By Isaiah Earhart
There is a common perception that the Obama Administration, and Obama himself, have not achieved the goals set by Democratic Party leadership. It is commonly communicated that the Obama Promises of hope and change are thwarted by a recalcitrant Republican Party, or that Obama’s willingness to negotiate with Republicans is cynically and brilliantly exploited by the mean and nasty conservatives. Other threads of thought among ‘liberal’ reasoning for the failure of deliverable change relies on the assessment of Obama’s personality, dismissing his uselessness in carrying out his campaign promises as having a weak resolve that gave in to the machinations of the corrupt elite in Washington. These narratives should be replaced by a realization of the extraordinary accomplishments, and strength of will, by the Obama Administration.
Obama is an incredible success at doing exactly what Democratic Presidents are supposed to do, and I think his success began from the very beginning of his presidency.
In the face of economic devastation brought by widespread fraud and abuse perpetrated by the criminal economic elite banking and lending class, 67 million people mobilized and voted for hope and change. The financial crisis that cost Americans about $14 trillion and precipitated the Great Recession causing the eviction of 10 million people- as of August 2013- left people clamoring for justice. Obama responded to these calls for accountability by nominating Eric Holder as attorney general.
The move was as calculated as it was shrewd. Holder just got through cementing a “sweetheart deal” with the Bush Justice Department on behalf of Chiquita who was caught red handed funding and arming the terrorist group AUC with thousands of AK-47s so they could more effectively terrorize and execute laborers in Colombia. Holder’s deal with the Bush Justice Department kept all Chiquita executives out of jail in exchange for a monetary payout.
The takeaway should not be that Holder is a sociopath that helped top executives working for one of the world’s most awful, brutal, and reprehensible corporations get away with soliciting murder and terror on poor people, although it would help explain this, this, and this; the takeaway should be that Obama nominated a person to head the Justice Department that has a brilliant and exceptional record of protecting the most egregious elite criminal corporate functionaries and keeping them out of prison. It is no wonder why the rate of federal prosecution for financial crimes is lower under Obama than the rate of similar crimes under Gonzo Ronald Reagan.
Some Holder apologists suggest that prosecuting bankers is just too complicated a task for the U.S. Justice Department; this former federal prosecutor and current U.S. District Judge disagrees.
It is not possible to blame Obama for having a weak personality; succumbing to the popular clamor of populism of hope and change would be a sign of a weak Democratic President. If I was president and I ran my winning campaign on hope and change, and I nominated someone who helped engineer the Great Recession with the creation and passage of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act in 2000 and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act in 1999, and that person went on to make $5 million a year managing a hedge fund exploiting OTC derivative market in 2006, and made almost $3 million in speaking fees for the nation’s largest banks- to be Director of the National Economic Council on the first days of my presidency, no-one would possibly believe I had a personality weak enough to be moved by any sort of populism whatsoever. Right?
But that is exactly what Obama did in his nomination of Larry Summers.
What kind of economic outcomes for the working poor would you expect from an administration that placed the CEO of GE, Jeffrey Immelt, as the active Chairperson of the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness? After all, GE and Immelt had just finished the incredible accomplishment of laying off 20% of his American workforce while managing to become one of the largest tax cheats in U.S. history.
I do not have an excellent grasp on how unicorn single payer got sold out. I think it died the death of silence and omission by the executive branch; it just was never mentioned or brought to the public as a policy option. Death by omission, especially considering the disaster that is U.S. healthcare, is an excellent accomplishment. Obama successfully employed the death by omission strategy with poverty as well. With about 25% of every child in the U.S. living in poverty, Obama managed to run for reelection in 2012 trying his best to not even mention the word ‘poverty.’
But a real test of a Democratic President’s success is not how the President can stifle moral social movements largely on the periphery of acceptable media discourse; Democratic Presidential success is measured by the willingness and effectiveness in killing off moral social movements that are very popular. Very popular democratic initiatives include breaking up the too-big-to-fail banks, prosecuting crime in the financial services industry, using the powers of the executive to reduce the largest prison population on the planet, closing Guantanamo, ending mass surveillance, getting J Edgar Hoover John Brennan out of the intelligence community, ending NAFTA, rescheduling marijuana as NOT a Schedule 1 narcotic, and having the very popular public option to the sociopath health insurance industry.
I know it is very controversial to say that the executive can kill off the public option, since the ACA is ostensibly a creation of congress. I think the public option died far sooner than what most believe- in the summer of 2009.
With all of Obama’s success in killing off democracy and thwarting progress, I don’t think his achievements are as outstanding as Bill Clinton during his time as Democratic President. Clinton really accomplished some major cruelty with NAFTA, the Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, DOMA, Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act- which included gems like “three strikes” and money for many more prisons, the Telecommunications Act of 1996, Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act – absolutely brutal for single mothers, the now infamous Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act, the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, and the Iraq Liberation Act- which was used to help justify the AUMF four years later.
