I, too, am literally sick to my stomach. And given the diary currently at the top of the rec list, I know this, too, will be unpopular among some here.
I really never wanted to believe that we Democrats were defeatists. But I've begun to change my mind. Already, two weeks into the new Democratic administration that we all cheered to victory, around here, it seems that victory might as well have never occurred. The Obama Administration has already let us down. The Democrats have failed us. "A historical opportunity thrown down the drain." Nevermind that the stimulus hasn't even passed yet--circumstances and logic don't matter.
Instead, we seem programmed to smear other Democrats gratuitously, even enthusiastically. Let's kick this bad habit. Preferably now--before it gets worse.
I voted for Obama, but I did so knowing full well that I would not be happy with every decision, or lack of decision, he made. I have no problem with others airing their concerns or disagreements; I will do the same. But why not do it sensibly and logically?
There are 1442 days left in Obama's first term. 714 days left for this Congress. There is a short-term and a long-term recovery to our current crisis, and here we are, 15 days in, whimpering and hollering, while blaming fellow Democrats because the long-term recovery hasn't happened yet.
Blaming fellow Democrats before a bill has passed, or had any chance at all to succeed.
Simultaneously proposing that we adopt a "grand vision", a bill "almost entirely dedicated to creating and rebuilding infrastructure," (yet also "build solar winds and farms" and "build thousands of new, small schools...")--while going on to criticize our current bill using time-tested Republican smears:
Instead, we got a spending bill.
Damn right we got a spending bill. If Democrats do fail, it will be because we don't spend enough in the right places to stimulate the economy. While the current bill is not perfect, as Obama and numerous Democratic senators recognize, it is a start.
If Democrats have failed at all, we've failed in that we've drank the Republican Kool Aid--and in doing so, we could be becoming exactly what they once accused us of: Defeatist. We're legitimizing the Republican practice of latching onto 1% to cast a shadow on 99%. We're beating ourselves up needlessly about having created a monster "spending bill".
We're criticizing Democrats for literally no reason:
To my sheer amazement, I have seen little or no repudiation to the failed economic and political philosophy that allowed this calamity to occur in the first place. Alan Greenspan himself conceded that "there is a flaw in the model."
But you won't hear anything resembling that from Obama's economic team. To the contrary, they appear to be doing everything possible to preserve the corrupt, greedy system of Wild West capitalism that has led us here.
Nevermind that this philosophy has long been repudiated (even Bush acknowledged that laissez-faire was bankrupt by initiating TARP)! Nevermind that the entire idea of bailing out the banks and enacting a trillion dollar stimulus bill makes it fully clear that the invisible hand is DEAD! Nevermind that Obama has pledged to strengthen the regulation of Wall Street, and that we haven't given him a chance to make that happen yet.
Oh, let's whine anyway! This is what we have become--and our political self-mutilation must stop now.