I was living in Chicago in 2008. I remember being in tears as Obama spoke in Grant Park; it appeared that after the horrors of the Reagan, Clinton and Bush eras, we as a nation had turned a corner. Then three weeks after the election, Obama named Tim Geithner as his Treasury Secretary nominee, Larry Summers as the director of the National Economic Council, and Hank Paulson as an economic adviser. It was then I knew we had been deceived in the most egregious way.
Yeah, the appointment of Geithner was key for me too, knew it meant business as usual. The way 'single payer' healthcare was dropped like a hot rock without much debate was the next clue. I follow a blogger, John Michael Greer, who predicted Trump's victory in Jan 2016 and explained in great detail why he would win. Greer didn't support Trump, merely explained him. His recent book _The King in Orange_ goes into greater detail.
Most Americans aren't afraid of hard work. And they don't resent other people getting rich by hard work, talent or even dumb luck. But they do resent that highly paid executives who drive their company (or the entire nation) to the brink of destruction either retire with a golden parachute or get another highly paid job. No consequences for failure if you are rich. Meanwhile the kid who drops a tray of hamburgers at Mickey D's or the part-time teller whose drawer doesn't balance one day are let go.
Yup the famous AF1 trip ... not only did K drop his bill but he expressed support for the ACA (that he had been critical of), and apparently convinced other progs to do so also - When asked by his astonished supporters (I worked on 2 of his campaigns) why - he said "For Pres. and Party" - at that point I realized there was no point in electing "progressive" Ds, because, when push came to shove, they folded like a cheap suit ....
Hey, that isn't always true, I mean, look at Bernie Sa...oh, dear.
However, as a rightish, libertarianish, NON-Democrat, I must also say that the Republicans, as an opposition party, as ethical human beings and as strong proponents of a prosperous and peaceful country...are crap. Wrapped in a cheap suit that has just folded. Into a pool of urine.
The only time I don't viscerally hate the Republicans is when the Dems (and their lackeys in the press) are so insane, hateful and outrageous it distracts me from looking at their opposition party.
Back when I was so proud of myself for questioning the blind, "My country right or wrong!" red-white-and-blue patriotism they were doling out in civics classes, it NEVER occurred to me how bitterly disappointed I would one day be in my own government. I was so naive, it's painful to recall.
Everyone folds like a cheap camera. They are in business for themselves and not for you. Was true in Classical Rome and true now. They posture for votes, not ideology.
“… [L]et those who are to preside over the state obey two precepts of Plato, — one, that they so watch for the well-being of their fellow-citizens that they have reference to it in whatever they do, forgetting their own private interests; the other, that they care for the whole body politic, and not, while they watch over a portion of it, neglect other portions. For, as the guardianship of a minor, so the administration of the state is to be conducted for the benefit, not of those to whom it is intrusted, but of those who are intrusted to their care.”
"Was true in Classical Rome..." a slight digression, but on that though it has always amazed me how reading a modern English translation of Cicero's written advice "On running for the [Roman] Consulship" sounds basically indistinguishable from what a modern American politician of some wit and maximum realist-cynicism would write today:
It has the merit of being true. A succession of figures I have known have not dimmed this in me. The only person I knew involved in this process who had idealism that I would call bulletproof was a newspaper editor, sadly dead. Maybe some military officers, but it depended on the topic.
We need candidates who truly understand not only the stakes, but also what it takes -- that is, the likelihood of today losing everything to stay real, yet when going down in flames, staying true and keeping the faith that the "arc of justice" will out.
This is not exclusive to revolutionaries at all. There are people who are willing to sacrifice their lives in an (ostensibly) just war; while small numbers of people everywhere sacrifice their reputations and livelihoods doing what's dangerous but right. Somewhat recently, Tulsi Gabbard's calling out Hillary Clinton's smear with strong language while an active candidate was, for me, one good example. People will remember this. Likewise, Perot, Nader, Ron Paul, also went down, sending messages while sticking to their guns. Eventually, a watershed level of public awareness is reached. The true practical selfless goal.
That stunt was depraved, as sick as anything you could witness from a politician. I was unaware of it until Jimmy Dore featured it on his show. The crowd was stunned. You could see the enormous pain and confusion on their faces as they wrestled emotionally with the incomprehensibility of witnessing their hero do something so shallow and disturbing. That's when I went from seeing Obama as just another self-serving, albeit brilliant, con artist to recognizing him as truly evil.
It was horrid and revealing of his true nature, but it does fall behind W's making a video of his looking for WMDs in the Oval Office before a crowd of amused WH correspondents after the very reason for our invasion of Iraq had been proven false, and this by a Vietnam draft dodger, who also had fellow draft dodger as VP.
The contempt the elite feel for us, as perhaps they should, cannot be overestimated; after all, we keep voting them into office.
I wonder if the Bushes got an invite to the birthday bash. Best of pals, apparently. In the UK Blair finished it for many people who still harboured hope - 100% cynicism from Blair onwards. No doubt Obama had a similar effect in the USA. To extinguish people's last vestiges of hope is yet another evil to add the Blair and Obama catologues.
I'd forgotten about that. I was probably still pondering Clinton stealing the Republican's law and order playbook while "ending welfare as we know it" to get elected. I still wonder about the psychology behind Clinton having been raised in dire poverty by a single mother then going on to throw millions of people like himself and his mother off public assistance and into poverty, again all for the purpose of winning the presidency. Judging by just the last few presidents, including the present one, I'm convinced one has to be a sociopath to even consider a run at the Oval Office. And maybe the people who keep voting them in are just as bad.
Because at some point in all of our lives, we want someone or something else bigger than ourselves to take the ultimate responsibly for all of the really big, bad, hard stuff. Most people still live and die in that mindset. It's hard to imagine, but even as we shed tears over narcissistic con men's beautiful words, (they, who will happily walk away with both our fortunes and our blame) we have only ourselves to hold accountable for the eventual outcomes attached to shirking reality in favor of a privilege that belongs to only to children. This vast, ravenous political-military-industrial apparatus we despise has only arisen in response to our biggest subconsciouswish come true.
Well *somebody* votes them into office. Honestly doubt we citizens are the only ones voting. 2020 vote was obviously manipulated. Because the Deep State that gladly manipulated votes in 3rd world countries for decades will now gladly manipulate votes inside the USA. Ohio may as well be Burma to the globalist class.
At a White House Correspondents' Dinner Obama also joked about sending predator drones to kill some popular band that Sasha and Malia liked. The guests thought that was pretty funny too.
Trump did mean tweets but I don't remember him ever joking, ever, about killing people or starting wars on false pretences. Does anyone here remember anything like that?
