With a Heavy Heart

I, along with millions & millions of others, were so hopeful & excited just three years ago. We just knew that finally we had somebody who could cut across the bullshit & inspire other politicians to be better. Now, not so much. I am still an unabashed liberal, & I still love President Obama, but I am so, so disappointed that his leadership qualities are not what we all hoped they would be. I do understand that he dislikes conflict & confrontation; I do, too, but I wasn't elected president to transform the political system, & he was. He's undoubtedly a brilliant man, & I know his heart's in the right place, but why on earth can't he stand up to the people who only want one thing: to destroy him & his presidency? And in the process, they're destroying the whole country.

My heart actually hurts when I think about the mess we're in right now, & how much it's damaged the chances that Obama will be reelected in 2012. And the absolutely worst part is that the very people who caused the economic crisis are the ones blaming Obama & the Democrats, & I'm sorry to say that apparently most people seem too dumb to recognize this. It's just too bad that the morons who voted for the "teabaggers" (as Bill Maher calls them) can't be the only ones who have to suffer the consequences. That would truly be karma. Ah, well.

I really think that the president needs to look up the definition of "compromise". He's constantly being bullied into giving up way more than the other side. That's actually called "capitulation", not compromise. He really, really needs to draw a line in the sand that he absolutely will not cross. Instead, he keeps letting the teabagger-led Republicans move the frigging line to wherever they want it. Say what you want about Bill Clinton, but he knew how to deal with these kinds of people. I'm afraid that Obama's lack of administrative (& perhaps political) experience is coming back to haunt all of us. Maybe he should talk to Bill- & Hillary, too, about the mess he's in. I agreed with Clinton about using the 14th amendment solution for the debt ceiling debacle (& apparently so did Nancy Pelosi, whom I love), & I think Obama should have just said "Fuck this shit- I don't need you" to the Republicans, & raised the frigging thing, which every other president has had no trouble doing. Isn't it more than a little suspect on the part of the Republicans that this president is absolutely the only one who has had this problem? Do people still think after this that racism isn't involved in everything the Republicans do, especially the teabaggers? I think it's insulting both to the man & the office, & yet they keep getting away with this behavior.

The Congressional Democrats aren't blameless in this whole situation. Not enough of them, either, are speaking the truth clearly or often enough to the American people. Why can't they, & the president, have the balls to tell the truth about how & why we got to these miserable circumstances we're in, & to blame the people responsible? It's just unbelievable to me. At least the teabaggers have the guts to say exactly what they think, even if they are all batshit crazy & completely ignorant of history. Something has got to be done, & quickly, or what's still left of the middle class is going to be obliterated. Those of us who used to be middle class, & are now the working poor (at least those of us who still have jobs), have almost lost hope of things getting better for us. I fear our country becoming like some third world country that has two classes: the rich (who, because of the inequality of our tax code are getting even richer); & the poor (all of the rest of us). Our country could return to the condition it was in after the Depression, before FDR & the New Deal & the rise in importance of labor unions ( which actually helped more than anything to create a middle class).

We have to hold people responsible not only for what they do, but also for what they don't do. Every member of Congress should have his/her feet held to the fire. Moaning & bitching may relieve stress, but it doesn't solve problems. And the idea of only cutting spending, especially for those programs which really help people ( more than ever in a bad economy) & not making everyone pay their fair share of taxes is simply ludicrous, & is also, I think, criminally naive. We need to raise revenue the right way, create programs to put people back to work (maybe by actually making stuff in this country again), & refuse to be terrorized (yeah, Biden was right) by ignorant morons who simply want to destroy our president, our government, & our very way of life. They may have nothing to lose, but we have everything to lose, & we're losing it fast.