As the year wound down, Norman Solomon noted that MoveOn carried more water for the White House than even The New York Times:
And so, the same day that the Times editorialized to excoriate President Obama for his latest betrayal of civil liberties, MoveOn sent out a huge email blast sucking up to Obama.
The Times was blunt in its Saturday editorial: “By the time President Obama gave his news conference on Friday, there was really only one course to take on surveillance policy from an ethical, moral, constitutional and even political point of view. And that was to embrace the recommendations of his handpicked panel on government spying -- and bills pending in Congress -- to end the obvious excesses. He could have started by suspending the constitutionally questionable (and evidently pointless) collection of data on every phone call and email that Americans make.”
But, the newspaper added: “He did not do any of that.”
As the Times editorial went on to say, “any actions that Mr. Obama may announce next month would certainly not be adequate. Congress has to rewrite the relevant passage in the Patriot Act that George W. Bush and then Mr. Obama claimed -- in secret -- as the justification for the data vacuuming.”
We like Norman and we agree with the above but, honestly, his re-emergence as a voice of meaning comes after far too many years of running defense for Barack Obama's administration.
The Progressive magazine just wrapped up a fund raising effort where they beseeched you to help them "beat back the right wing."
Seriously?
That's the goal for the left?
Stasis is the most we can hope for?
That's really something when Republicans are in the White House, outlets like The Progressive tell us that we need universal, single-payer health care, that we need to repeal the PATRIOT Act, to end illegal spying and, on and on, the list went.
Today, the sad magazine lowers expectations and claims 'success' is beging back the right wing.
That's why we get no where.
We have dreams and goals while Republicans are in power and then so many of us turn into cheap whores the minute Democrats are in power.
Matthew Rothschild is the best example of a left whore.
One minute, he's appalled by The Drone War.
The next he's applauding Barack for sending gay athletes to Russia.
Why?
Did the innocents killed by drones suddenly matter less?
Do we mistake anything Billie Jean King might do in Russia for Barack's bravery?
The left moved mountains to take down Bully Boy Bush and we have nothing to show for it.
ObamaCare?
That's a gift to the insurance companies, it forces all Americans to purchase insurance or pay a fine.
How is that a good thing or an improvement?
Before ObamaCare, Americans could buy insurance if they wanted.
All ObamaCare's done is take a choice and turn it into a mandate.
It is not single-payer, it is not Medicare for all.
It is nothing that the left wanted or fought for in the Bully Boy Bush years.
And that's going to be the signature 'achievement' of Barack's two terms?
As Louise tells Thelma, "You get what you settle for" (Ridley Scott's Thelma & Lousie from Callie Khouri's Academy Award winning screenplay).
And settle's all you can do when you define your entire being around defending a Corporatist War Hawk.
Last week, Iraq's chief thug and prime minister Nouri al-Maliki began his assault on Anbar Province. The Friday before, Amy Goodman and her fellow whores devoted a segment to Iraq on Democracy Now!
If you watched that entire segment, you were surprised by what happened, you were surprised to learn the assault began with an attack on protesters, you were surprised by all of it.
Because, as we pointed out last week, the segment was worthless.
It was like sitting in on a bunch of college students trying to bluster their way through a discussion on reading they failed to do.
And this passes for 'information' and 'public affairs.'
When Bully Boy Bush occupied the White House, we wouldn't have accepted that, we wouldn't have settled for it.
The fact that we do today explains why there is nothing the left can point to with pride from Barack's first four years in the White House.
When you're idea of 'success' is maintaining the status quo and beating back the right, you really shouldn't be allowed to define yourself as left because that's very much a centrist position.
And it leads no where.