Hi Rita! I follow John Michael Greer pretty religiously, and I remember a lot of your comments! I agree, JMG truly just *explained* Trump, but the number of people who accused him of supporting Trump, and the number of times I was accused of the same thing whenever I tried to talk about it, led me to believe that they were only making said accusations because the explanation wasn't something they wanted to hear.
I agree, by the way- I think Americans by and large don't resent wealth, but they do resent unfairness. And our rigged casino of an economy is becoming impossible for the average American to ignore.
Exactly. If they want to get rich, the should go into business, not capitalize on their bullshit rhetoric with sleek documentaries or shows or whatever the hell he’s doing at Netflix. Try saving the kids in Baltimore first.
I disagree. Many people who earned their wealth have done much good in the world and given much of that wealth away. I think you're on to something, but i believe it is POWER that creates psychopaths.
I think Geitner was 3rd choice for the folks who pulled the strings - the first, it seems to me, was Rubin - but by that time he and Citigroup were, shall we say, under a cloud. The second would have been Summers - but he had been making an AH of himself with comments about women, etc - so the 3rd was Geitner - the guy who at his hearing said he had counted on his accountant to fill out his income tax from, which was done improperly - so here's a guy up for Sec of the Treasury who couldn't even do his own income taxes - pitiful, but the Big Banks wanted one of the 3 (gee, wonder why) and though he was the runt of the litter, he was the only one left standing ...
Or if you are a man of principle in a government agency, you get pushed out the door and black balled to make room for younger, more compliant employees.
The title of that book is an obvious play on The King In Yellow, a evil stage play in the Cthulhu Mythos that creates a magical gateway to the Court of Hastur when it's performed.
While The King In Orange didn't really seem to spend as much time talking about the magical thinking surrounding the electing as I expected it too, it was still a great read analyzing the mass psychology behind the 2016 election and contained a lot of astute observations. I've been reading ADR and Ecosophia for about a decade now and honestly Greer's ability to observe/document the ebb and flow of current events astounds me.
But yeah, my "okay, this is a load of BS" moment was when the Obama administration massively expanded the drone program in the wake of winning a nobel peace prize for...being inspirational? For not being named George Bush? I don't know. But my forever-D relatives still seem to think he was great, despite not really accomplishing a whole lot. He talked a good game, and really knew how to deliver an inspirational sounding speech. And being handsome probably helped. I don't know. But I'm sorry, as far as I'm concerned waging warfare from 1000s of miles away using murder planes you can't even retaliate against is just wrong.
I was looking for mention of his Senate vote for immunity for telecom. providers --breaking his campaign pledge--because (1) Matt did not in his article and (2) because it happened before the general election. It's an important point in the timeline for all the people who still seem to believe it was reasonable at the time they voted for him to believe Obama intended to bring about "change," represented "hope" for a new kind of government/politician, or was just meaningfully different than other Democratic Party candidates for President. (I'm not attributing that to anyone here, not even Matt; that said, it is a sentiment I encounter regularly and assume others do, too.)
No one, looking at evidence available, should have believed Obama would be a transformational or progressive President. The unfortunate truth is that politicians always promise positive change in some form, and most voters continue to believe it despite years and years of evidence belying it (in the case of Obama, the history of the Democratic Party since at least 1992), even especially relevant evidence calling it into question coming directly from the politician himself (such as breaking the immunity pledge and getting more money from Wall Street than any other candidate). When the candidate ultimately doesn't bring change, shame on those who believed it would be different "this time."
It is easy to look back and admit you made a mistake. It is harder to accept the obvious beforehand--that the Democratic candidate will betray you--because you will stand almost alone and face criticism. You will be told you have no choice and are naive if not stupid for thinking otherwise. You will be called, at least by implication, worse: you're racist/you don't like Obama because he is black. You won't get to revel in and share the happiness your friends feel. Etc. And that, in part, is why nothing will change--most people are passive cowards.
Yeah, when he backtracked on the FISA bill, that was a huge clue that he was full of shit. I started doubting him then. And when he picked his cabinet, I knew we had another Clinton on our hands.
Thanks for the reminder on the "look forward not backward" ON the Bush/Cheney war crimes. That seems to have been the veritable *model for the handling of the 1-6 ruckus. "Nothing to see here, folks, nothing at all. Let's just move on !"
Do you remember the Hillarycare adventure of 1993-4?
He probably could have appeared like he was fighting harder, but he took what he could get. The health insurers had enough votes to kill the bill. Do you not realize that?
Obama could have championed “Medicare for All” with a fireside chat and a few graphs. He could have asked ALL Americans to contact their members of Congress.
But he didn’t. He was owned then and he he owned now.
Does anyone really believe in smash mouth politics where politicians do things not in their own interest because they get phone calls because they are frozen in fear in their offices?
I didn't know health insurers could vote in Congress. Anyway, using sortition instead of voting for members of Congress could clear up the lobbying mess. Also wouldn't need to flush billions of dollars on political campaigns every few years. ...
A vanguard revolution and overthrow of the current US government--which now is just a front for the dozen of so richest people in the world--will eventually happen. A strongman or group (the ideology doesn't matter, left or right, as long as it is authoritarian) will find the key to starting a populist uprising in the U.S., and then the real fun will start.
Members of the military gunning down protestors by the dozens, like is done in other nations. Concentration camps, thousands of people "disappeared", mass graves, the whole nine yards. This is what's coming and Obama, after Bush, set the country up for it. It's surprising people don't say this. Maybe they don't realize how bad it is in the nation. I suppose they think the NSA is listening.
Of course I could be wrong. Maybe we just gradually sink into the mire until China takes over, and everyone stays happy at home, watching sports and playing videogames. I am though almost 99 percent sure elections don't matter anymore. You can't vote against the interests of Goldman Sachs.
He wasn't there to send a message. He was there to accomplish something to burnish his own legacy. It's a consistent theory of people acting in their own interest. Divining that interest is the hardest part, and usually not that hard. Do you not think that if he could have instituted a NHS he would have? It would have been a better legacy. He took what he could get.
With the de facto fascism inherent in the system in the US, I don't think anything like the NHS or M4A is possible. Where is the money that is going to make it in politicians' interest in the short term to do this? That's right, it doesn't exist.
These kinds of histrionics are exactly why Dem voters are such dupes. The signs were ALWAYS there if you looked closely enough. But voting to feel good about yourself trumps doing what’s good for the country. Obama is a narcissistic menace and apparently it’s contagious because all of his apostles are now similarly afflicted.
Trump's base is suburban homeowners and his 2016 coalition was wealthier than Clinton's. We must build bridges with half of the country that doesn't vote. Fuck the Trump voters. We need to get poor people to vote, but understandably they don't when they know nothing will change.
