Eight years ago today, America was in the midst of squandering a trillion dollars on George W. Bush's Iraqi Crusade to rescue his father's legacy. Eight years ago today, the bubble of over leveraged debt and nonexistent real wages was about to burst, causing millions to lose their jobs and their homes. Eight years ago today, millions of Americans couldn't go to the doctor, or even get a flu shot, because they couldn't afford health insurance. The Democratic Party responded to these challenges by nominating Barack Obama for President. He won, then he made good on his promise to change the country.
Barack Obama began winding down George W. Bush's misadventure in Iraq as soon as he was elected President. Today, Vladamir Putin is following Bush--the person who saw his soul--into Middle Eastern misadventures, while our President has used cunning diplomacy to protect American interests over the long run, without military intervention. That is change I believe in.
Eight years ago today, Osama bin Laden was alive and well. Today, he is dead as a door nail. That is change I believe in.
Eight years ago, few could afford health insurance and some could not buy it at all because they had the misfortune to have cancer or other life threatening illnesses. These people were denied the basic right to be healthy. The United States stood out as the only Industrialized Country which did not make health insurance universally available. Today, insurerers are barred from discriminating against people with pre existing conditions and subsidies are available to help people afford health insurance. Ten million Americans who were relegated to receiving substandard care in emergency rooms before now have insurance, access to doctors' offices and the preventative care that comes with it. That is change I believe in.
Eight years ago, people were about to lose everything as the housing debt bubble popped. Today, because as long as real wages remain stagnant there will always be debt bubbles, the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau is taking proactive steps to reign in the next debt bubble--the student loan debt bubble. The government is making sure that loan servicers follow the law and make repayment plans, like the income based repayment included in the Affordable Care Act, available to borrowers. That is change I believe in.
Eight years ago today, every car on the road you could buy burned gas and polluted the environment and coal power plants were popping up all over the place. Today, hundreds of thousands of electric cars are on the road and the most common newly constructed power plant runs on solar energy. That is change I believe in.
Eight years ago today, gay couples who spent years loving each other could be barred from seeing each other at the end of life because gay marriage was a concept at best. Today, in part because of Barack Obama, his choices to serve on the Supreme Court and his choice for Vice President Joe Biden, gay marriage is the law of the land and those who are passing can spend their last days with their beloved partners.
Barack Obama has done all this while putting up with rabid anger from the delerious right. And he rarely gets the credit he deserves, so when I read about how Hillary Clinton's rich friends like Susie Buell (who has more in common with Donald Trump than average Americans: http://m.sfweekly.com/...) love to whine (see: http://www.politico.com/...) about the best President, by far, in my lifetime, I am reminded about why I voted for Barack Obama in 2008.
I voted for Barack Obama because I believed he truly understood the challenges of middle and working class Americans. I voted for Barack Obama because I believed he would put the welfare of average Americans like me ahead of his friendship with rich mega donors. I voted for Barack Obama because I believed he would achieve health care reform. I was right. And it is amazing to see how our country has changed for the better over the past eight years.
Yet Hillary Clinton, apparently our nominee apparent, still would rather be friends with rich morons like Susie Buell, who sat out the 2012 election because Barack Obama spent too much time fighting for the average American and not enough time stroking the egos of megadonors, and in so doing put the health insurance of millions of Americans at risk than fight for us as average Americans. It is why she cannot put away an incredibly weak (at least on paper) challenger who isn't even a member of the Democratic Party.
The way to win in 2016 is not to kowtow to the rich megadonors. It is to run on this record, the record of Barack Obama's incredible accomplishments and to say that you will build on his successes. Bernie Sanders denies Obama's massive changes when he says the President did not go far enough--Senator Sanders, you voted for the ACA because it was as far as it could go at the time, and you should admit it moved the country pretty far along in the correct direction. And Hillary Clinton denies changes when she flip flops on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, hedges on the Iran Deal, and listens to megadonor-Arm Chair Generals rather than observe just how much we can influence through diplomacy and the trade that comes with it.
I believe that, in order to defeat Donald Trump, we should reclaim this record of change and nominate a candidate who will truly support and defend our President's record. I support, and hope you will join me in urging to run, Vice President Joe Biden for President of the United States.