I am tired. And annoyed. And tired.
In Crack Den comments, res ipsa responded to a commenter saying, “they’ll still call you a liberal, Barack,” with “twice as often and twice as loud.” Which, yeah. I’m not denying there have been times in the past when I’ve critically underestimated Obama, when I’ve considered him to be making some incredibly boneheaded centrist blunder when actually he was doing something smart, but in this case, if this was an attempt to seem reasonable, I don’t think it’s descending into the madness of “woe is me” ism to say that it ain’t gonna work, it’s never worked, never ever ever. You are a liberal terrorist-loving gay-marrying pussy no matter what you do, because that’s who you are to them, and it’s not dependent on your actions. It’s dependent on their need for an enemy. And a cheap joke. And some fucking Wiz wit or whatever. It’s not about you. Get that through your skull. To the right-wing bullies who have run and still run our politics, you barely exist except as a target.
With regard to the practicalities at hand, I want to believe something else is going on here, that Obama will in fact translate his statements of opposition to the immunity provision into action in the Senate, but I’ll have to wait and see on that one. For now let me say that the talk of heartbreak and OMG OBAMA SUXXORZ NOW and who is disillusioned and who told you so just intensifies the exhaustion this campaign has instilled in me. I never was all that wrapped up in the idea of Barack Obama as a new kind of politician. His message was new in many ways, exciting in many ways, the man is a stone fox who’s done some good stuff for Illinois and he can bring me to my feet cheering but he, also? Is a Democratic senator who has run a phenomenally successful campaign and he’s probably going to be president, and if anybody thinks for ten seconds that means we get to, like, take a break or something, finally lay down and nap, keep dreaming. President Obama is gonna make us happy, but he’s also gonna piss us off and we’re gonna have to yell at him a lot, because I think I can safely say that even the most liberal of our Democratic politicians is not liberal enough for the majority of the people who call themselves Democrats, and those same politicians are cowed by decades of being told acting conservative was the only way to win.
Remember that. Decades. We’ve done a good job in the past five or so years of trying to get them to at least recognize they don’t have to hump Bush’s leg in order to look good to the Heartland, but it’s been the past five years or so. And it’s been people on the Internet, while every newspaper editorial board and every TV talking head tells them to be very Sensible and Serious and Slow. Meanwhile, those people protesting are carrying Bush puppets and some of them talk about Cuba, so let’s make it out to be their fault we won’t listen to them, and tell them they ought to wear ties. We’ve raised some money but we haven’t raised enough to be AT&T, and we simply haven’t hurt them enough to make them love us. Let’s be honest about this. It’s a game of masochism, this is, and we aren’t whipping them hard enough. I would love to say to you that after November we can all chill for a bit because Barack will have it in hand, but come on. Even giving his statement up there the most generous possible read, which is “I have hidden your keys, chill, Russ Feingold texted me a minute ago saying he’s gonna chain himself to the Senate door so this isn’t gonna be a thing after all, at least not a thing I need to be involved in,” he’s still gonna need us shoving him in the right direction. And I intend to shove.
You can throw the right-wing all the bones you want. They’ll still snarl around your ankles, because it isn’t bones they’re after. And if Obama doesn’t know that now, he’s very soon going to find out.
A.
Obama is rhetoric and nothing more.
We hear about his tremendous ‘organization’ and all evidence suggests it it quite the machine – well, he’s asking to be made leader of the free world why the fuck can’t he demonstrate some leadership. Use the bully pulpit and his e-mail lists – he could put a stop to this.
Saying he’s going to try and get rid of immunity in the Senate doesn’t cut it, it is B.S. and he knows it won’t happen. If he used his capital to tank this, I may even vote for him … I won’t hold my breath though.
“Obama is rhetoric and nothing more.”
It is not that the Telcos getting immunity doesn’t piss me off. It sucks, and yes, I am disappointed in the milquetoast nature of his statement and in the DINOs in the House.
But this is one fight, out of many that we have to fight together in the next 5 months and hopefully the next 4 years. It is one hell of an important fight, it is a basic fight, but it is one fight, and a fight that is not over. We lost this round, it hurts like hell. Like A. said, we get up. Maybe I’m young, guess I’m a Pollyanna, in that I still think Obama and Co. are a good bet to get important shit done as President of The United States. Let’s take 48 hours to be pissed, and then keep swinging.
(Small shout-out also to Rush “My Congressman Is A Rocket Scientist With Big Brass Cojones” Holt. )
If you read BHO as just another pol you aren’t paying attention…
I was certainly disappointed with his statement, and am skeptical that the fight to remove immunity will amount to much.
But when I hear him speak, I hear someone who is trying hard to say things that people may not want to hear, and to try to move the dialog forward.