I voted for Trump both times. In the past I voted Clinton 2x and Obama 2x. But after '15 I woke up and realized the system is broken. For me a Trump 2nd term would have at the least (or so I hoped) force the Democratic party to break up.
There is an awful article about a former Cuomo-sexual (I threw up in my mouth typing that) that was in Elle or Vogue this week coming to terms with being duped, but the whole thing is about his sexual assaults (which to be clear should lead to impeachment and if possible criminal charges) instead of the massive nursing home deaths he covered up.
Agree. I used to be duped until 2006, then joined Greens, now Greens are Dem-lite. They all suck. I don't vote at all now. Not putting my stamp of approval on their rigged corporate and intel agency shit show.
The trans agenda took it over. They are backing surgeries for kids and hormones for life, against their previous anti-big pharma stance. Among other things.
I pray everyday for the sort of organization Stalin was able to impose on Russia. Remember, the Russian peasant was even more ignorant than the typical racist from Bumfuck, Neb.
“Weeping” over Obama is puerile melodrama. It’s excessively theatrical. So, yes. Everyone sharing their Obama Anonymous stories of hitting bottom is possessed by a fit of histrionics.
Humbled!? You jack asses voted for him for a SECOND TERM! He pissed in your face and you just asked for more of the same. He fooled you once and then you were bamboozled yet again.
It’s easy to be humble after the fact, after all the damage has been wrought. Death bed regrets are empty gestures. If you die with regrets, it’s because you were an asshole up until the moment you were about to croak.
The contributors here are mostly right wing authoritarian with a few notable exceptions.
I think Matt is genuine in his disappointment because he has an undeniable paper trail, but I suspect most of the "I loved Obama and he let me down!" crowd here are the same as you, but less honest about it. They were the same people listening to grifters like Ann Coulter and Laura Ingram and buying copies of D'Souza's "The Roots of Obama's Rage" for family and friends at Christmas who would not shut up about politics during Thanksgiving dinner. They were already warming up their Glenn Beck inspired "cultural Marxist" talking points they continue to use against anyone they don't approve of to this day.
Imagine, people calling the ultimate crony capitalist Obama a "cultural Marxist." No wonder no one took his critics seriously.
One of the things that drove me away from liberal thinking was all the mind-reading. I'm really impressed with how you know what's in other people's minds and hearts, without even meeting them. That's quite a skill.
Me, I can't be entirely sure of what my own "true" motivations are, let alone any else's. I'm an agnostic, but the older I get, the more impressed I am with the Christian notion that we all pretty much have bad intentions, and our intentions are most suspect when we are judging others and enjoying that warm glow of intellectual superiority and moral self-righteousness.
Here's another way: Let's decide what forces seem to be dragging down the middle and lower classes, and take allies wherever we can find them to fight back. Even if they watch Tucker Carlson! Even if they voted for that commie Bernie!
There's way more overlap than people realize. And there are forces that want to keep you from noticing that.
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.“ - CS Lewis
"....I'm really impressed with how you know what's in other people's minds and hearts, without even meeting them."
Nobody here, or anywhere, "knows what's in other people's hearts and minds." Speaking for myself, and I assume many others, my words are meant to assess other people's opinions and convey my opinions of those opinions. We're all clumsy with this arrangement because we have, alone among earth's organisms, complex brains that are wont to go many places at once.
And I agree wholeheartedly that "there's way more overlap than people realize." Though I might correct you slightly and add that I think there are many people indeed who "realize" this, but are frustrated by their perceived lack of agency and feel stymied as how to remedy this state through a series of steps that might lead to concrete action.
That is the great task before us, is it not? How to combat the inertia, forge a few alliances, leave behind the trivial squabbling, and get on with it? The bad news is that "there are forces that want to keep [us] from noticing that." The good news is that more and more people are doing just that---noticing. And desire to somehow respond accordingly.
I think Thucydides was on to something when it came to human nature not changing much, which is what I'm talking about here. The "can't know hearts and minds" speech along with your version of original sin is more convincing when applied to individuals, which is not at all what I'm talking about here.
My overlap is with people who no longer think politics will provide the solution. A small group here, but very influential.
Anybody calling ANY American politician a "cultural marxist" is pretty much on their hands and knees begging to not be taken seriously; and in many cases, to my good fortune, extending a broad invitation for ribald ridicule.
I consider the vast majority of both the left and right authoritarian, so it's important to identify which authoritarian group I am refering too.
I think you and I would both agree that the commentators here are only a drop in the bucket and you're right that Matt encourages diverse viewpoints on all topics. He certainly did when he wrote this brilliant article:
Now read the comment section. It seems pretty clear to me based on this the Taibbi book most commentators here would be the least comfortable with is "I Can't Breathe: A Killing on Bay Street"
I consider a reflexive assumption of valorious truth telling and puppy dog goodness on the part of all law enforcement authoritarian right, but we may read that differently and have a different viewpoint on this.
Yeah, I've noticed this too. It's because when Matt first started his Substack, he was writing anti-woke articles, so that drew in a lot of men's rights and otherwise conservative types, or self-exalted intellectuals who have watched every second of every Jordan Peterson video. Or they think that the one thing they know about is the answer to every problem. To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail. To a man who just done saw Tucker Carlson talk about immigration, everything is about that.
What's worse, most are just interested in scoring points: politics-as-football-game, and exhibit absolutely no imagination. Threads here are like being frog-marched past an exhibit of Ayn Rand's underwear collection (all gray). So what could be an interesting and entertaining exercise is instead a drag.
And they sob and pout and kick and scream when you take a pass on participating in their "debate" skirmishes. Instructed---or baited---to build an "argument" and to defend a light comment that wrly or casually dismisses an obviously ludicrous conspiracy theory, or some banal cribbed propaganda from The Daily Caller. Lack of imagination in spades, cubed.
I never voted for him even once. Matt's "one of the great political liars of all time — he fooled us all" is patently false.
He struck me, from the first, as a thoroughly empty mass-media creation lacking all substance. And, for anyone who cared to listen, those who'd known him during his university and law school days reported their experiences with him which amply backed that appraisal with direct first-hand testimony.
It's a bit of hyperbole of course. He doesn't mean every single person in the United States. And Matt's experience came mostly from his long hours on the campaign trail.
Here's a link below that provides sources---friends and colleagues---to "those who had known [Obama] during his university and law school days."
These appraisals are also "amply backed....with direct first-hand testimony." Now, if you disagree with these "amply backed appraisals," perhaps you could be so kind to provide your own, unquestionably meticulously compiled and collated "amply backed appraisals" that you strongly hint are somewhat unkind to, or even disparaging of, Obama.
