6 years ago
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If Progressives Don’t Wake Up To How Awful Obama Was, Their Movement Will Fail
"We don’t get to keep him. We don’t get to keep the first black president. We don’t get to let that be ours; we have to reject it, in the same way we’d have to reject the first female president had Hillary won…" By Caitlin Johnstone.
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+3Submitted 6 years ago by AdelleChattre
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+2Submitted 6 years ago by AdelleChattre
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Not so sure about this.. Any president, no matter how progressive or anti establishment will have to deal with Wall Street and 'the establishment'. He (or she) will have to build relationships with those groups in order to push through any changes. There's no point in living in an imaginary world where a knight in a shining armour will appear who won't even talk to Wall Street, Republicans and establishment Democrats and, yet, somehow manage to change the US for better. Was Obama the perfect president? Not really. Was he awful? Not even close. Should we aim to elect candidates that will progressively limit the power of Wall Street? Absolutely. But more Obama, Hillary or any other hate does no good, no matter how comfortable living in the hate bubble feels.
I'm not sure if you read the article or just the first paragraph. This article wasn't even about Obama's $400,000 check for a wall street health care speech.
It's all in exactly how a president 'deals' with Wall Street. Rejecting corporate Democrats, especially Diet Republicans like Obama and Clinton, is the only way an actual progressive like either of the Roosevelts even takes office. Clearly, and I think this is the point this article makes well, you can't win for losing. Electing people to the right of Eisdenhower and Nixon may be one way to win, but it's definitely how to lose.
This was an interesting essay, and the author raises good points. However, I thought that her style detracted from her message. Sure enough, when I went through the comments, I found this from someone named Brian Orner directed to the author.
He writes, "You’re a good writer, and to some extent, I applaud your take-no-prisoners approach. But you’d do far better to tone down the arrogance and stop casting aspersions on everyone who doesn’t think exactly like you do. You’ve managed to take a massively complex enterprise — The Presidency of the United States — and reduce it down to what you presume is a cause-and-effect email from the financial community. This is absurd. I don’t have the time or the energy for a full rebuttal, but I will point out that you’re actually advocating for systemic hatred. No real progressive would do that. That’s Ann Coulter talking."
Caitlin Johnstone's response really wasn't much of a response. She responds, "You haven’t written anything in more than a month. Quit bitching about how you think other people should be writing and start creating your own content."
Orner replies (accurately, I'd argue, especially his third point), "1. Bitching? I don’t think that word means what you think it means. 2. Quantity is a poor substitute for quality—especially in journalism. 3. The ad hominem attack proves my point perfectly.
Johnstone's second response is "Yeah we’re just giving one another feedback. You think I should be nicer, I think you should stop telling people how they should use their gifts and start using your own. It’s been nice exchanging feedback with you."
That is followed by responses from two other readers who called her out on her lack of respect for those who wished to address some issues with her.
If I had been the author of this piece, in particular, and Orner lazily concern trolled me, handwaving me away as might-as-well-be Ann Coulter, I don’t think I’d feel obliged to thank him for it. Sounds very much to me as though Orner has an axe to grind more so than any points to make at all. I see nothing wrong in Johnstone’s piece, nor in her handling of a random troll. My two cents.
"You feel attacked because someone gave you their viewpoint? Man, that is delicate. One shudders to think what you’d feel like as a victim of genocide callously justified as saving “countless lives.” Get a thicker hide." That was some good advice that you have to sashinator. It's even better advice for Johnstone.
Or what? Whatever the problem you’re pointing out is, it must not be her facts. Is it what those facts necessarily imply that’s dangerous?
Good luck with that. If this is not obvious to someone by now, I don't know what will change their mind.
Based on the response to Hillary losing it seems that it is unlikely the Democrats will learn their lesson. Instead of asking themselves what they did wrong in the election, they accused the country of being full of racist bigots.
Colbert's glib McCarthyism, and the way the audience seems to love it, is starting to make my skin crawl. Maybe we lost one Papa Bear only to gain another, I'm noticing.
Oh get off your high horse, wouldya? Could you ask for a more idealistic naiveté about how the world works?
