backing of the so called progressives.

Tax Revolt?

sorry for the multi-post. Having strange things happen here.

It is “interesting”(?), in the same way that old Chinese proverb/curse about ‘the times’ we ‘may live-in’ uses that word, how tenaciously people who’ve voted their ‘selfs’ into this predicament cling to the “HOPE!” they can, somehow, “vote” their way out of it.  Of course, there’s no arguing the fact that suicide (whether “painless” or otherwise) does appear to put an end to at-least peoples’ present misery….and mass ‘self’-destruction is dead-certainly the “final solution” looming just down this “industrialized democracy” super-highway a little ways.

Some here see through the toxic smoke and past the fun-house mirrors to the utter bankruptcy of the entire dog-eat-dog ‘dominance’ paradigm and all that has been CONstructed according to its pathological CONceits.  Yet even many of these Persons seem stuck in the CONtrived CONviction there is really no accessible and viable alternative, which effectively CONdemns even those no longer half-wittingly complicit in their own degradation to the same fate as their fella-‘n’-gal inmates who’ve actively cultivated the corruption and raked-off its lethal ‘fruits.’

Maybe, though, as the CONtraption goes on disintegrating around them, some of those already dis-‘enchanted’ with its motives and methods will begin to see, in each other and their common Humanity, a glimpse of the great Natural Living Arrangement they’ve been so ruthlessly shut-out-of during the ten-thousand-year rule of FEAR here that is finally now coming to its inevitable CONclusion.  Using the ideological/institutional/electro-mechanical apparatus of “civilization, to CONtrol their Human livestocks’ increasingly miserable half-lives, the tormentors and their two-legged tools have about reached THE END of their own ‘rope’ now, and have no other design but to try piling the bodies of ‘others’ deep enough beneath them to prevent the neck-snapping jolt already on its inexorable way.

There is no longer even any real public pretense that it is anything but plain ‘self’-preservation driving the owner/operators of the ‘device.’  Their clear message to “....your huddled masses” has been for years that it’s every “individual” for his/her ‘self’....and that “money” is not only “speech,” it is the one true test of who is fit to survive.

It’s a good thing our Mother Earth has entirely different ‘standards’ for that.

HokaHey!

Big B:

There was a bill calling for amendment introduced by Reps John Conyers and Donna Edwards.

http://www.truthout.org/bill-introduced-calling-constitutional-amendment-tackle-campaign-finance-ruling56658

Dennis Kucinich is also working one up according to his interview on Democracy Now yesterday.

Not that the Corpo news would have covered it though…

Big B:

Dennis Kucinich and a couple others are drawing a Consitutitional Amendment according to his interview yesterday on Democracy Now.

Another bill has already been introduced by Rep Donna Edwards and John Conyers.

http://www.truthout.org/bill-introduced-calling-constitutional-amendment-tackle-campaign-finance-ruling56658

Not that the corporate media reported it though…

Big B:

Dennis Kucinich and a couple others are drawing a Consitutitional Amendment according to his interview yesterday on Democracy Now.

Another bill has already been introduced by Rep Donna Edwards and John Conyers.

http://www.truthout.org/bill-introduced-calling-constitutional-amendment-tackle-campaign-finance-ruling56658

Not that the corporate media reported it though…

What is going on in the US is absolutely amazing to me. I had some hope Obama would correct direction and the world would slowly get back in a more ‘non retarded’ direction but now I know exactly what has happened. Obama is slowly showing what side he is with and it certainly is not the middle class or the poor or those who believe in justice and common sense. I have said now for a while that the US is building steam for a political revolution, now I would say that even a violent revolution is possible.

@nherit The Wind:

Hate to burst your bubble, but even Paul Krugman has seen the light. He begins his article with “Oh. My. God.” And ends it with “We’re doomed.”

http://community.nytimes.com/comments/krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/10/clueless/?sort=newest

@John Ellis:

I don’t doubt for a second that anything you said was correct. My point was simply that these were not instinctual acts of nature like eating or procreating. My point the Prof. is that we are evolved to “survive,” which may or may not have been through violence over the years. In the beginning there is a conflict. How we react to that conflict determines if there will be a collective resolution through violence (war). Therein lies the choice.

And, as with war, we are similarly being pounded with a heavy doses of propaganda right now with respect to our political system. I personally believe the intent of that is specifically to disillussion the public with their democracy/government because that is the only way to achieve a truly free market; the people have to stop believing in the one tool they have to protect themselves. I never said it wasn’t working, just that we have a choice.

