I hesitate to post this, since (as far as I can see) the discussion is
based on a misunderstanding: I was trying to analyze the political
situation, trying to understand what's going on and what to expect. CB
misinterpreted this as a personal attack on Obama and so doesn't
understand much of what I was saying (and seems to think that I agree
with everything that another pen-pal says about Obama). If the reader
isn't interested, feel free to hit "discard" now. Sorry to clutter
your in-box.
CB:
>>> Note that Congress is necessary to do social democracy. The idea that Obama
>>> can just "do" social democracy is a left anti-Obama exaggeration.<<<
me:
>> The fact that CB didn't mention the role of the Supreme Court above says
>> that he opposes rule by law.... No, that's not true. But it's equally
>> ridiculous to say that I'm engaging in "left anti-Obama exaggeration." <<
CB now:
> I thought about mentioning the Supreme Court, but I couldn't think of how
> the the Supreme Court would have as big a role as Congress, really first, and
> the President in "doing" social democracy...<
The Supremes knocked down a lot of the New Deal legislation. It thus
seems pretty relevant, just as it's relevant that Obama is pushing
someone who seems to be to the right of himself politically as his
appointment to the SCOTUS.
> I don't think what I said is ridiculous given the approximately 8 months of
> national rhetorical style of _only_ mentioning Obama for everything going
> messy. Obama is directly responsible for escalting the war in Afghanistan,
> but on that u have the military , which has its ways. Obama is solely
> responsible for his anti-teacher pro-charter school position. He doesn't need
> Congress not to have that position.<
I see nothing wrong with talking about what Obama wants and does,
since it's clear to adults that what he asks for and gets is
constrained by other political forces. Similarly, I don't have to
mention gravity when I talk about something falling down.
It's also clear that he's a product of the environment that he grew up
in and the ranks that he rose in. So he's going to appoint more people
like Summers and Geithner, i.e., "experts" or "technocrats" who accept
the capitalist system and even most of the neoliberal institutional
overlay of more recent origin without question. As I've said, that's
better than appointing Brownie's ilk. Also, from a leftist
perspective, that attachment to "technocrats" is more harmful when it
comes to economic issues than to, say, FEMA.
Because of his technocratic attitudes, we might see him as
constraining the more "progressive" members of Congress, i.e., as an
obstacle to the kinds of programs that enthusiastic Obama-fans were
looking for back in 2008. In short-hand, at least for left-DP issues,
it's Obama that's limiting Pelosi more than vice-versa.
BTW, while some pen-pals (who shall remain nameless) are into
criticizing Obama because they hate him, my purposes are simply to
help us understanding what's going on and what to expect. I don't
believe in the "Great Man" theory of history, so I see no reason to
either adulate or denounce him. I also see no reason why efforts to
understand what's going on should be interpreted as personal attacks
on Obama.
BTW2, he seems like a nice guy. I wouldn't mind having him live next
door. A good person, but even the acts and attitudes of good people
are shaped and limited by political forces.
me:
>> what I said was: "I agree that Obama isn't going to do anything like social
>> democracy
unless he's forced to do so by popular pressure."
>> Congress is obviously part of this, since it wouldn't allow any kind of New
>> Dealism (soft social democracy) without popular pressure on them, most
>> likely from outside "normal channels." The Supreme Court would then try to
>> gut any New Dealism that was passed. The people who Obama has appointed the
>> the Supes don't change this conclusion.<<
CB now:
> The idea that Obama would appoint some social democrat/socialist as a Supreme
> Court Justice is a form of left-anti-Obamaism. It's takes the form of
> posing some radical idea that is not at all part of the current US political
> reality and banging Obama for not doing it, for not being a socialist,
> basically. <
I never said that Obama would appoint social democrats. I am not
stupid. (Please quote me on this issue instead of making blanket
insults.) Rather, one can understand what's going on better if one
looks at issues such as who BHO appoints to the SCOTUS.
CB:
> It ignores the heavy duty rightwing attack of the last 8 months accusing O of
> being "socialist" for proposing mildly liberal reforms. These rightwing
> attacks , Tea Party and all that, have had the political field to themselves
> almost, and have gotten promotion by the media. There has been no "social
> democratic" or even liberal mass counter-attack.<
And I've never minimized the right-wing attacks (and I don't know
where the impression that I did so came from). As should be clear from
what I write, I care more about the social forces behind politics than
the personalities (such as Obama's). It's true that the pro-Obama
forces (or those establishmentarian forces that want Obama to lean to
the left) have been pretty anemic of late, partly because of their
marriage to the DP.
