From politicalwire.com
November 11, 2009
Pessimism Grows Among Americans
A new AP-Gfk poll finds 56% of Americans believe the country is headed in the wrong direction, a dramatic turnaround from April when 48% thought the country was going in the right direction and 44% it was on the wrong track.
Just imagine that you find yourself in a Twilight Zone experience where you are locked in a movie screening room...all alone, with no way out. And what is displayed on the wall-sized screen 6 feet in front of you is an endless melange of the horrific.
Images from the concentration camps to slasher movies to animal abuse stories to starving children in Africa to thirteen dead soldiers in Texas keep playing over and over and over again in an endless loop. Suddenly the film stops and a door bursts open. You rush to the door and as you step outside you realize that you have become part of the film you had just been watching. Suicide seems a viable option.
Almost as depressing as that little scenario is what we have actually been subjected to since the inauguration of Barack Obama. There has been an endless barrage of hate speech, bigotry, threats upon his life and his wife and children. The economy on the brink of an actual depression thanks to the the two Cheney/Bush wars has raised unemployment in the United States to the highest its been since Ronald Reagan was in office (you know...St. Ronnie of Hollywood?). Millions have seen their pensions melt into nothing. Their houses, once their aces in the hole, have lost half their value. Their dreams of a comfortable retirement shattered. Meanwhile, the banks are busy gouging credit card holders and making billions in profits. And on Wall Street, which came close to being paved over and a potters field put in its place, is about to hand out billions in bonuses thanks to the bailout funds showered upon them by the government.
Obama, the archangel of change, has suddenly fallen to earth. And it has not been a soft landing. I do not attribute one iota of deceit or guile to his clarion campaign call to overhaul the bloated corrupted federal government that for so many seems to have stolen from the rich to give to the poor for years and years. No, I think he was in earnest. More's the pity. One recalls the New Testament scene where Jesus ousts the money-changers from the Temple. Have you ever wondered how long it took after he left for them to resume their normal operations? The ways of politics are immutable. Money will always buy power. And those who benefit the most from the coffers of the rich and powerful will always be beholden to them. As it was in the beginning, is now, and forever shall be. Amen.
We still have tens of thousands of troops in Iraq. Our brave men and women are dying at an alarming rate in Afghanistan. Guantanamo Bay is still open for business. Hate groups of every stripe are emboldened by the insane rants of Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh. The ultra right, bought and paid for by various vested interests, stage "tea parties" as if they were the equivalent of the American patriots who were fighting real tyranny and oppression. What gall.
Congress has divided itself into two opposing forces. The Democrats, some just as venal and callous as their Republican opposites (yes, I'm referring to you "Blue Dogs" and others like Mary Landrieu who are more concerned for their own future than that of the country) have made attempts at achieving the mandate Obama has handed them. But they are faced with an opposition so blinded by ideology and in the thrall of the far right that they find themselves stymied at every move. And in the end, they either let it die or make concessions that are abhorrent to those who put Obama in office.
What I am most surprised at by the poll numbers that led this piece is that only 56% of us think we are headed in the wrong direction.