I mean, as much as I appreciate tlaking with all of you, I’m under no illusion that what I’m doing here is practicing ‘democracy.’ Nope. Like all of you, I’m venting to be heard. Personally, I think Howard Zinn’s take of democracy fit best. he believed that it only ever worked when people went out and agitated and disrupted the system to such a degree that it was forced to address their grievances. Sitting here typing on Truthdig until election day will not do it. That too, is a choice.

Is it not funny that not one senator, or congressman, or President for that matter, has introduced legislation to reverse the SCOTUS decision on campaign financing? (oh, Barry protested, for about a five second sound bite, and then moved on to the next sound bite, what he does so well)

The silence from our elected representatives has been deafening.

It will become official in 2012 or 2016, the corporate states of amerika will be the order of the day. Our military will be sent over hill and dale to protect markets and procure natural resources.(pretty much the same as now) social spending will disappear, infrastructure will fall apart, and amerika will become one giant company town, with a breadline outside the company store, and smokey, sooty skies blocking the sunlight. In short, we will be China.

I hate how everyone, including the author, takes it as an absolute fact that Obama is totally corrupt and bought and paid for by Wall Street.  This is based on shoddy evidence, misunderstanding the limits that are placed in him BY LAW, and flat-out reductionism—ignoring inconvenient facts.

Do I think he messed in handling the banking and stim situation his first year? Yes, definitely!
But do I think he did it deliberately? No!
Do I think he got snookered by Summers and Geithner? Definitely!
Do I think he’s smart enough to figure out he got snookered? Absolutely—he already has!
Will he take steps to correct his mistakes? Absolutely—he is already doing so.

Obama is FINALLY listening to the ONE GUY who can claim to have fixed a recession: Paul Volcker. Volcker has always been there for Obama, but the President didn’t seem to realize that that prick, Summers, was DELIBERATELY neutralizing Volcker.  IOW, Summers was quite willing to let the ship sink as long as he got to be the captain.

The economy still sucks, people are still out of work, but the nose dive has slowed, alot.  I’m more than sympathetic to those who are out of work.  I lost my job in April and spent the next 5 months seeking another job.  So I was definitely one of the statistics.  To PROPERLY paraphrase Ronald Reagan:
“Recession” is when your neighbor loses his job.
“Depression” is when you lose your job.
“Recovery” is when the fat cats on Wall Street who CAUSED this mess lose THEIR jobs!”

Not that I really disagree with any of the author’s premises, what I think is more likely the case is that the financial services industry wants to put their money to work where it will realize the best return on its investment.

The Democratic party has lost the favor of the left, then alienated the right that were disenfranchised from the Republican party by Bush and wanted change. They’ve alienated the middle class that were under the illusion from the Democratic party’s minority days that they were the people’s party not the corporation’s. What everyone has come to understand is that both parties are the corporation’s, and regardless of if you vote for JP Morgan’s democrat horse, or JP Morgan’s republican horse, the horse still runs the race for JP Morgan.

The industry is just following standard oscillation of sentiment, if a stock drops 50% in a 6 month period it’s competitor starts to look a lot more attractive if they are selling the same product.

First, let’s burst a bubble:  The Democrats never, never had the Supermajority that they claimed in the Senate because they included Joe Lieberman as one of them.  He had clearly shown he was a supporter of the GOP during the campaign season, and the fact that Harry Reid did not strip him of his committee chairmanship in 2006 shows that Harry is a lousy leader.

Now with that lie out of the way, this President must face reality.  He allowed his DNC, Clinton, and Emanuel advisers to strip away his agenda in favor of a corporate one.  He allowed the policies that were put in place by the Bush Administration in their last days to stand.  And, finally, he bought into the myth that he had support from his own party on the Hill.  In short, he boxed himself in by listening to the very people who had not supported his run to the White House and DC politicos do not work well with those they do not in their hearts support. 

Now we have a failed first year, fat cat bankers who are acting like the spoiled, over-indulged children they are, a GOP who has taken over the political agenda through lies, propaganda, and miserable, fake grassroots fanatics, and a Democratic party at each others throats.  It is time to stop this insanity once and for all.  It is time to vote out both parties in November, put in purely Independents who take no money from anyone except the people, who actually take the time to meet and talk to people face-to-face rather than telephone town halls or webinar meetings.  It is time to put in people who understand what is happening in the real world of this nation, and who will use common sense to govern, not corporate bucks!

