In 'A Message to Obama's Progressive Critics', a screed intended to address the widespread concern among the progressive movement over Obama's staff picks, Steve Hildebrand succeeds only in making my concerns grow more acuminous.
I clicked on the post with great optimism that it, being from an Obama insider, would shed some light on these appointments and put our fears to rest. I thought we deserved some explanation other than 'trust us, we know what we're doing'. Instead, this is what we got:
In the first 75% of the "message", Steve feels compelled to re-educate us on how big a victory this was for Obama, what a unique campaign it was, and just how bad things really are in the country. It's good that he did this because us progressives would otherwise have no idea that, for example, things in the country are really bad.
Only when we get to the second to last paragraph does Steve finally get to his "point."
I could go on and on. The point I'm making here is that our new President, the Congress and all Americans must come together to solve these problems. This is not a time for the left wing of our Party to draw conclusions about the Cabinet and White House appointments that President-Elect Obama is making. Some believe the appointments generally aren't progressive enough. Having worked with former Senator Obama for the last two years, I can tell you, that isn't the way he thinks and it's not likely the way he will lead. The problems I mentioned above and the many I didn't, suggest that our President surround himself with the most qualified people to address these challenges. After all, he was elected to be the President of all the people - not just those on the left.
So,
- We must all come together.
- "Progressive enough" is not how he thinks.
- President must choose the "most qualified"
- President of everybody.
The first point is a facade. Congress has been coming together quite well for decades to ruin our country and hand it over to monied interests. Almost all of the major legislation that has led to our current predicament, from the Iraq war resolution, to the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act that paved the way for the outlaw financial economy, was passed with overwhelming bipartisan support.
What would be a change is for someone to fight for us and I am optimistic Obama may be that person. But I am still skeptical that it will ever be possible for anyone who has the best interests of the public in mind to come together with the organized crime syndicate that is the Republican party.
Come on. With few exceptions, and there are some, these people are the bane of humanity. They long ago lost whatever conscience they once may have possessed. And they would just as soon see progressives and liberals die as to look at us. They will not come together. They can only be forced by political expediency into line.
The second point ("Progressive enough" is not how he thinks) is inarguable because Steve didn't say enough. Obama doesn't think like what? That there are varying degrees of progressivism? That it matters?
But it does deserve a correction: With only a couple of exceptions, the vast majority of Obama's picks aren't just not "progressive enough." In fact, they aren't progressive at all and many are diametrically opposed to everything the progressive movement stands for.
The third point (President must choose the "most qualified")
This argument is actually offensive.
Aside from the fact that most of Obama's crisis picks - national security, economy -were actually involved in, or instrumental in creating the problems we are now trying to solve, Steve is strongly implying that "most qualified" and "progressive" are antithetical. Even if that's not what he meant, combined with Obama's actual choices, that is the natural conclusion from the argument.
And when we do look at Obama's actual choices, what can we discrn are these great qualification? Let's see, has been on the wrong side of the issue for most of adult life. Check. Helped to actually create the disaster in the first place. Check.
It is progressives who have been right all along. This is not just a left right duality. It is a right and wrong duality.
It was obvious to progressives that the laissez fair trend would result in exactly what it has resulted in - mass wealth inequality resulting in mass economic hardship for the majority and increased social unrest as a result. We were the ones who knew that the free market orthodoxy was a scam. We were the ones who knew that Wall Street had grown too powerful and out of control.
Many progressives were predicting economic calamity decades ago. I think we all in the progressive netroots were predicting it at least 5 years ago. We've been writing about it here as long as I've been here.
Are you really going to try and tell me that progressives are not the most qualified? We are the only ones qualified.
And it is the same with foreign policy. It was us, long before the Steve Hildebrands of the world came along for political expedience, who knew that the Iraq war would inevitably fail. It was us who knew that we can never win a "war on terror" with conventional forces. It was us who have been begging our leaders to lead us away from a petrolatum based economy that enriches warlords and religious despots.
Is is us who has been right all along about every major problem this country faces. But we aren't the "most qualified"?
The forth argument is true. Obama will be the president of all people. But I'll repeat the argument I made in the recommended dairy I wrote in rebuttal to Obama's first diary here at Daily Kos:
Must I point out that a perplexingly large percentage of the American public also believes that WMD were found in Iraq. And that Saddam Hussein was involved in the September 11 attacks.
On the other side, I would argue that a vast majority of Americans did not believe that "government is the problem" thirty years ago. Or that private corporations were more efficient and effective at providing government services then the government itself.
There can be no argument that the voting public has been dissatisfied with the performance of government over the years. And for this the Democrats must bear much of the responsibility. But the shift in public perception against government was not just the result of cumbersome bureaucracies, inept management and too high taxes; it was the result of a massive, precisely orchestrated campaign to create that perception.
And this is what I mean about failed leadership. It is not enough to take a poll and decide what can be done. We must change perceptions so that we may do what must be done. We must educate. We must persuade. We must lead.
My diary was the one that actually bumped Obama's from the #1 spot on the Rec'd list. And for a whole day they were sitting next to each other. So it is not presumptuous to suspect that in Obama's follow up diary, he was addressing my dairy when he wrote this:
I also agree that it is the job of Democratic elected officials to help shape public opinion, and not just respond passively to opinion thats been aggressively shaped by the Republicans PR machinery. I am simply suggesting, based on my experience, that people will respond to a powerfully progressive agenda when its couched in optimism, pragmatism and our shared American ideals.
I was fairly satisfied with that response - although I have found that the term pragmatism can often be defined as going along with the herd and accepting the limitations imposed by mediocre minds and dim imaginations.
I see only two explanations for Obama's cabinet appointments: One, he really does believe they are the best qualified. If so, then we got duped. Or two, he is making a political calculation. If so, then a defense of this strategy may be beyond the purview of public discourse.
Regardless, I would strongly advise Mr. Hildebrand to read Obama's posts and avoid defending his cabinet choices in the future. Making the argument that someone like Joseph Stiglitz, who has been right for so many years, is not as qualified as Time Geithner and Larry Summers, who have not only been persistently wrong, but to some degree, are the actual architects of this economic crisis, will persuade few.