I completely agree that come Jan 21 our work is just underway, but I’m ready to accept that our guy has warts, will not always be what we expect, will sometimes disappoint, but will on balance be the kind of leader we have needed and haven’t had in a couple of generations…
Time will tell…
Some things are so important it is better to stand up for them and lose than to win by ducking. Any issue that involves something so basic as our 4th amendment right to freedom from illegal search and seizure, is one of those important things. Obama now has the political capital to risk some temporary loss of it by standing up for our 4th amendment rights. But, he didn’t do so.
I’m very worried that the reason he didn’t do so, is that he doesn’t believe our Constitution is meant to be followed, come Hell or high water, as I do. Even the US Supreme Court just a few days ago stated that the Constitution is to be followed at all times, in war, in peace and in all other times. Why does Obama not agree with that?
If he does agree, he must be too timid to risk his political capital, for fear of what the Rush Limpbrows of the world will say about him. I don’t want another presidential candidate like that. John Kerry should have been the last one of that breed.
obama is smart enough to know he has to play the media and money men til he has the white house.
I think it was the blue dogs and the more mainstream Dems he was throwing those bones to, A.
which also sucks.
Hypothetical conjecture (that I wholesale lifted from Balloon Juice), but… what if he’s serious about prosecuting this administration’s violations of the 4th/FISA? Who would he need to be witnesses? Telcos. What would the telcos want in return? Immunity from prosecution.
We’ll see.
I volunteered to host an Obama bakesale for MoveOn tomorrow, and if it weren’t for the 12 women who’ve volunteered to help, I’d call it off. I’m disgusted.
I thought he knew that pandering would never feedthis bulldog.
With so much bi-partisan capitulation in an election year, it almost feels as though there is second shoe waiting to be dropped. This strikes me as way too straight forward for this may roll over on. Is there something we are not privy to?
… for this MANY to roll over… – shesh – my kingdom for a spell checker
On ‘Countdown’ tonight, John Dean made a pretty interesting observation.
He said that he had spent the day reading the new FISA bill (poorly written, he said) and talking to people. And he said that, while the bill grants the telecoms *civil* immunity, he didn’t see where – and others agreed with him – it had any sort of grant of *criminal* immunity.
If that’s true, and if soon we will have a Justice Department that will actually do something about stuff like that, it may be the best result of all.
Much as I hate the idea of letting the telecoms get away ‘free’, big lawsuits that bancrupt the telecoms will just leave us all with fewer telecom choices. But send a few of their CEOs, et al., to jail, and then see what sort of respect they start giving to their customers’ civil rights.
I’m pissed off not because of the telecos but because this confirmed to me that Bush & Co. are going to get away with every single thing they’ve ever done. OK, not the ones who were stupid enough to actually get paid in boats and golf trips but everybody else. And that is most of them.
Congress is making a big show of investigating interrogation procederes right now and I should think that is a good thing but I don’t anymore and that’s a bad thing. I feel like A) Democratic Congressional oversight is all for show and B) come Jan. ’09 everybody will want to look forward, not back.
B) isn’t necessarily a bad thing but it’s not consistent with the oath that people take when they serve in Congress. They’re not supposed to uphold the Constitution when it’s easy or when it’s politically beneficial. They’re supposed to uphold it full stop.
Congress may as well stop every investigation they are doing right now because I know where it goes — it goes nowhere. Major League Baseball lied to their ass about steroids and Congress didn’t do jack about it.
Maj. Gen. Taguba is out there saying Bush is guilty of war crimes and Scott McClellan is kindly saying Bush isn’t credible on his cocaine usage or anything else and is surrounded by a bubble of war mongers and oil profiteers and DEMOCRATS STILL CAVED*.
I like (really I love) Obama but tonight…not so much. Tonight I’m reminding myself of all the shitty things that FDR and JFK did in their time in office and saying “everybody has warts”. “Everybody has warts” doesn’t lift the spirits like “Yes. We. Can.”
* – I’m not stupid either. Reid could have put the Senate Judiciary Committee bill up on the floor instead of the Senate Intelligence Committee bill and headed this thing off. He didn’t. Reid and Pelosi could have assigned different conferees to reconcile the Senate bill to the much better original House bill. They didn’t. This “compromise” has been a giant fucking game from the outset. Don’t piss down my back and call it rain. There was never even a real fight. At some point the good people on the losing side of these issues have to ask themselves if they should be putting a little more of their own ass in the fire. We have representive government. Don’t tell me if only I make enough phone calls Tinkerbell will come alive or however that goes. It’s you in the arena Sens. Dodd, Feingold, Obama. It’s you Rep. Wexler. Return with your shield or upon it.
OK. I’ve over my drama.
I’m looking forward to the Saturday blogwhoring thread because I saw a cool bicycle wheel with an integral hub motor that is wicked genius. Nothing beats American ingenuity and by American ingenuity I mean made in China and assembled in America. It turns any bike into the functional equivalent of a moped with one wheel change, fork upgrade, and a battery. 60 mile range at 20 mph!
thank you, athenae, for the sensible words.
i think many, admittedly, including myself, were dizzy with excitement and the return to reality was somewhat jarring.
what’s needed from all is pressure. constant pressure.