And you seem to be staking a claim as one of those alert political analysts "who cared to listen," or perhaps even a special someone "who'd known him during his university and law school days." Please share your "reported...experiences" with the studio audience. I, for one, care to listen.
If so: Hilarious, since Millennials have so enthusiastically embraced their role as cheaper and more compliant replacements for government officials who develop scruples.
My response was "What a fucking disappointment." The end. Who are these sad people who make politicians into their romantic super heroes? Some people haven't addressed their misplaced lovesickness for Sanders and AOC yet, either. It's politics as entertainment, as Matt has written about.
Right now, as Jimmy Dore likes to say, The Squad could bring the House to its knees. But they choose to play nice with Queen Pelosi. Why? Because all they care about is power and being re-elected.
I am in Maxine Waters’ district and I have written to her many times. Never a letter back. They can ignore the common man who are not writing big checks.
form responses loosely affiliated with what you’ve written them about. the fact of the matter is they really don’t care about you or me.
my wish is that in the midterms, everybody just decides to vote out all incumbents, cause havoc on the hill and maybe we’ll start to see representatives actually listening to us, but probably not.
The few small glimmers of hope I get in life come from "left" and "right" commentators talking to each other here and acknowledging we all hang together.
MT's a journalist; his job is to shine the the light. He's not a politician; it's not his job to "fix shit." That's up to us.
I was in love with Tulsi politically until the Biden endorsement. Unemployed, donated to her many, many times. But she's been dead to me ever since and, ultimately, proves that EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THESE POLS has a price. Even the Tulsis. Even the Lincolns and Kennedys. The price is Silver. Or Lead. The ancien regime is just irredeemably corrupt and I leave it with Thomas Jefferson: "The Tree of Liberty must from time to time be watered by the blood of Patriots and Tyrants."
My understanding is that the Biden "endorsement" was perfunctory, the one thing standing between living to fight another day and being financially/legally/etc. destroyed. You know, the way they are now doing to Trump and co.
Please keep your guns in the gun rack and don’t attempt to hang or threaten politicians or anyone else. That Jeffersonian quote is being used far too often for my liking.
Sadly, I think you are right. The rot is just too deep, and there are no negative feedbacks in the control loop to self-correct the US political system to even keel. Few (somewhat) bright spots here and there won't change much, and even those are tarnished, like Tulsi.
Given all we learned about Bernie, I have no doubts he is right. Still, doesn't excuse endorsing Biden. Really nothing does in my opinion. Was is a lapse of judgment? Blackmail from DNC? If the latter she should have exposed that, but I also understand that it is easy to criticize from sidelines when in reality we cannot even imagine all the ways the queen of warmongers can ruin your life and career, and of the people near and dear.
I agree with your sentiments, but I think the timeframe is a tough call. However, things that grow fast, die fast. This is almost a constant in the natural world, and relative to history, what we call America happened very fast.
There's a flower that blooms from a cactus in Hawaii called Night Blooming Cereus. The cactus is ugly, thorny, and spindly all year, then on a perfect full-moon night, it blooms an extraordinary flower...you can watch it bloom. Before the sun comes up, the flower is already withered and dying. That's America...and it has bloomed. Now we have to watch it die.
I am in SoCal and I am refusing the jab. I am a retired R.N. who worked my ass off for forty years. I used to like going out to dinner but the LA City Council just passed a resolution where only the vaccinated can eat out or shop etc.
So I decided to move back to Ohio in the fall but then today I see where the Biden admin. is seriously considering no fly lists and a ban on Interstate travel for the unvaxxed.
But my tax dollars will allow thousands of illegal aliens to come into the US and be flown and bused all over the country with no jabs!
And Bill Gates says our SS benefits should be stopped if we refuse the experimental jab. Money I earned breaking my back!
Damn! I never dreamed this country could go full Woke Gestapo (Democrats!) in a few short months.
We see the pillars of our system already being knocked down. The Constitution in shreds. The gov't being unable to fulfill its first duty: to provide for the welfare of the people. The decay though will be masked constantly by all of the media, who still have ads to sell.
I agree w/ your take; I think it'll be 3-5 'regions' too. I see it happening after the dollar takes a major hit and Wall St becomes irrelevant. It won't be pretty, but I think it's inevitable. Phisto sez 2 years, I was thinking about 5 but I think he's right. Post midterms it's gonna get UGLY.
Yes, Buttar is a Democrat trying to unseat Pelosi. Isn't it important to understand the "playing field" he is on? The CA primaries are now rigged for "top-two". I support Buttar. I understand your skepticism.
I get it - Pelosi is a schmuck - but, since what happened with Kucinich; I don't think there is any point in electing progressive Ds, if that is what (s)he is - it seems to me this top two thing sucks - do you like it, who decided that? (I live in NY)
Dee, saw the same thing. When Obama didn't create healthcare for all the first day of office and then chose his cabinet, I knew I'd been duped. He could have been the best and, in my mind, turned into the worst. Always thought Michelle was smarter than her husband, but, no, she didn't influence him into being a better president, not for a moment. Thanks for a great and needed article, Matt.
No way is Michelle smarter than Barack - she couldn't make it as a lawyer which is why she became a 'diversity officer' at a Chicago hospital making $125K a year UNTIL Barack landed some federal $$$ for the said hospital and they in turn shoved Michelle's salary up to $300K plus (as reported in The New Yorker magazine circa 2009). No matter, Michelle remained angry and was never really 'proud' of her country. Both the Obamas are grifters of the highest order.
This is an article on Michelle's job at the U of Chicago hospital that the McCain campaign used to criticize the Obamas. But is should have been used as an example of why we need a national health care system instead of the corrupt insurance scheme we have now. https://archives.cjr.org/campaign_desk/the_obamas_and_the_chicago_hos.php
She probably can't be spending energy on such tasks since she shared in interviews the pandemic put her into a low level depression. So fortunate she had two houses to fly back and forth between to help her cope.
You wanted Obama to create healthcare for all on his first day in office? Did you ever learn anything about the Legistlative Branch and its powers in school?
Yep, on his first day. On that day 86% of Americans wanted it. Obama had the wind at his back and both houses. It was the perfect time. Everyone was behind him exept the AMA, the banks, big pharma, for-profit medical. He could have swept it in. After a week, it was impossible.
Liz Fowler - Baucus, the Sen running the hearings on health care praised her for her great contributions to the process - Baucus, who, during the hearings, when he refused to seat any M4A panelists - had some docs, yeah legitimate MDs, who stood up and protested, arrested and removed form the chamber - saying what we needed was "more police" Baucus, who was able to get M4A for his constituents in Libby MT - because of the widespread asbestos contam. there ...
