This is a Tempest in a Teapot. A distraction. A "look, a monkey," kind of mindset.
And tempest in a teapot is a brill way to describe the 'johnny-come-lately' ad-hoc opposition that the teabaggers are. When the GOP win where will the Teabaggers go?
Look, I know. I understand the frustration of those on the left. I am on the left. Way out there beyond many of the folks on this weblog. Way out there than most folks in general. I am way out there.
I honestly believe that this country will one day be a European-styled Socialist/Democracy. I will probably die before that happens but I believe it will happen some day. We do not have a choice.
But I am also a realist and in terms of today's politics a leftist-pragmatist, much like our president.
I wanted the Public Option, sure, but I cannot tell you the joy I felt when the Health Insurance bill passed. I live in California and I cannot tell you the pain I felt when Prop 8 won. I knew deep in my heart it would be overturned and it was. I knew the stimulus package was way too small and would not be enough to really turn the economy around but I am thankful for all the jobs it has saved in these extremely tough times.
I supported Hillary Clinton in 2008. Of course, until Obama was nominated. Every day I wake up, and I am so chuffed and thrilled that he is our president, that Obama is on television every day, infuriating some and challenging the rest to do the right fucking thing. I get his e-mails every day. I donate. I do my part. But never once have I felt like he is really speaking for me, and what I truly want.
But, here's the kicker: That is alright. I know that in this fucking oligarchy we live in, we wake up, do our thing; if it is someone as fortunate as me to be a fucking wine buyer at a grocery chain or if it is some poor soul who has no home, desperate for any kind of job, it is the life we live in. And only Obama and the Democrats provide hope to make that world a better place for the poor souls.
I want us out of Afghanistan, full stop. I knew that electing Obama would not make that happen. I supported Hillary! I knew she would have done the same thing. We are finally getting out of Iraq. Something Hillary might not have done. Obama did pass an, albeit tepid- something!, health care bill. Obama did regulate the bastards on Wall Street. (Punch it home with Warren! Recess appointment if you must!) But Wall Street reform was weak tea as far as some one like me was concerned.
I knew going in to it. I knew that no fucking politician of this nation could ever truly satisfy me, save Bernie Sanders (why doesn't he run for president? Oh, that is why. Because he would never be elected.)
You must win. You want the desk, you have got to win the election. That is why these idiotic, joker, fools obstruct us from our own party. They are cowards, desperate to hang on to any slice of power and influence they can hang on to. They are fucking politicians, damnitt. Folks like Sanders, Frank (most of the time), Franken, Marcy Kaptur, Barbara Jordan, Pete Stark, etc, ... they are the exception that proves the rule that Politicians Suck.
They do. Even the ones you love; the Democrats you supported, bled for, gave money to; they will throw you under the bus in a heartbeat to serve their best interests, whether that means getting re-elected or filling their personal coffers, or burnishing their 'power' cred at Palmer's in DC, getting the best table, damnitt, 'cause they deserve it. Do not be fooled.
Here am I, a man who treasures the Neil Innes song, No Matter Who You Vote for, the Government Always Gets In. I know that Obama will let me down, just as I know Hillary would have let me down, too.
Yet, it is better than what will happen if the fucking GOP, bastards, evil mutherfuckers get a hold of subpoena power.
We saw what happened with Clinton, right?
And that is another great topic of discussion. Check out the fab comments on 538 re this issue, the whole Gibbs thing-y today. The 'professional left' as it stands today would have handed it to him, right? They would really have shown him who is the boss, right?
Balanced fucking budget. I'm sorry, let me say that again, louder: Balanced Fucking Budget. Very few of our men & women dying in combat. Let me say that again, slowly & louder: Very few men & women Dying in Combat. The 'professional left' did show Clinton who is the boss, by getting Bush elected.
It is like the Velvet Underground. No one bought their records, but those few who did, started bands. Those Democratic, jilted lovers (many of them crappy-ass Nader supporters) are exactly the folks who you read now on lib blogs. Hell, I am a fucking Situationist and I got in to a screaming knock-down fight with my ex-girlfriend about her stupid-ass Nader vote. (It still makes my blood boil!)
Is that what you want, left? Dailykos DemLeft? Fights aboot fine print and dollar signs? Fights about who wins every fucking media cycle every fucking day? That is not a life that this FDR Democrat is willing to fulfill.
Obama disappoints me. Every fucking day, he does. But it is a far better sight than the unctuous, satanic, blisteringly malevolent motherfuckers in the GOP: The 'entrepreneurs' who bust unions. The 'entrepreneurs' who insist that tax cuts for the wealthy will stimulate the economy, the 'entrepreneurs' who maintain that 'tort reform' is necessary, the 'entrepreneurs' (It is a fucking French word, GOP assholes) who wish Social Security & Medicare a thing of the past, the 'entrepreneurs' that demonize immigrant workers yet throw lavish parties, full of rocket salad and the finest Napa Cabernet, the 'entrepreneurs' that are not entrepreneurs but regular working folks, who get the shaft again, 'cause their boss told them they can't have insurance 'cause they did not work 40 fucking hours a week. Or they smoked. 12 years ago. Or their Mother had high blood pressure.
As much as I am frustrated and pissed off about Obama, Clinton, whate'er, Dem representation, I always remember this:
Republicans, whatever, (small business, one of their fave canards,) always look at YOU, the public: as THE BOTTOM LINE.
That's right. Humans, life, all its' twists and turns, its' foibles, its' moments of extreme bliss atop Half Dome, getting married with a honeymoon in Paris, finishing a triathalon, getting published in the itty-bitty local rag, dropping a strawberry in your lover's Champagne, that is all as nowt. You are a fucking figure in a ledger. And this is respected, this is understood, a given. That which is the house you own is the person you are, ...
But there is more, right?
Those champagne toasts in trailer parks, those knowing winks in the lobby at the theatre, those docents wearing their finest retail clothes.
We cannot lose sight of the big picture.
I am distressed.
Big fucking deal, there is a world to be changed (and won.)
I cannot carp, as a super-left man, what is being done today. It is not enough (it never is) but it is as much as the fucking GOP bastards will allow. (Let them run the House, yet they will impeach the black man.)
Even revolutionaries, perhaps faux-revolutionaries (such as myself) know compromise is the key to progress.
Fuck. I am a collaborationist. I am NOT.