Although it would be difficult to be as horrible successful as Clinton, Obama does have some tangible achievements besides killing off moral and democratic social movements. Obama achieved a very hard fought victory on getting a “free trade” deal with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea. Obama had to fight very hard for the deal because there was significant backlash from working people and people who cared about human rights. Richard Trumka, President of the AFL-CIO, wrote an impassioned letter to President Obama using candidate Obama’s own words opposing the “trade” deal with Colombia “because the violence against unions in Colombia would make a mockery of the very labor protections that we have insisted be included in these kinds of agreements.” The letter from Trumka goes on to list, by name, the 22 union activists and the 6 Catholic priests murdered in 2011 alone because of “their courageous commitment… with the prophetic denunciation of injustice and the cause of the poorest in the country.” [original emphasis]
On the insidious bright side of Obama’s “free trade” deal, the agreement with Panama provided legal protection and codification for the 400,000 corporations and the extremely wealthy that use the Panamanian banking system to dodge taxes.
Obama’s “free trade” deal with South Korea was opposed by the Korean Union Movement, the AFL-CIO, the Teamsters, the International Association of Machinists, the Communication Workers of America, United Steelworkers, the IBEW, the Carpenters, Professional & Technical Engineers, Friends of the Earth, the Sierra Club, National Farmers Union, National Family Farm Coalition, Public Citizen, United Students Against Sweatshops, U.S. Chamber Watch, and 550 diverse organizations have joined together in opposition of the Korea FTA. But Obama was relentless in the pursuit of achieving policy in the face of such opposition. (Is relentless policy pursuit a personality trait?)
I think we should all take a moment to realize what an incredible accomplishment this trade deal actually was. In the face of democratic movements at home and abroad, with the NAFTA disaster still freshly despised and reaping havoc and punishment for the poor and working poor, Obama used the “fast track authority” fought for by the Bush Administration to force congress into an up or down vote on trade agreements designed under the Republican Administration. And it worked!
Although Obama has a significant achievement gap to reach the incredible conquests of hurting worker democracy and dignity destroying policies produced during the Clinton Presidency, one should not give up on the prospects of amazing Obama achievement. Obama is currently seeking fast track authority so his administration can ram the Trans Pacific Partnership “trade” agreement down the throats of union members, small farmers everywhere, poor people who need affordable medication, environmentalists, people who love internet freedom, and anyone that likes democracy.
If Obama can accomplish the Keystone XL Pipeline that will transverse the nation’s largest aquifer and if he can somehow get the greatly sought after TPP, he just might win one of these.
12 comments:
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;^)
My god, Karen.
Why do I bother reading any other blogs?
Great pickup.
Rock on, sister.
@Isaiah--
Thank you for an incredibly informative guest post.
In particular I was unaware of Eric Holder's insidious past.
This explains a lot with respect to the total absence of bankster prosecutions following the 2008 financial collapse.
I thought Holder was simply incompetent, an unwitting tool of Obama and the latter's corporatist objectives.
Apparently, I was giving Holder too much credit. He's been a witting partner in Obama's corporatist administration all along, and evil in his own right.
Obama tweeted after the 2012 election, “The definition of hope is you still believe, even when it’s hard.”
In other words, forget about how we were fleeced last time. Just keep voting for these pseudo Democrats (aka DINOs), who govern like Republicans, and just keep waiting and hoping that maybe someday we will get what we thought we were voting for.
Such is the way of our American kleptocracy, which is an apt description of our devolving economic system. The kleptocrats don’t give a fig about the economy. The purpose of kleptocracy, our political and corporate whoredoms, is theft and looting of the nation’s wealth.
“The junk merchant doesn’t sell his product to the consumer, he sells the consumer to his product. He does not improve and simplify his merchandise. He degrades and simplifies the client.” – William S. Burroughs
@All
It is really quite an honor to write for this community. I really appreciate the great comments and the people who comment here. This really is the best blog I have ever found.
@Zee
Eric Holder is a real piece of work. He was appointed to Superior Court of the District of Columbia by Reagan in 1988. He served as active Attorney General under Bush W while congress was approving Ashcroft. Holder personally asked Clinton, as Deputy Attorney General at that time, for the pardon of Marc Rich- which he later vociferously and blatantly lied about.
He and Obama are personally to blame for the torture of Chelsea Manning and the criminalization of whistle blowing. Holder represented in his private law firm not only Chiquita but Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, JP Morgan, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, ING, Morgan Stanley, UBS, and MF Global.
When Forbes prints an article like this, one should really grasp the nepotism:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/05/07/obamas-doj-and-wall-street-too-big-for-jail/2/
@Anne
Glad I made you smile, Anne. I will add *thought criminal* to my list of achievements along side the four times I have been arrested for civil disobedience :)
@Denis
Kleptocracy is the perfect word for our economic system. Great writing, by the way.
Mr.Earheart: a spine chilling well researched column. My only questions are;
Is every democratic president who is elected expected to continue with the destructive process of silencing democracy and does it depend on the person in office to make these decisions? Is this why Jimmy Carter was hounded out of office when he attempted to run an honest administration? Do people like Obama with some degree of intelligence know what he is accomplishing and totally
ignorant of the final results?
