Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
Having transferred trillions of public treasure for the sake of Wall Street's health, Obama now picks up where George Bush left off on Social Security. Obama's deficit commission is pre-programmed to assault the last vestiges of the social safety net. The president "is the right wing's most potent weapon, the one before which liberal Democrats throw up their hands in surrender without the dignity of a fight."
Obama Can't Say "No" to the Rich
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
"Once Wall Street was on its feet, Social Security would be back in the crosshairs."
Before Barack Obama had even taken the oath of office, in January of 2009, he promised to put all of the so-called "entitlement" programs "on the table," for cutting. There was no reason to doubt that Obama really planned to go after Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and other programs despised by the rich. After all, he had just been elected to a four-year term in a landslide and was, therefore, as secure as any politician can be. Obama was telling everyone who cared to listen that he was would certainly not stand in the way of gutting what's left of the American social safety net. Rather, Obama was telling Big Business that he agreed with them, that the poor and the elderly were sucking up too much of the nation's wealth, and there must be a day of reckoning.
The new president immediately started the clock ticking on Social Security and other entitlements by scheduling a so-called "deficit summit" for later in 2009. But it was not yet the time for a full-court-press on poor and elderly people's programs. First, Obama needed to shore up the finances of the Wall Street bankers that were among his earliest and most generous supporters. The bank bailout was priority number one, to be followed by a farcical health care bill designed to funnel trillions to the insurance and drug industries. A frontal attack on Social Security would have to wait a year or so. It would not do for Obama to join with Republicans in stealing from the old and the poor at the exact same moment they were bailing out the filthy rich. But, once Wall Street was on its feet, Social Security would be back in the crosshairs.
"Obama's so-called 'deficit commission' is stacked with rich sociopaths sharpening their knives to carve up, sell off or otherwise doom Social Security."
Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic Speaker of the House who was once the co-chair of the Progressive Caucus, pretended back in January of 2009 that she hadn't heard Obama when he said "everything" was "on the table" for cutting - except, of course, the military, which is immune no matter how high the deficit. "The only thing we didn't want to put on the table," she said, "is eliminating Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid."
In April of this year, Obama once again reminded everyone that everything is and has always been "on the table," as far as he's concerned, including Social Security. His so-called "deficit commission" is stacked with rich sociopaths sharpening their knives to carve up, sell off or otherwise doom Social Security. It is a battle that safety net defenders thought they had won against George Bush. Barack Obama has picked up Bush's marbles and put them back into play. He is the right wing's most potent weapon, the one before which liberal Democrats throw up their hands in surrender without the dignity of a fight. Obama, working in plain sight over the past 18 months, has constructed and rigged a deficit commission to render a kind of death sentence to the foundational program of Roosevelt's New Deal.
Obama will pretend that circumstances and Republicans are forcing him to call for austerity. But that's a lie; he came in singing the GOP's song, and is behaving precisely as one would expect from a center-right administration. Obama is in his ideal element, constantly saying "yes" to the Party of "no."
For Black Agenda Radio, I'm Glen Ford. On the web, go to www.BlackAgendaReport.com.
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.
Comments
Excellent interview with Glen Ford last week
on "Education at the Crossroads" with Basir Mchawi and Sol McCant on WBAI www.wbai.,org (online for 90 days from show which was July 8, 7pm). Note: I support TakeBackWBAI www.takebackwbai.org Sanda
And another pro-rich guy, Jacob Lew
And for the hundredth time, Obama has appointed yet another promoter for the super-rich, Jacob Lew, to take Orszag's place at OMB.
Like Orszag, Jacob Lew is also with the Brookings Institution's Hamilton Project, started by Robert Rubin to push forward the agenda of privatizing Social Security, public education, and virtually everything else which has yet to be privatized (that is, turned over for free to the corporations).
Which is why Obama will never appoint a Glen Ford, James Galbraith, Michael Hudson, or anyone else not a puppet of the ultra-rich!
Sad, but it is what it is.....
Why can't people, sentient beings, especially Black ones or Liberal ones understand that Obama is who he is? He honest to God loves these people, who they are, and what they represent, he admires these people as accomplished, and he is a DYED-IN-THE-WOOL NEOLIBERAL, period point blank. Nobody has said a word about something as elementary as Obama appointing HIS OWN Attorney Generals, especially in light of the Seligman case. Simple fundamentals, lacking! Tragically, Harvard done fucked up his mind... that is... if he ever had an independent one, chocked full of core principles, to begin with. I doubt it. Obama worships American Exceptionalism and it's "values" to his core.
Andrew Cockburn at Counterpunch, "The Fall of Obama,"
http://www.counterpunch.org/
THE SYSTEM CANNOT BE SALVAGED
President Obama is what he has always been, a slick, amoral creation of the DLC, a bizarre organization whose core belief is that one Republican party wasn't enough for America, so they created a second. If the reactionary President Obama is the best that the New Dems can do, and all that the Republicans and the so-called Tea Party have to offer the world is more tired, rehashed Reagan at home, and an unwinnable, never ending war against Islam overseas, then, this system cannot be salvaged. It is doomed to continue its "evolution" into a thoroughly militarized surveillance and incarceration state, forever at war against those within it who do not share the neo-liberal fundamentalism of its so-called leadership, as well as against those outside of it who no longer wish to suffer the horrors of American hegemony. The Roman empire lasted for several centuries. The American empire, as we know it, will be undone within 60 years.
The photo says it all
The photo that accompanies this article is right on target! This is what the Neoliberals are showing us.
Obama can't say no to the
Obama can't say no to the rich. This are conformities that are equally present today.There are hundreds, if not thousands of individual arguments within The Obama Deception In the end, it is very important to carefully research all claims both for and against any argument. No matter what you believe, taking all arguments in financial, social and political context will give you a more complete view. There are many quotations and statistics in the movie that are, at best, incredibly questionable. It is best to take “The Obama Deception,” along with all other conspiracy theory or “questionable truth” theories, with a big grain of salt.
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