A continuous misunderstanding I see on the board...

vaberella

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Fri Jan-07-11 06:32 PM
Original message

A continuous misunderstanding I see on the board...

Edited on Fri Jan-07-11 06:38 PM by vaberella

A lot of people have said that Obama has surrounded himself with the wrong people in his White House Staff.

I find that to be utterly incorrect. We're talking about law making here. Laws that are progressive and innovative is what we need and demand, correct?

WE surrounded him with the wrong people! The American people failed to give him the progressive tilt (irrespective if they are Repubs or Democrats---YES! Republicans CAN and HAVE BEEN Progressive----YES! For all intents and purposes---Snowe and Collins ARE PROGRESSIVES! And have shown to be so consistently!!!). This is further proved by the fact that extreme Repubs have taken the house.

If it's true (and I don't see that but I find that Dems, are generally lazy when it's not the GE) that "the Left" or "Obama's base" failed to vote because they're upset with him for some reason or another--- then they would have now managed to make the nation that much worse. If the above thought is true...then it would be our fault that the nation has moved progressively worse and has remained progressively worse. People may have voted for Dem without checking background---meaning are they pushing what we want in the sense of a progressive wide spread view. Then Blue Dogs lost seats. That doesn't mean that America wanted Liberals in power that's why the liberals managed to remain. That's hardly the truth, although I've seen many on the Left push this meme. If that was the case then the House would never have gotten eaten by so many EXTREME Repubs---they would have kept at least a few moderate Republicans in office.

In any case, Obama had a difficult situation when he went into office. No one can deny that. And I'm not speaking about the economic situation---but the coma-induced dog that is the Congress (it woke up for a short time during the lame-duck season---maybe it was the talk of duck). What does that mean? It doesn't matter who the CoS staff is, if you have a crew that has ALWAYS said they will not work with the President and FILIBUSTER all of his agendas or halt all of his office appointees then you have a group of people who do not want to work with who we have in power and who don't give a flying fuck about the CoS would say or do.

I think people have failed to say this because they want in some way to diverge responsibilty. There has to be some time or another we have to see that the real problem is not always Obama. It's getting the American people on message and making sure our Representatives are on message. In order to do that we have to have a consensus as to the message. One can't say, poll 3 states that the nation is more Liberal---yet the House proves otherwise. That doesn't add up---especially also when the House even while had Dems had DLCers or Blue Dogs who sounded more Repub than anything. Keep in mind it was House Dem reps who wrote letters saying they wouldn't support the removal of Bush tax cuts for rich---or did we forget that. It was Congress in general who FAILED twice to remove the tax cuts of the rich. It was not Obama, like so many like to believe. The vote was dead on arrival because of Congress.

I find that, even if it there was a progressive tilt---with a Republican leaning Congress---no matter what you might think. Obama's progressive agenda would always be thwarted. He doesn't have the back up. People say FDR---he had a nation in duress and people wouldn't to do anything to turn things around. And he managed to do a lot. Obama has a set of people who would rather watch the nation fail in order to ensure he fails. THEY EVEN SAID SO!! So I'm trying to see how Obama is supposed to twist arms and get things done. We're not in the 20s and 30s or even 40s where a few death threats from Al Capone would get the nation to turn your way (I realize that government never ran this way---it's an OTT statement). We've got to work with what we have here. And unfortunately Obama has no one. William Daley, I find, even if he was a leftist---would NEVER achieve anything with this Congress. Let's be real now.

I don't see many on this site taking responsibility for their representatives and some of you guys lives in Red leaning Reps. Why aren't we seeing that even Blue leaning districts puts in people who do not have a liberal agenda. This is irrespective of political leaning actually. Why aren't people voting in moderate leaning Repubs? Does the American public even realize there's a difference?

I think we need to be honest with ourselves here...that Obama has done very well with the impediment of government structure he's been dealing. However when people claim he's not "progressive enough"--which I state is due to his Congress. Or his pick of Daley as CoS ---because he's not a progressive. A progressive once again IS NOT A POLITICAL leaning. Let's get that straight. PROGRESSIVISM HAS NO PARAMETERS. This means that incremental change is as equally significant as sweeping change. Progress can never be too little--change towards something better is still change with the broader intention in the horizon. The political climate just gives us the results. It is a way of thinking and that is all. That means anyone can be a progressive---that means you can be a Republican and Progressive. Therefore---Daley for all intents and purposes could be a Progressive.

Aside from this point---the real issue is who we have backing up the President in the Legislative branch---who also appoints the Judicial back up for Obama (sadly enough). The Legislative branch is singularly important and can be extremely destructive as well as supportive to our development. We need to see that we have to get these people in order.

Obama's staff is not really the issue for legislative change and never has been. We have to get the public informed. I see way too much whinging in the blogosphere or even this board about things that we need to change through actual activity. If we work this year to put some Liberal Dems in Congress this year----that's one step. If we push like beasts to find and support Dem and Independent liberal Reps in the House---that's the second key. People want significant liberal change. Find the candidates and put them out there and pimp them out. Then we'll see something.

I've already talked to someone and I'm starting a site on this. Hopefully it will be launched in the next 2 months. It will list all incumbents and candidates. Only those who are progressive leaning. I will not touch progressive Repubs...yeah I find Snowe and Collins tolerable and they're strong in their community. However, there are many Dem candidates that are progressive but aren't spoken about or ignored---McAdams in Alaska was one of them. I think there were probably 80 more.

In any event...I just wanted to comment on that and my solution to do something active to give Obama the progressive leaning back up. Progressive leaning Reps in Congress will get what we want in the end. And I think this CoS talk is a divergence from the real issue at hand...our own failure as citizens to get the reps we deserve and need to meet our agenda.

-Edited to clarify some points.