So stop believing in fairy tales, Mr. President.  You never had a super-majority, you just wanted to think you did.  Stop listening to those who created this nation’s problems and start thinking outside the box and listen to people who might have better ideas.  Clinton once noted that it would be easier to lead if this was a dictatorship; Bush acted like it was one; and you, sir, need to find a middle road.  You have the power of the Executive Order to create oversight boards for the Executive branch, use it to enforce decent practices in departments like the Treasury or the State department.  Use recess appointments to get yourself fully staffed. 

AND FINALLY, STOP TRYING TO PLAY NICE WITH THE GOP!  STOP PLAYING NICE WITH REID AND PELOSI!  YOU WILL NOT GET BIPARTISANSHIP OUT OF THIS CONGRESS, NOT NOW, NOT EVER!  IT IS TIME TO LEAD AND IT IS TIME TO DO THE BUSINESS THAT THE AMERICAN PEOPLE SENT YOU THERE TO DO!  HOLD THOSE ACCOUNTABLE WHO ARE SELLING OUT AMERICANS - MAKE PUBLIC EXAMPLES OF THEM!  DEMAND FROM CONGRESS THAT THEY START ACTING IN THE BEST INTERESTS OF THE COUNTRY - AND IF THEY WILL NOT, THEN YOU USE YOUR SATURDAY ADDRESSES TO THE NATION TO EXPOSE THEM FOR WHAT THEY ARE:  CORPORATE HACKS WHO DO NOT CARE ONE BIT FOR AMERICANS, ONLY THEIR OWN HEALTH CARE AND SALARIES AS EMPLOYEES OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE. 

AND AMERICA, IT IS TIME FOR YOU TO RECOGNIZE THAT THESE PEOPLE WHO HAVE GIFTED BANKS WITH BILLIONS OF YOUR DOLLARS, KEPT HEALTH CARE REFORM AWAY FROM YOUR HOME (IF YOU EVEN HAVE ONE ANYMORE), ARE STOPPING DECENT JOBS BILL FROM PASSAGE, ARE NOT YOUR ELECTED OFFICIALS - THEY ARE YOUR EMPLOYEES WHO DRAW A SALARY, HEALTH CARE BENEFITS, AND A PENSION FROM YOUR TAXPAYER DOLLARS, AND YOU CAN FIRE THEM!  START INTERVIEWING THEIR REPLACEMENTS NOW, AND MAKE SURE THAT THEY DO NOT HAVE CORPORATE BACKING AS YOU DO.  YOU WANT AN EMPLOYEE WHO IS FREE OF CONFLICTS OF INTERESTS, SO THAT YOUR INTERESTS ARE FIRST, LAST, AND ALWAYS THEIRS!  FIRE THOSE WHO ARE FAILING TO DO THEIR JOBS - AND, MR. PRESIDENT, THAT COULD MEAN YOU IN 2012 IF YOU DO NOT START ACTING LIKE A LEADER!

Not that I really disagree with any of the author’s premises, what I think is more likely the case is that the financial services industry wants to put their money to work where it will realize the best return on its investment.

The Democratic party has lost the favor of the left, then alienated the right that were disenfranchised from the Republican party by Bush and wanted change. They’ve alienated the middle class that were under the illusion from the Democratic party’s minority days that they were the people’s party not the corporation’s. What everyone has come to understand is that both parties are the corporation’s, and regardless of if you vote for JP Morgan’s democrat horse, or JP Morgan’s republican’s horse, the horse still runs the race for JP Morgan.

The industry is just following standard oscillation of sentiment, if a stock drops 50% in a 6 month period it’s competitor starts to look a lot more attractive if they are selling the same product.

I said several years ago that there was an effort going on to turn America into Plantation America, and eventually the whole world into a plantation planet.

Among a few of “us” there is a mentality that simply does not want anyone else (except their immediate friends) from getting any of the benefits of prosperity.  That class of people are the ones whom the Bushes and Reagan are referring to when they say “Americans.”  They actually believe a fantasy - that an economy which only serves 2% of the people is sustainable.  They tilt the field so that all the money flows into their pockets, except the absolute minimum required to keep their laborers alive.

It is exactly the same mentality that had Nazi Germany’s economy running on slave labor; if a laborer dies of starvation, just roll him into a hole and put another starving person in his place.

No one counts except them.  Everything is distorted by them, for them, and TO them.  Share the wealth?  Are you kidding?