If you think Obama was a "blood-soaked necon" boy, do I have some bad news for you about presidents past and present.
Remember "We Like Ike" Eisenhower? Korean War.
How about FDR aka Saint Roosevelt of Our Church of The New Deal? Developed the A-bomb.
How about Truman The Trustworthy? He dropped 2 of them.
Going all the way back to Gen. Washington (The Perfect) who quelled the Whiskey Rebellion by riding at the head of an army with 13,000 militiamen. Over enforcing a tax. Nobody died because the insurgents all went home before the arrival of the army but had they not they would have probably been forced to fight and (given their numbers) died.
There is simply no way to explain damned if you do/damned if you don't choices POTUS has to confront to anybody still living cushioned Berkley sophomore life. Out in the world of geopolitics on 7 billion people scale, decisions lead to deaths. Always. The only question is how many and for how long.
Not sure if you mean to say every president is guilty, so no presidents are guilty. For instance, is Truman any more culpable for nuking two cities than Roosevelt was for developing the weapons? I’d say so. I don’t think Truman’s automatically innocent of wrongdoing because he was president. Do you? President Obama started several wars. Is that any sort of reflection on him or is it the measure of his authority, would you say?
All good questions. Hardly any straightforward answers, wouldn't you say?
To my mind, Truman is morally culpable for waging atomic war. Is there any other sane answer? Truman himself would tell you the buck stops with him. We don’t hold the scientists or the generals or the flight crews responsible, so if there’s anybody left it’s him. Yes, I’d say, presidents are responsible for their actions, but then, I think we all are. I would rather not think that the Nuremberg trials were victors’ justice, that ‘following orders’ excuses everything, or that ‘national interests’ justify every horror and atrocity automagically. I’d say President Obama’s authority does not absolve him of culpability for what he’s done. Just like I’d say the fact President Washington was a butcher on horseback doesn’t absolve Trump of his part of the current genocide in Yemen.
And therefore is there anything any one single person could have done morally better given Truman's, Obama's or Washington's circumstances? I argue no.
By not dropping the bomb an invasion of Japan would have taken countless more lives.
By not droning Yemen Middle East outright war would taken countless more lives.
It is a trade off of shitty end game scenarios and any sensible person calculates the least shitty one and takes responsibility for the consequences.
How does one add all that up and conclude Obama was "bad" is beyond my comprehension. At most you might conclude that the presidency is "bad". That is not something I agree with but at least it's a line of thinking I can follow. But, regardless, it is a separate argument and certainly not what the article is arguing. The article is saying "we need to elect Jesus, anything less is fascism". That's profoundly immature and unimaginative.
Really? Blue skying this here, but Truman might’ve not nuked city after city. That’s not really what you mean, though, is it?
Nuking those cities wasn’t about defeating Japan. Japan had no air power, and newly built U.S. bases on Okinawa were set to field sorties of 625 B-29s at a time unopposed, all day, every day. The U.S. could’ve bombed Japan back under the ocean without stepping so much as a toe onshore. There’s nothing credible about the excuse that the atomic war against Japan was about not invading Japan. Authorities will tell you so, but then authorities will also tell you a lot of things.
You don’t have to make shit up. Yemen was dirt poor and a hard place to live once, and now it’s an ongoing genocide in which the U.S. is an enthusiastic participant right alongside our mutual friends of the Saudis, Wahhabi Salafist terrorists somewhat better known as Al Qaeda. Countless more lives? Hogwash.
Oh, people take responsibility for the consequences of their decisions now? I thought we were being all “might makes right,” but now we’re back to “my country, right or wrong” again?
Libya for the win, Alex.
So especially high status people in authority exist on a plane above all moral dimensions. Got it. Stalin. Pol Pot. Hitler. It’s all good. Got it.
Your words. My suggestion is that sense of the article’s meaning sounds bogus to you because it is.
Oh-kaaaay. Good talk. Glad you feel strongly about... well whatever it is that your position is.
It must be really tough atacking a viewpoint without making your own clear.
You feel attacked because someone gave you their viewpoint? Man, that is delicate. One shudders to think what you’d feel like as a victim of genocide callously justified as saving “countless lives.” Get a thicker hide.
Whatevs