I's too bad it has taken this long for Matt's piece, putting it all together, to come out ....
Liz Fowler was on Baucus staff. His laughing at arresting Dr. Margaret Flowers and other Docs for National Healthcare should have made it clear where this whole thing was headed.
That 2 1/2 year stint as a community organizer was nothing but deep cover for this man who has always been more comfortable with the comfortable. Back in 2007, the recently departed Glen Ford wrote an article telling us who this man was and he was dismissed as an out of touch man stuck in the 70's. Obama was the long ago hand picked insurance policy for the establishment, the go to guy when the shit had hit the fan, as it did in 2008, and just the man needed who would lull libs to sleep even as he infuriated cons, neither seeming to notice that the polices remained the same, only the package had been changed, as meanwhile they bickered over inconsequential cultural issues.
The reason Obama was able to keep his cool for 8 years of verbal abuse is he knew the prize waiting for him; all the rest was just background noise.
Wasn't it Adolph Reed, as well, who had a few things to say about him as well?
What I figured was that the folks who were behind the D establishment, were, shall we say, a bit nervous about Hillary as "the heir apparent" (nervous not because she wasn't "their gal" but because they doubted she could carry the electorate) - so they brought O up from the ranks, promised him backing if he played ball - Hillary, smug as she was, never saw him coming until it was too late
I have always wondered how he ended up in Illinois. Not born here, not educated here, no family here at the time of his move. Somewhere during the Tony Rezko investigations I thought I read where he had something to do with Obama choosing Illinois. Supposedly Rezko helped facilitate the acquisition of the Obama home in Chicago, among other things.
If you are successful in Chicago/Illinois politics, there's a good chance you are morally fine with doing things The Chicago Way.
He had joined before that - look at his donors, his choice of advisers, as well as his cabinet picks ... I am really not sure how anyone who was paying attention could have been fooled - methinks too many wanted to be fooled and simply suspended their disbelief ....
One of my favorite journalists, Ken Silverstein wrote "Barack Obama, Inc" for Nov 2006 Harper's Magazine. The subtitle was "The Birth of a Washington Machine."
Two wings; the only one with power being the corporate one.
When progressives are headed by people who signal they'll compromise from the get go, while people like Manchin, Tester, Sinema draw a line in the sand and mean it, the outcome is preordained.
The Squad are grandstanders and everyone knows it.
Medicare got done in about a year. So all of his feigned lack of agency and being a hostage to a system is revisionist bullshit. He’s just a petulant, lazy child who doesn’t governing.
Personel is policy. You knew Obama was a fraud when he named Larry Summers and Michael Froman to his cabinet. Not in retrospect surprising from a guy whose whole schtick was being the first black president of the Harvard Law Review.
Not since St. Ronnie gutted public grade schools beginning in 1980 of what used to be called Sixth Grade "Civics" classes. Caused Sandra Day O'Connor to start teaching her *own Civics classes to kids after her stint on the Supreme Court.
He abandoned M4A in the primaries - "Yeah, it would be nice if we were starting from scratch, but we have to work with what we have" - that did it for me, and then I paid more attention - noted who was funding him - and a cascade of other things - I said I realized it would be hard to explain, as "progressive" why I was supporting that old white guy Nader, over the young charismatic black fellow - to me, it was a no brainer ...
So at best he would have his compatriots in Congress propose such legislation, and as the normal course of things happen, it would be weeks and months before it would emerge. The only way DAY ONE creation would happen would be by diktat.
The Democratic party was far from unified on UHC - in any form (and there is indeed more than the NHS as a model).
That for-profit medical includes most healthcare professionals who aren't keen to be conscripts to the ill-considered fantasies of over-promising politicians.
One area Matt missed out on regarding Michael Froman, was that it was he who gave a list of "suggested" cabinet positions to Tony Podesta, the head of Obama's transition team; all but three of them were eventually appointed by Obama.
Froman later became the US negotiator, appointed by Obama, to represent the US in the TPP deal. A further point is that Obama did not even wait for Congress to give him Trade Promotion Authority to begin those negotiations, which, under that format, leave Congress with no role, other than to vote the finished package an up or down vote, and this includes dumping the Senate's beloved tradition of the filibuster.
I always ask libs I know, who still defend Obama to this day, and who insist it was only Repub intransigence that kept their hero from delivering a progressive wet dream to all, if that were so, then why did his hand picked negotiator, with no input from Congress, deliver such a corporate wet dream with zero influence from Congress and thus the Repubs in it?
The answer I would get was like the one I'd get when I'd ask Hillary supporters what was the last use of the US military she opposed?
Silence.
The only way out of this mess is to totally reject the so called two party system and con men like Trump who use our justified anger at it to advance their own agenda and vote third party, a long process, but one that is our only hope.
Until then, we're stuck thinking that con men like Obama and Bill Clinton, who cash in after they leave office, or Trump, who did it while still president, offer some distinction one from the other.
All are scavengers, and they are eating our country alive.
No, it didn't appear that the nation had turned a corner; it appeared that a bunch of people were hoodwinked by yet another politician. Obama was plainly a politician from the start. It's just that you all were too blinded by the crappiness of Bush, with his advisors who were the closest group to evil personified since the Nazis, and the horrible Iraq War.
I never understood why it wasn't called Bushcare, because Obama had nothing to do with Bush doing such a crappy job as to give the Dems a 60-40 Senate majority in order to pass it. Bush was the biggest threat to world peace in 2003, resulting in Obama getting a "you're not Bush" Nobel Peace Prize in 2008 before doing anything, and then keeping Gitmo open and all the Wars rolling. And we wonder how Trump got elected? It was just people realizing they'd rather be told the truth about policies and lied to about crowd sizes than have promises broken by a media darling again.
Democracy has the good characteristic of allowing us to get rid of a crappy leader in a relatively short time, but it hasn't solved the problem of picking crappy leaders one after the other in its current incarnation.
Problem is, they only give us crappy choices. And what do we do about Nancy and Mitch, name any number, as in Pres. Biden. They have not been there for a short period of time. Don't get me wrong. Democracy best. We need to fix the corrosion, just how.
I'm right there with you. Matt's piece here makes plain the way the current system picks crappy leaders in league with corporate forces. Many people want to go far towards socialism to solve that problem, but this piece supports that it's simply the case that capitalist democracy needs a tweak, not to be thrown out with the bathwater.
What we have is a voting process that is mostly democratic, but a governing process that is completely controlled by monied interests, regardless of party. That is not a democracy, or more precisely a democratic republic, but a plutocracy posing as one.
Try calling up one of your so called representatives and see how much time you're allotted with that 23 year old intern/aide and then compare that with the face to face time, unlimited, that corporate interests have with the actual politician, and that will answer why we have what we have.