Back in the late 1990s, when the Fed kept cutting the prime rate while the economy was booming, the only time they decided to raise it was when the median income level started to go up.  It was fine for corporations and investors to stuff money in their pockets, but when labor rates started to climb, THAT was labeled “inflationary.”  It was clear that the real intent was to simply divert every dollar possible away from Joe Main Street and every dollar possible TO the wealthy.

Plantation America.

It’s coming. . .

This is flat-out, full-on Class Warfare. Between this and:
“Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI)—House Republicans’ top budget guy, and the author of a long-term budget roadmap that would slash Medicare and Social Security—says that attacks against his plan were orchestrated by the highest levels of the Democratic party, all the way up to the President.”
The malpractical Congress is taking off the gloves for its corporate masters. We’re getting beyond the point where they even care if they’re seen for what they are. With the Supreme Court’s decision on free political speech for corporations they all know where their bread is exclusively buttered.
Without a Constitutional amendment stripping corporations of the rights and status of an individual we are well and truly over as a representational democracy. We the People, have become immaterial.

There are two governments in the United States, and two freedoms. There is the government we elect, and the actual government that owns and controls things.

We have the freedom to believe in that government or to not believe, all of our other freedoms are illusory, because they don’t make any difference at all in the outcome of our lives.

Sure we can argue, intellectually the fine points of our imprisonment, the details of our deaths at the hands of our corporations, the degree of our destitution, and disintegration as a nation. But in the end all our intellectualizations, and pissing contests, are meaningless. Because there is no stopping what is happening, until the end.

Those that own this country created the mess we are in, and they aren’t about to change things, so that the so called “eaters”, have a chance. They are not going to do it, unless someone puts a gun to their heads, and that’s not going to happen.

At some point, the world will realize, that America’s wealth is in the hands of a few people, and that all America’s economy does is shift it around a little bit, giving a few more dollars to the elite on the right one day, and the elite on the left the next day, with each tick of the pendulum.

That will be the tipping point, the realization by everyone that America’s flame of freedom has gone out and only smoke remains.

The only thought that comes to mind and should be “the one” on every banker’s
and so called die hard “free enterpriser” in the USA is the one reminding us all of
what happened to the King and Queen who proposed that all their unhappy
subjects that complain about not being able to afford bread to eat, “need to eat
cake instead”.

C’est la vie Marie Antoinette.

FRTothus:

Not too long ago, I took a PhD of military history on directly over an article he wrote declaring war part of “human nature” and that “unless we submit to gentic engineering…, it will always be with us.”

I countered his argument by tying his logic to Social Darwinism, the same philosophy that was used to justify war, empire, racism and genocide in the 19th and 20th centuries. I equated his argument to a declartion that based on his logic, we can similiarly conclude that all men are rapists given the history of male rape through time.

Long story short, what I challenged was his notion that we don’t have a choice. War is not organic. People must be convinced of its necessity before they will commit to a resolution throuh violence.  It is fed, coerced, incentivized, and manipulated from the top down by a mere handful of people. If we are at war, I told him, it’s because it is something we have embraced by choice.

He had no answer for me, nor did his readership. Given that his writing clearly conflated his politics with his academic assertions, I’m not surpised.

So why am I telling you all of this?

Because we all need to understand that we do have a choice. Our fates are not preordained. Difficult does not equal impossible. What is going on in American politics is quite artificial. Like war, they are being propagandized and manipulated from the top down, which means that our politics have been mostly inorganic and ultimately self-defeating.

An organic movement is more a shift of consciousness. Advertisements have power only if we let them. Pork rinds taste good only as long as we consider them appealing. And American democracy will reflect the will of big business only as long as we allow it. Right now, our politicians think that we cannot see beyond the influence of corporations and that will drive them to do the bidding of corporate America. However, if corporate money and advocacy became a voter repellant, their influence evaporates over night. The answer is getting people to believe they have the power to choose. It’s in getting them to relaize that only their dogma to the two-party system keeps them from having the government they want and deserve.

The “Wall Street moguls” need a little face-time with an unruly angry mob and a
refurbished guillotine. America’s grand experiment in democracy has come up a
crapper. ‘We the people’ are excluded and that is by design. Criminy, what more is
it going to take?

Well, maybe now, the ‘fat cats’ know how we the sheeple feel

“The crisis of modern democracy is a profound one. Free elections, a free press and an independent judiciary mean little when the free market has reduced them to commodities available on sale to the highest bidder.”
(Arundhati Roy)

It is the democratic Republic which is dying, and, true to Benj. Franklin’s prescient cynicism, we have not been able to keep it.

