Obama bashing

Online blogging has tickled down to captivate even me, witness my tepid attempt.  There’s been so much news on how writers, wanna-be writers and ranters nee bloggers are now “journalists” and “news-reporters” and the next new thing.

Into their fifth year, “Netroots Nation”, the progressives’ blogger conclave convened in Minneapolis this past week.  Not to be left out, the right premiered their mirroring event “Right Online” a few blocks down the street.  (Couldn’t they have had the independence to pick another city?  Lemmings all?  Or limited imagination?  Come to think of it, weren’t the Republicans also-rans, fiercely running in place after Howard Dean’s internet fundraising success in 2004?  But then again, Republicans are the undisputed champs at negative campaigning, single issue popularism, outright electoral fraud and unconscionable lying.  But I’m getting ahead of myself.)

NPR played a clip featuring Netroots Nation yesterday morning.  Right Online had their turn this morning.  Both reports couldn’t avoid tieing in a bash of our President.

He can’t get it right.  The Netroots Nationers kvetch about the futility of campaigning for him when he doesn’t deliver.  Now, they argue, is the time to hold out for stronger guarantees for our due, before going door to door for the next election.

What?

The news loves this shit.  Lambasted from the left and right, the President can’t win.  And I suppose it is a no win job.  Damned if you do / don’t, right?  That’s what he signed on for.

Still, its heartbreaking to hear the left and progressives give up on what is possibly the best President we’ve had in the last thirty years.  By “best” I mean the one most interested in fairness and creating a better world for the majority, if not all Americans.  Jimmy Carter was good, maybe even better, but all the rest were in it for their self-interest.

OK maybe I’m a little naïve, and perhaps Obama’s means and methods are out of date and of a by-gone era.  Of a time when your neighbors, friends, employers and leaders could be trusted to have your mutual (best) interests in their decisions.  Sure, he can be a heartless, self-serving politician, but compared with the noise surrounding him, he’s a saint.  Is he the problem?  Or is it us?  

Could it kill us to give him a break.  To give him time.  To trust him.  And give a little credit for what's been done given the situation he's inherited from 8 years of Bush?  Does anyone at Netroots Nation really think life would be better under any of the current Republican candidates? 

Has the progressives conveniently forgotten that the Feds are no longer pursuing DADT and DOMA?  And the bailout of GM was not a moneypit but saved over 1.4 million jobs?  And healthcare reform passed after more than eighty years of thumbs up the butt?  Duh, do you forget we are still in a recession?  Not every social program can grow in funding and instead of burning energy flailing against that reality, focus it on the military largesse and the tax-free lives of the super-rich.  According to a NY Times editorial, over 70% of the population supports better carbon emission controls, from cars to factories.  Why isn’t that leveraged to broaden EPA, and reduce factory farming and their subsidies?

To all liberals, progressives, conservatives, tea partiers and all you sanctimonious political hangers-on:  stop being such self-interested bastards.  Raise up a little higher.  Your opponent / enemy is you.  No single person / party / group needs to or should win-it-all.  Perhaps it's useful to examine our own lives.  What is your limit for buying, getting, burning more?  Have you ever regretted the results your choices and actions?  Did it ever occur to you that a me-first attitude is an undercurrent to most of our decisions?  All we all that different from the obvious brain-numbing self-interest that obsesses / drives the Tea Party?  And we / they conveniently call that politics, and for the good of all?

(Sigh).  We can do better.  We have to.  Why must we feel/think/act like crabs in a bucket?

Clearly no one wants to go first.  In this world, any signs of openness are seen as weaknesses.  Eat or be eaten.  And that's where Obama hit the wall.  Try to be open, try to be sensitive, try to be collaborative, and the other side muscles you aside, pounds you down.   But its no help to have those ostensibly on your side doing the same.