When a Supreme Court judge can say with a straight face that money contributions have no impact on how politicians vote, we are being told things that both we and they know are false.
Nah, there's no "vote of no confidence" like there is in a parliamentary system. Presidents are in for 4 years no matter what they do, with rare exception. The Democrats pretended to want to impeach Trump, but they didn't really.
That's why MSM (i.e. Democrats) brought him back as the permanent Republican punching bag. And they'll keep pushing him back on stage, forever. He radically energizes their half of the country into deranged hate.
If Republicans (the rank-and-file that is) were smart, they'd admit he failed his promises (i.e. failed to be willing to sacrifice everything for this cause); do everything they could to find a much better rebel (seasoned politically, in some way; knows when to speak and about what and how to deliver it; etc.)
And now under Biden, all of the neocons have been on-boarded. It's one big party, with two identity clubs, controlled by mobster gangs who periodically unite to rape and pillage different parts of the population.
I'll cop to not having any good ideas politically. It's monumental...an inflection point, as the SmartPeople™ like to say. I'm open to suggestions. In the meantime, I work on my building and grow vegetables.
You didn't put anything on my shoulders. I get cranked up occasionally and wrangle on the interweb, but it's just steam. We live in the country club of the world; my problems are picayune compared to most of humanity.
You won't do anything. From here on you should consider what will be done to you, because Americans have no say in how the nation is run. This is the greatest delusion of all: That things like voting and attending town halls matter. Voting is the opiate of the masses. What will be done to you and me will be determined in corporate boardrooms and by the thugs that surround the coming American Fuhrer or People's Kommissar.
I wasn't in Grant Park, but I did shed a few tears--proud that the American people could elect a black president to bring (((CHANGE)))! Everything went down hill from there. The fact that he was a conman was not our fault, perhaps. But not facing up to who he really is, is our fault.
I don't really think of him as a conman. He might've been doing the best he could given his knowledge of all things political/governmental. He just wasn't nearly knowledgeable enough.
I felt the same way when Trump started naming Goldman Sachs alumni to his administration before taking office after the election. Good feeling gone a week after the election.
Well it turned out that much of what he said was the truth.
1. No Russian Bounties
2. No Fire extinguisher attack
3. No Russian Interference
4. Biden DID the Quid Pro Quo for $1B to have the Ukraine PG fired for investigating Burisma.
5. China COVID epicenter: like Jon Stewart declared Bat Virus coming from Wuhan Lab is similar to “an outbreak of chocolatey goodness near Hershey, Pennsylvania” you can safely assume “it’s the fucking chocolate factory,”
6. Lowering Interest rates would create more commerce - housing starts at 13 year high.
7. FALSE POSITIVE TEAST At 0.1% prevalence, the PPV would only be 4%, meaning that 96 out of 100 positive results would be false positives. Health care providers should take the local prevalence into consideration when …
9. Did not pay for dirt on Hillary. She paid a spy for dirt on Trump.
10. The COVID Vaccine has skipped the last step in the Clinical Trials. There should be NO mandates till the trials are finished but Biden is going to fire the head of the FDA and put in his own man so he can start PASS PORTS and PENALTIES.
And notice there is no push for finger stick antibody screenings for Covid plus T and B cells. Cleveland Clinic did a study finding natural immunity is likely lifelong.
They would rather shove swabs into our brains and our kids brains and likely soon they will charge us for THAT privilege!
Whatever anyone thinks of Trump, this was the main effect of his presidency: The veil dropped. The truth is now obvious. We have a permanent, uniparty ruling class in this country. Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer play for the same team. If you can't see it now, you're really not trying.
I, too, was living in Chicago in '08. I was thrilled we elected (not me) our first Black President. What a beautiful family! But while living there, I saw what happened to Jack Ryan in the 2004 IL senatorial race against Obama. I actually knew Ryan's brother. Obama's team convinced a judge to unseal divorce documents exposing personal marital details in order to ruin what was otherwise a "clean" candidate. Jack Ryan has an autistic son---but that was irrelevant to ruining at all costs. I lived in Chicago and the suburbs for more than 30 years. The "community organize"r was actually a hit man (of sorts) and no one within his sights is untouchable. Chicago politics is notorious for very good reason!
Ryan was Obama's opponent in the general. Ryan had been married to the actress Jeri Ryan, and Obama got a judge to unseal sealed divorce documents that included her accusations against him--which were really no big deal but got played as if they were and Ryan dropped out over a weekend. The State GOP having no back-up, recruited Alan Keyes from Maryland, just to have someone on the ticket, and, predictably, he was crushed. He had done the same thing in that year's Democratic primary against an investment banker, Blair Hull. It was Obama' go-to tactic that year--if he couldn't disqualify the nominating petition as he had done to Mary Flowers in his first run for State Senate, get sealed court records opened up, and it was Daley connections that got the judges to do what they shouldn't have done--unseal sealed court records for no compelling reason.
Given the national situation in 2008 and the lameness of Mitt Romney in 2012, arguably Obama never won a tough election. Bobby Rush crushed him when he ran for Rush's Congressional seat in 2000.
He was never anything close to what he pretended to be--heck, he wasn't even descended form slaves like most African-Americans. His white mother was descended for the original Massachusetts Bay colonists, and his Black father was a tribal prince from Kenya brought over by the government to study here because he might be a bigshot one day. (Turned out not to be.)
Obama never showed any loyalty to American Blacks or progressives beyond what he did to get elected and maintain a false reputation. He and Michelle met through her Daley connections, which also got him his virtually no-show jobs as a U of C lecturer and associate at Davis-Miner law firm where he did work for Tony Rezko (who got them a super sweet deal on the side lot at their Hyde Park mansion)--and they always knew o whom they owed their careers--and probably who had information that could hurt them.
And now he even pissed on his long-time political allies like David Axelrod, to hobnob with people like Beyonce, instead.
His daughters seem nice and that is a big thing, but otherwise he is a pretty repellant person.
His mentor was Valerie Jarrett, a razor sharp real estate exec tied into Rezko and every other hard edge in the super development surge in the 90's and into the 21st century, and was about as connected throughout Chicago as any one individual coming from the bottom up can be. There was a reason she went with him to DC; she's as shrewd as there is, and he knew it.
I worked for Valerie for several years in the early-to-mid 1990s--about 3 levels down the org chart. I didn't see her every day, maybe about once or twice a month on average. Very sharp.
She was an attorney in the City Corporation Counsel's Office, and then Commissioner of Planning before she went to Habitat and became a developer. Pretty typical career path in Chicago, except she linked up with a President-to-be.