In came the banks and the speculators, the carpet-baggers, who, not through industry, but through cleverness and deception and theft, been enabled, unchecked, to buy political influence beyond all others. The check was supposed to have been from civil government.  That’s their job.  But, in a very cozy relationship with the Networks, who excuse themselves from culpability by distractions, instead forego their standing as a   public utility, and engaged in… well, it is what it is, prostitution, filling OUR airspace with hawkers and barkers and visual magicians spinning meaningless vignettes between their real source of revenue: the ads.

Meanwhile, the real work carries on.  The bankers have taken over the Congress that was to enforce the US Constitution’s insistance on only Congress having the authority to print money, and a freightened Congress, abbrogated that duty away. Now, like the Bank of England’s indebted Crown, the US (private!) money system, loans the US every dollar THEY print. Every dollar used to pay back the loan is borrowed, too. 

The Peoples’ money no longer determines policy, if it ever did.  With access to media Face Time open only to the wealthy, no common voice will ever be heard at the Forum. 

Wouldn’t a democratic Republic at least not allow the wealthy few to institutionally profit from the meager input the people can impose through election? A democracy exists to protect the People from the power of money. This is not what we see occuring.  The vote is all we have ever had, and if that is subverted, then we have nothing left.  Not even our 2nd Amendment guns will stop the Armored, Standing Army Swat Teams that know on which side their bread is buttered (and it ain’t with the American public, that’s for sure). 

The US Constitution is too radical for our leaders.

We must get the money out of politics to the greatest extent we can. How do we make them listen if they have all the money already?  I don’t know how to organize this stuff.

“All democracies turn into dictatorships - but not by coup. The people give their democracy to a dictator, whether it’s Julius Caesar or Napoleon or Adolf Hitler. Ultimately, the general population goes along with the idea… That’s the issue that I’ve been exploring: How did the Republic turn into the Empire ... and how does a democracy become a dictatorship?
(George Lucas)

“The twentieth century has been characterized by three developments of great political importance: the growth of democracy, the growth of corporate power, and the growth of corporate propaganda as a means of protecting corporate power against democracy.”
(Alex Carey)

“Americans cannot escape a certain responsibility for what is done in our name around the world. In a democracy, even one as corrupted as ours, ultimate authority rests with the people. We empower the government with our votes, finance it with our taxes, bolster it with our silent acquiescence. If we are passive in the face of America’s official actions overseas, we in effect endorse them.”
(Mark Hertzgaard)

“This [the U.S. Constitution] is likely to be administered for a course of years and then end in despotism… when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic government, being incapable of any other.”
(Benjamin Franklin)

Respect.

Based on the recent Supreme Court decision to open up the corporate floodgates and grant them “super-person” rights, you would expect that only corporate sychophants can ever be elected in future.

But it happened in Oregon:

http://www.counterpunch.org/cooke01282010.html

Could it happen in a national scale that people see past a well funded PR campaign and vote in their own best interest?

Guacamaya

Democracy is all you have. Once the people lose confidence in their
democracy, and hence their government, there will be nothing to stand in
the way of a new robber baron age of monopoly and poverty. Ok. So we
were all fooled by the democratic party. I say good. Its out in the open now
and we can no longer deny that they haven’t been working for us for 2 or 3
decades. No more “lesser of two evils” rationalizations for not voting our
consciences.

Use your democracy or lose it.

Time fire up what’s left of the green party folks!

We are many, they are few yet “they” rule our nation, and to the detriment of the many. Will the electorate ever awaken to its real power to restore this nations government to its real role and responsibilities?

I think one can reasonably assume all the Obama “bluster” is designed to placate the masses and right the sinking Dems chances in the mid-terms.  He is not about to really bite the hand that feeds him and I’m sure Wall Street has been told this.  All this crap is about perception, not reality.  Both parties have sold out the middle and lower classes and that will never change until we overthrow all of them.

Obama’s campaign for “change” began before the meltdown.  He and McCain, rubber-stamped by The Party, were nominated before the meltdown. 

As one scholar said, after the election of Obama, “the next president will be the transformative leader,” not this president who is a man out of time from an era now dead.

How can there be any form of democracy in the US when large companies can influence elections with unlimited funds. After the new high court ruling it now also seems possible for foreign companies (governments) to do so as well. For there to be a true democracy there should be a maximum donation of say $10,000. That is unlikely to happen and the country will remain being run by the rich and big business to suit themselves. It’s citizens seem blissfully unaware of this and truly believe that they are living in the most democratic country on earth.