Crossposted from Hillbilly Report.
It is just a sign of the times. Once again Progressives and those of us who are serious about making our country a light of hope for all again are being stabbed in the back in the interests of those who have raped the middle-class, stagnated wages and crashed the economy to get bailed out as we all sacrifice. For those of us who really believed in the opposition to the Bush Administration in the last decade and really believed in the hope for real change in 2006 and 2008 it is another bitter pill to swallow and another insult that should bring about a stark realization. Right now we are the only people in this country who have had absolutely no representation in Washington in the last thirty years and worse yet the election of 2012 offers no hope whatsoever that we will be heard until at least 2016.
Most of you have heard by now that once again the President is stabbing us in the back and adopting a Republican talking point and policy in lieu of showing some sanity and doing what is right.
This is yet another incident that on it's own would raise eyebrows but not alarm but taken with everything else this President has done or refused to do serves to point out one thing. When it comes to policy with this administration Progressives and anyone with courage and enough common sense to know what is right is going to be left out in the cold. The only question left is whether our President just does not have enough guts to fight for anything, or whether deep inside his own heart he really believes in the ideals of the Republican Party.
Either way our country has been crippled with one party rule. What do elections really mean anymore if no matter who wins we get the same policy and horrid direction for our country anyway?? What did it matter in 2006 when we retook Congress but our leadership lacked the courage to really fight for real change?? What did all the "hope" for "change" really matter in 2008 in retrospect when all we have gotten is a third Bush Administration with a watered-down healthcare bill.
One thing we can all be certain of now. If you believed in a new way for our country and desperately wanted a return to when work was valued as much as wealth and laws were enacted for the benefit of America as a whole and not just 2% of the greediest and least patriotic among us you will not be represented no matter what happens in 2012. The one lesson of 2006 and 2008 is that no matter what mandate is handed down from America to be America again it simply will never be fulfilled because quite frankly Republicans do not care about us and Democratic "leaders" are too busy being Republicans to listen to us. They look upon us with scorn and shame.
That is why I no longer believe the White House and at least half the Democrats in the House or Senate leadership. Because they do not believe in me or my vision for America. Since they refuse to show me and my hopes for this country respect I have found that I no longer respect them either. Their cowardly, watered down Republicanism may not be as extreme but when you really consider things it is actually worse. That is because either they know better and are cowards or they actually believe in Republican vision and are liars.
Either way I am fed up. Luckily I am not alone:
Trumka also announced the creation of an independent advocacy PAC that will “build the political power for America’s silent majority, the middle class and poor who are struggling to get by.”
It will be an effort by and for working people, communicating beyond our membership and striving to ensure all who work a strong and clear voice in the political process.
Working people everywhere are beginning to follow real leaders like Trumka with the courage to fight for the ideals they profess to believe in. Democrats seem determined to stab us all in the back again and again even if it means losing folks that have long fought for them.
Sadlly for Progressives we are faced not only with the task of changing our country but indeed we are now faced with the fact that we have no existing party that we can depend on to represent us. I do not believe Democrats on the leadership level are cowards, I believe they have profited enough by keeping things the same that they have decided they are better off being Republicans with a D by their name to keep up appearances.
That is why I am calling for and will support any Progressive that will stand up for us and run for the Presidency in 2012. Whether within the Democratic Party as a primary candidate or in the general election as an Independent I am hoping that a Progressive candidate with a Progressive platform and the will to fight for it will run and give me a chance to fight for what I believe in instead of constantly voting for Republican rule no matter who is elected.
So to those of you who say that I must vote for the lesser of two evils or the sky will fall and Republicans will win the White House I submit this. Republicans HAVE won the White House and have gotten just what they wanted. I really see little difference either way.
Although a few good Democrats remain in Washington it saddens me to realize the party that I have been a part of and believed in for so long no longer represents me. I believe in the ideals of the Democratic Party but unfortunately with the Obama Administration the Democratic Party has moved away from those ideals and left me and millions of others stranded with no place to go.
Without a third party or primary candidate from the left in 2012 I will not be voting because I refuse to vote for and sanction the ideals of the Republican Party like I did in 2008. If Obama and the Democratic Party he leads wishes to join Republicans in completing the legacy of George W. Bush I cannot stop him, but I can promise he will do so without my vote or support.
It has come to that.