Chicago is easily much worse than the worst anyone has written or thought of it. Whatever you've read, figure it's worse. But it's a surprisingly vibrant and active city with major development that's working; it's not Detroit by a very long shot.
My Serbian American friend at a little Catholic college up in WI was expelled twice for poor grades and allowed to return because his dad was connected to Chicago alderman "Fast Eddie" Verdolyak in Chicago. The cavern of corruption goes to the craziest places. I think the third time was just too much!
He wasn’t even a community organizer. That was another con. He opened an office and made sounds like an organizer, but didn’t do squat and took his first chance to get out of 83rd and Harvey.
I don't doubt that Trump was allowed to win the R nomination, but he was not supposed to to win the election. If he was controlled why not have him throw it? The deep state was a thorn in his side the entire 4 years he was in office, are you suggesting that was a ruse?
Yes. Would a true statesman throw a lavish million dollar birthday bash for himself, and invite celebrities rather than statesmen/women and those who helped get him to where he is? He's a piece of absolute garbage.
You were living in Chicago in 2008, but I would wager you either were not a long-time Chicagoan or were not paying attention, because those of us who were, knew that Obama was above all a product of the Daley Machine, and people with that background ALWAYS remember where their true loyalty lies.
Yes indeed. I had been living in CA for 12 years by then, but I was a Chicagoan and I didn't know anything about Obummer but my dad (a lifelong Democrat) sure did. He voted for Nader.
Part of the Cook County/Chicago Democratic Party money machine. A big part, they have their place and when they speak people listen. And when someone needs a job outside of govt, the kid of people who can deliver.
“Me too” and have come under lots of fire for despising Obama and HRC who aided and abetted the rise of the orange wonder elected per our convoluted undemocratic process in 2016. I’ll go on record as voting for them while holding my nose. Will go on record that M Williamson was the only honest primary contender in 2020.
It was Tulsi Gabbard. She scared the PTB so much that immediately lies about her began to spread, same as they did with Jill Stein. Notice how easily Americans fall into believing lies? If they hear them a few time, voila, it's the truth.
It is funny that people with actual military experience -- as opposed to faux military experience or none at all -- tend not to make it to the semifinals, much less the finals, in the D and R circuses.
The wondrous thing is that those with actual time in the military seem to be slandered as u patriotic or cowardly while the draft dodgers make a virtue of their fealty to God and country. It is puzzling and astonishing to behold.
In the same way, you can preach hope and change while shovelling sacks of government gold into the hands of those who treasure the status quo.
The Founding Fathers were right-standing, corporatized armies are a bad thing and inculcate a bad mentality into the populace. America will always support combat veterans, but training corporate killers with nowhere necessary to go isn’t a good thing.
I’m generally of a mindset that a strong navy is of far more importance than a massive army-and it’s accompanying corportiz d bureaucracy.
Yes. Stand corrected although Williamson was honest. Recall now that Gabbard was accused of being a Russian operative or dupe or some such HRC nonsense
Tulsi was accused of "liking" Bashar al Assad; Jill Stein was accused of being a Russian operative. One could almost know for whom to vote by the accusations against that person.
Obama spent three hours talking Sanders into stepping aside; Bernie should have stayed in. He was the one who could beat Trump, not Hillary. When Obama and Hillary ran against each other, Kucinish was shoved way off to the side, while they took front and center. Yet, when Dennis spoke, he was the one who made perfect sense. It was a terrible thing when the League of Women Voters got kicked out of running the presidential debates.
Non-important point: The LWV refused to be party to a 'debate' in which the questions were supplied ahead of time to the candidates.
League Refuses to "Help Perpetrate a Fraud"
WASHINGTON, DC —"The League of Women Voters is withdrawing its sponsorship of the presidential debate scheduled for mid-October because the demands of the two campaign organizations would perpetrate a fraud on the American voter," League President Nancy M. Neuman said today.
"It has become clear to us that the candidates' organizations aim to add debates to their list of campaign-trail charades devoid of substance, spontaneity and honest answers to tough questions," Neuman said. "The League has no intention of becoming an accessory to the hoodwinking of the American public."
Neuman said that the campaigns presented the League with their debate agreement on
September 28, two weeks before the scheduled debate. The campaigns' agreement was negotiated "behind closed doors" and vas presented to the League as "a done deal," she said, its 16 pages of conditions not subject to negotiation.
Most objectionable to the League, Neuman said, were conditions in the agreement that gave the campaigns unprecedented control over the proceedings. Neuman called "outrageous" the campaigns' demands that they control the selection of questioners, the composition of the audience, hall access for the press and other issues.
Wasn't there something about part of that fraud being the elimination of third party candidates from the debates? The corrupt CPD that took it over from the LWV essentially just allowed R and D candidates.
I did a bit of googling- a HRC spokesperson said of Gabbard if the “nesting dolls” fit. Quite frankly I’d be inclined to favor a candidate who didn’t want to sanction or bomb my country to death
Any movement built around a person is going to be vulnerable. For a reform movement to work it needs to be a thing people want in and of itself, regardless of leadership so that it can survive successful smear campaigns against any of its leaders or members. It needs to be about the movements goals, not about good v. bad people.
Even the most anti-celebrity, non-egotistical leader we've seen recently, Corbyn, was successfully kneecapped despite already being party leader.
Obama helped nudge Sanders to the sidelines in part because he had some affinity for Sanders. And to save him from being mangled. And he would have been mangled. Perhaps not as badly as Trump was mangled, but mangled nonetheless. The Omegas ultimately don't cater to any breed of Delta misfits, whether they be dotty Vermont socialists, or loudmouth New York real estate barons. The sanctity of the fraternity must be preserved.
Yeah. I stayed up late to watch her announcement live on FB. First time I ever donate to a presidential campaign and I don't regret it. She's not perfect, but man oh man is she principled.
I didn't vote for Clinton or Trump. I voted for Gabbard, writing her in in the last presidential election. I vote for the person I think best (even when s/he has been kicked out by the Dems and Repubs who are determined never to let a good person win).
Even before the election, Obama announced that Geithner and Summers were on his economic advisory team. The day he announced that, the Dow Jones went up more than 600 points. Wall Street traders knew what we all later found out to be true: Santa Claus is back in town.
Obama was possibly one of the greatest frauds foisted on America. Were there to have even been a remotely genuine picture of Obama painted, the following fun facts would have been included:
-This is a guy who sat with his CIA chief John Brennan every Tuesday and went over a "kill list" where Obama was a defacto judge, jury and executioner, often ordering drone attacks that resulted in many innocent victims, including bombing crowds at weddings. That's actually the kind of guy we're talking about here
-Obama, along with the help of the French, ordered the assassination of the Libyan head of state, overthrew the government of one of the most prosperous African nations. Open slave markets filled with Africans followed.