The needed "counterattack" that I would see is the "popular pressure
... most likely from outside 'normal channels'" that I mentioned
above. (On this point, I am Jimmy-One-Note.) This is clearly pretty
weak, partly (but not solely) because so many "progressives" think
that the Democratic Party is the be-all and end-all of politics, so
that we should waste time defending Obama.
> Basically, it is a demand that Obama commit political suicide for the
> socialist ideas of the tiny, tiny, I mean really tiny US left. By tiny , I
> mean they have no visible means of support in any mass of Americans.<
I wasn't "demanding" anything. Please look at the signature line so
you know who you are replying to.
me:
>> BTW, I wouldn't expect Obama to even try to institute New Deal-type policies
>> (unless pushed by the people), even though he currently has a majority in
>> both houses of Congress.<<
Here, this is one place where I made it very clear that I "never said
that Obama would appoint social democrats."
CB:
> This is like you haven't been paying attention to the accurate
> characterization of the US Democratic Party and members of Congress given by
> just about everybody on these lists for he last ten years as a capitalist
> party, two faced, self-sabateurs, scoundrels Or not noticing how many
> socalled Blue Dog Democrats there are. Obama "the socialist" (ha) doesn't
> "have" the Congress. A large minority of the Democrats in Congress opposed
> the public option and better proposals. Obama has to get "the votes" to do
> anything. He doesn't control the members of Congress.<
He has more power than anyone else concerning what Congress does. In
addition, at least according to a lot of pundits, he could have been
doing more to mobilize Congress for his programs than he has been
doing. He also seems to forget that if you want something from the
political process, you have to ask for more than you expect to get: if
he had asked for single-payer for example, it would have likely evoked
exactly the same kind of opposition but he would have gotten a better
health-care reform than he actually got.
In any event, it is a total distortion to say that I "haven't been
paying attention," etc. One of the _reasons_ that >> I wouldn't expect
Obama to even try to institute New Deal-type policies<< is the
capitalist nature of the DP. Also, it's important to remember that
Obama is also part of that capitalist party.
>> Jacob Heilbrunn's review of Jonathan Alter's THE PROMISE in Sunday's NY
>> TIMES Book Review says that Obama's perspective is one of Ivy League
>> meritocracy, not populism or New Dealism. That fits all the evidence I've
>> seen. Of course, he's just the POTUS and needs the consent of Congress and
>> the SCOTUS. But he doesn't seem to be the type who would mobilize the
>> citizens to oppose his opponents.<<
CB:
> He ran as a 2010 era liberal Democrat [and neither Heilbrunn nor Alter would
> disagree with this statement, as far as I can tell]. That's basically a
> Clintonian, or slightly more liberal than Clinton, which is to say
> significantly removed from a New Deal liberal especially by the last thirty
> years of Reagnite dominance of US politics.<
That's true. But then why are you defending him so vehemently,
including misinterpreting or misrepresenting what I said, etc.?
> This is characteristic of left anti-O'ism too. Ignore what he actually said
> during the campaign, which was CENTRIST-left, and then accuse him of not
> carrying out a social democratic program, which program was not what he
> campaigned on.<
I never said he was a social democrat or anything like that. See above.
>> Heilbrunn: "Obama himself had two sides -- Chicago community organizer and
>> Ivy League meritocrat. The meritocrat won out... the contrast with Franklin
>> Roosevelt, who heartily reciprocate the enmity of the privileged class from
>> which he emerged, is striking."<<
CB:
> How snarky. One wonders ( ad hominem) what Heilbrunn's background is.<
It's not snarky. It's a summary of a longer analysis of Obama's personality.
CB:
> Roosevelt had a completely opposite situation of mass political
> consciousness, mobilization etc. , although at the beginning of his term he
> was not that left. He _was_ from the elite and the mass situation forced him
> left. <
As I said before, Roosevelt was subject to >> popular pressure on
them, most likely from outside "normal channels" <<
> The fact that Obama went to Harvard law school does not get him into the
> elite on the level that Roosevelt was, as from a capitalist family. The
> simplemindedness of the analysis of O as a "meritocrat" is what's striking.<
You haven't read the book under review or the review itself, have you?
In any event, all the evidence I've seen fits the hypothesis that BHO
is wedded to meritocracy. As noted, that's better than Dubyaism.
> Obama is a little American boy with his thumb in the US political oil pipe
> rupture, a kind of variation of the Sorcerer's apprentice , who can't control
> the forces he has taken on to control.<
That's why we need popular pressure on him most likely from outside
"normal channels." But I wouldn't trust his intentions.
--
Jim Devine
"Those who take the most from the table
Teach contentment.
Those for whom the taxes are destined
Demand sacrifice.
Those who eat their fill speak to the hungry
of wonderful times to come.
Those who lead the country into the abyss
Call too ruling difficult
For ordinary folk." – Bertolt Brecht.
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