Voted for Obama, got McCaine

2009-12-21

...I believe Obama had given up his earlier ideals much earlier -- when he first began seeking the presidency -- at that time, behind the scene, having had to make the deals and agreements that would attract -- and did attract -- the corporate world to agree to support him -- with massive amounts of money and influence. The bankers and corporate stake holders he immediately appointed to power, as soon as he was confirmed, were thus pretty secure beforehand in knowing that if he were elected they would continue to have their hands on the helm. -- The Pentagon and its corporate acolytes -- and generals -- (remember how they were smartly lined up, in uniform, behind him when he gave his acceptance speech?) -- knew their expansionary plans were safe too -- no danger of a "change" in foreign policy, outside of a few eloquent speeches for initial public relations purposes. (We were the only ones who didn't know, who were naive.)

Just harkening back one year ago to the man's glowing campaign speeches with its airy promises of an amazing, real democratic future of peace and hope -(not to mention also his two books of his inspiring biography ) -- the sudden new realization of what we have for a president is a sharp and shrewd (and smug) prevaricator, a corporate flack, as Green says, not bothered by deceiving his base, deceiving organized labor who had done so much for his election, not worried about his disillusioning all the young people, the new voters who had gotten politicized by the seeming real choice his election had offered them, and hypnotized by his gorgeous rhetoric.

They were betrayed by his surrendering one rational standard after another, as you noted, and also: continuing the Bush/Cheney renditions, continuing the phone surveillance of US citizens, instituting preventive dententions without trial -- ! -- (who could have imagined a more unconstitutional initiative?), -- the so far gutting of anything substantively beneficial in the health care bill, which, if passed, sets into law the monopolistic powers of the private health insurance industry, (as several congressmen have pointed out) -- the expansion of the war in massive increases in troops and U.S. contractors, and the huge expansion in the bloody drone bombing campaign on Afghanistan's tribal villages -- etc, etc. That disillusion is most painful -- and I fear very dangerous.

Update, 2010-01-21:

...Obama has taken this "appease the Republican" course since the day he took office, appointing many of the holdovers from the discredited Bush administration (finance, military, non-head personnel at Justice, FBI) into the most powerful positions in his government -- (in addition to continuing some of the worst anti-civil liberties and anti-constitutional practices.) He cannot have been naive in doing this. These were people who knew their former positions in government were secure when they supported him during the primary campaign.

He received more money from the pharmaceutical and insurance industries than any other candidate has -- and once in office he agreed to sign on to the interests of those people, even before the congressional debates on health care began. He has even now been talking about cutting Social Security and other entitlements(!) How is that different from what the Republican agenda has been? And this was all before the Massachusetts primary ever came up.

So I can't see it as a question of "mistakes." I see it as a question of conservative policy, cynical, crass, deceptive -- sordid.