Stumpy Flacks wrote:
The growing progressive drumbeat about President Barack Obama’s failed presidency, coupled now with fantasies about opposing his re-nomination, or with anguished hand-wringing about his failure to communicate, to lead, etc. etc., dismays me. This hysteria is rooted in fear and anger over the intransigence of the corporate plutocracy we are up against.
And like us, your first thought might have been bottom line -- specifically, how much did In These Times pay for this tired old crap? Limp Flacks was writing this same piece months ago with "What is Next?"
Are you as tired as I am with never-ending critiques of Barack Obama coming from the left as well as the right? Mainstream punditry has decided that he is largely a failed president (never forget that the MSM thought he was a failed candidate before he wasn't).
When did the MSM think Barack was a failed candidate? Answer: Never.
He was the choice of the press whores doing their bidding for the corporations.
That Limp Stumpy would lie about reality is only surprising if you missed his all-over-the-internet entitled "On Tom Hayden" in 2008 which was really about himself and revisionary tactics. Reading him writing about CED (Campaign for Economic Democracy), the first question should have been: "Isn't Dick required to note his connection to and work for CED?" Ethically he is required to do so. But when have ethics ever mattered to Dick?
Those aware of the CED are probably even more puzzled by Dick's rush to bury it claiming "It came to an end as Tom focused on his own political career, getting elected from Santa Monica to the California state Assembly, while many other CED activists found niches in government, party politics and mass media." Seriously?
Tom Hayden was elected to the State Assembly in the 1982 elections. The CED did not vanish. Not only did it not vanish, its coffers were overflowing. When first published in 1981, the author's profits from Jane Fonda's Workout Book went directly to the CED. This continued as the Workout became so much more than just a book by Jane Fonda garnering huge sales from vinyl and audio cassette copies and revolutionizing the home entertainment industry with its video cassette version. The Workout was created by Jane after brainstorming with her attorney over way to raise money for CED besides utilizng her film salaries. Fonda herself has estimated that, by the mid-1980s, the Workout had raised $17 million for CED. As the 80s came to a close, Jane separated the two.) As the eighties wound down, the CED became Campaign California.
Though the above may be news to some readers, it's not news to Dick Flacks -- he just prefers not to acknowledge it for reasons unknown.
His reasons for insisting that people stop criticizing Barack are very clear: He endorsed Barry.
Limpid Flacks didn't have much of a reputation left when he endorsed Barack (which is why he is so often identified as "the husband of"). But apparently, he feels his endorsement of Barack matters. Still matters.
Which is why he can't criticize his itty-bitty baby, his would be wet-dream crush were that still possible.
Tiny Flacks wants you to know that it is a distraction from real activism to criticize Barack. Tiny Flack is nothing but the Town Whore. If he had any ethics, he wouldn't be Richard Flacks.