When he speaks of concerns for his people does he realize the difference between rhetoric and action and really believes he is
representing the people who voted him into office?
Maybe I am too naïve in having trouble recognizing the true extent of the calamity being perpetrated on the American people and nation.
Thank god for a 3 party system in Canada which keeps things from going off the cliff and a good chance of improving the leadership here before too long. I appreciate people like yourself who have the skill, guts and courage (like Karen) to clear the air for us and validate our deepest concerns. Thank you.
@Pearl
First of all, thank you for your kind words.
The case of Jimmy Carter is an interesting one, and the breadth of information I have about his presidency is lacking. I will tell you what I think and possibly (hopefully)someone here will enlighten the conversation with more knowledge or a more informed view.
Before I proceed, I would like to say that Carter, post president Carter, has worked quite diligently to make the world a better place.
On the domestic front, I think Carter started to drink the neoliberal cool-aid before he left office.Under the Carter Admin, there began a deregulation of finance, lower taxes on the rich through lowering capitol gains tax, and a deregulation of industries like railway, trucking and airlines. And I believe in 1977 and 1978 there were Democratic Party super-majorities in both the House and Senate.
But the foreign policy of the US during this period of time is more revealing. The Indonesian government were busy performing a US sponsored genocide, beginning in 1975, on the people of East Timor. In 1978, the Indonesians ran out of bullets and other genocidal niceties. They came to the US to get re-armed, and Carter and Company rearmed them. The genocide continued until 1999, I think.
Sadly, Canada also played a MAJOR role in thwarting UN resolutions to end the violence as the country sold the Indonesian army about $400 million Canadian worth of weapons in the 1990s.
On a side note: I think the Carter Presidency ended on a virtual coup by the CIA. George HW Bush was running the CIA at the time, and I think he had the Iranians keep the hostages through the 1980 election to ensure Carter's defeat. (Remember the Iran/ Contra Deal?) The hostages were released, if I remember correctly, on the day Ronald Reagan was inaugurated in January of 1981. There is a fascinating book by Barbara Honegger called The October Surprise. Honegger worked in the Reagan Admin and resigned.
I digress...
Herein lies my issue; we had a Democratic Party Pres with massive majorities in the House and Senate, and the people cannot win the basic 'guns or butter' argument in POLICY. The budget in the Pentagon actually grew.
To answer your questions, which are really big questions, I think the American political class sees their constituency as things to be auctioned. I think Denis (and William S. Burroughs) pretty much nailed it.
I don't think Obama believes a word he is saying, and I think he completely understands the devastation he is perpetrating on main street and abroad.
Isaiah: Lovely name of a Prophet??? We need one today.
I thank you for your response. The details you provided now proves to me that my worst thoughts, that the political mentality of the U.S. both with leaders and lawmakers and people believe in the neoliberal philosophy and that anyone domestic or foreign not subscribing to this philosophy is an enemy. As a survivor of McCarthyism, I recognize the symptoms, just hoped it had not infected everyone and everything.
No wonder we Sardonickyites are so cynical and with good cause. However, knowledge and action are the only weapons we have. I wrote succinctly about my views in a comment to Karen's last column about the Fourth of July which I had written to Maureen's recent column.
My only hope after a lifetime of fighting the true enemies here at home, I will leave it to our progeny to continue the battle even if merely to survive. Already many NYTimes readers are getting the message with outrage about the health care system which is enriching the rich in a good NYTimes Editorial about the hospitals organizing to extract more money from the population.
Our sword is the pen and knowledge which is becoming easier to spread around in the internet age. Thank you Ed Snowden. I will look forward to more presentations from you as I do to Karen's great pieces and those of my dear friends on her blog and for a short while feel like I am breathing in fresh air instead of choking on the poisonous utterings of the establishment.
I am continuously amazed at what ends up on this site. I realize it is demanding of your time, but truly wish that you Karen, could figure out a way to update it EVERY DAY! Things, whatever that means, are changing too fast so perhaps that is why you can't. But I wish you would think about, and try it for a week-10 days. And then evaluate it and ask for comments. You provide an excellent service. Living in VT I feel overwhelmed by trees, and farm animals and gardens and water and mosquitoes and NATURE. I often feel totally removed from the real world. I venture out and can't wait to return. So thanks for that connection to how things are going "OUT THERE."
I have a confession:
1. Shortly after he appointed Summers et al, I emailed Obama at the White House that, while I had voted for him, I now considered him a piece of shit, in those words.
2. I again voted for the same piece of shit in '12 in the hope of a revolt within the Democratic Party.
You, Earhart, have absolved me from 1 but I will forever bear the quilt of 2.
Great piece by the way.
Interesting background on Eric Holder, who has not served as a mere errand boy at Justice so much as Obama’s self-effacing, behind-the-scenes tutor, shaping Administration policy towards big money. Holder may have been the real force, more than Summers or Geithner, aggressively protecting Wall Street. If Obama has a Cheney, it’s Holder.
@Isaiah--
Thanks also for the interesting deconstruction of the Carter presidency.
@Jay--
Fascinating, frightening characterization of Holder as Obama's Cheney.
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