-The majority of the 16 Trillion dollar bailouts of the Wall Street and European banks happened under Obama. There was a bill in both the House and Senate to re-instate Glass-Steagall, break up the banks, and cancel the toxic debts. In that case, Americans would not have had to pay for the purchase of trillions of toxic paper, and could have had a real massive infrastructure and rebuilding program. Obama and his team tried did everything to prevent the bill from advancing and instead forced all of America to foot the bill for Wall Streets totally worthless financial paper.
Because of that, we're now looking at an even more epic financial bubble. However, thanks the Obama's Dodd-Frank financial "reform," Title II of Dodd-Frank authorizes bank "bail-ins" where financial institutions can directly seize depositor accounts, and yes, depositors would also be responsible for covering derivatives contracts:
"As unsecured creditors, depositors and bondholders are subordinated to derivative claims. Derivatives are the investments that banks make among each other, which are supposed to be used to hedge their portfolios. However, the 25 largest banks hold more than $247 trillion in derivatives, which poses a tremendous amount of risk to the financial system. To avoid a potential calamity, the Dodd-Frank Act gives preference to derivative claims."
As the bubble pops, all the financial wizards and heads of the zombie banking system will tell us there is no alternative, the worthless debts have to be paid, or else the whole system will crash. It's a lie. Hopefully people don't fall for it. We need an orderly bankruptcy re-organization and bank separation.
In the financial crisis, the bondholders needed to take the pain of the defaults, even though that would have had severe consequences for large public investors like pension funds and thus pensioners. Although it would have been painful, it would have reset debt levels to something sustainable. What Obama did by bailing out the bond holders is the same thing Biden is doing by extending eviction moratoriums (moratoria?) — kicked the can down the road and creating a much larger problem in the end.
I would have been happy to deal with the “severe consequences” if a few of the people responsible would have gone to prison. The fact that nobody did disgusts me as much as the crimes themselves.
I think it's important to remember it's government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Before the Renaissance, nations didn't really exist. Europe was just a collection of "regions" run by a small hereditary ruling class. If your parents were serfs, you were a serf, and that was pretty much it.
Despite this disgusting oligarchical system of organization, creative individuals got together and actually overthrew that system, because it was inherently rotten and evil.
I think those who have usurped government power need to be reminded that it's not actually their government, and they can be removed, regardless of how secure they believe their hold on power to be. If nations collapse and governments collapse, you have no more international trade, no more international law, no more basic rights. It just becomes feudalism again, with small isolated communities, subsistence farming and agrarian societies. This is actually what the reigning oligarchical class prefers. It becomes infinitely easier to control and manipulate when everything is fragmented and isolated. It has taken the insidious financial parasites of Wall Street, the City of London, and that whole merchant banking class a long time to actually penetrate nations and usurp power to the point we see today.
I think it's a mistake to believe they have everything in the bag and now just need to all break off into local feudal-type economies. In fact, those in power would probably like that to be the perception, because it would mean people no longer believe in representative government, or their ability to self-govern. These were fundamental and revolutionary concepts which got us out of the dark ages, and were cemented with the Renaissance, the Wesphalian system, and later the American revolution.
One could argue that much of the arc of world history since that time has been an attempt to turn the clock back, and to bring us back under a feudal-type system of organization. Now it's just 21st century feudalism, "technocratic feudalism." They call it the "Great Reset."
I think it's important to have this broader historical process in mind if we're to really situate where we are today, and what's the actual best way to transcend the current doomed system.
A Sweeping History of the Great Reset (NOT the BBC with Matt Ehret)
"I think it's important to remember it's government of the people, by the people, and for the people."
That is certainly the *ideal, but like most ideals, rarely put into actual practice.
The two party system has long offered a faux choice between Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum for ages. It makes the peasants *feel that they are part of the system, and usually prevents them from picking up pikes and charging the Capitol. They are to rationalize, "well, my guy didn't win THIS time, but just you wait four more years, and *then we'll show 'em." The Wizards behind the Curtain, with their Citizens United Laws making Corporations "people" under the law, and outright bribery, ah... I mean, MONEY "Political Free Speech" have long since *so badly bastardized the quaint notion saying "of, by and *for the people" to the *reality: "of, for, and by Global Corporations" as to obviate and extirpate the original "ideal".
I just don't think that this quote, as true today as when it was written, *can be shared *too often:
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free" ― Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
Well, after reading these comments, We The People are 330MM strong, of which 200MM or so would outnumber even the multi million members of the federal government. Strength in numbers.
As a former bond trader, the desecration of the written laws of bond indentures takes away the assumed protections have of lending capital within our markets. Whether it be the giveaway of assets to the UAW in the GM imbroglio or the Puerto Rico Tax Receipt haircut, it destroys confidence in the Capital Markets that were the envy of the entire globe...and nobody gives any care. We are taking our strongest strengths and blowing them off as if they are not important....it is lunacy. Next we will be destroying the municipal bond market as the idiots we elect ignore the clearly written legal protections for lenders to get the far more numerous state pension holders their $$ though it doesnt fit the narrative. I get it, the average state worker didnt plan on having their pension swiped because dumb politicians sold the farm with no plan to pay it back. But cant we agree that there should be some reform from letting these folks make promises they can mathematically keep? Always screwing up and playing the heart strings of the electorate later doesn't cut it?
I don't know what this comment is about. There is no 'law of bond indentures' which I wrote many of during a long legal career. There is the law of the bankruptcy code which will determine your haircut if you invest in bonds your debtor can't pay. One of the blessings of American law is a forgiving bankruptcy system for debtors, why we threw out the British and their debtor prisons. Do you propose we bring them back? Behind every dumb borrower is an even dumber lender.
Brilliant summary! No morals, ethics or values. Just a perfect black/white face to make Americans think they were progressive forward looking people. Now Biden. Start to look forward to see what will replace the very broken (for a very long time held by tape ) system. Think local and regional. Set up alternative structures and systems. Move private-- dont depend on any level of govt.
No, not the Wall Street Banks; the OWNERS of the Wall Street banks, and the London banks, and the Singapore banks, etc. Anyone who can't see that the capitalist-imperial governments are ruled by the owners of banks and investment houses is blind, blind, blind.
Excellent! This is the stuff that most Americans apparently find it difficult to hold in memory for more than two day—if they ever realized what was going on it in the first place. And so the country is where it is today, and will be until the final collapse. I think that Obama's sole accomplishment was being elected while black—well . . . sort of black.
Like all money, bitcoin is made up out of nothing. The reason the dollar is more substantial (where "substantial" hardly means "strong") is because it is backed by the "full faith and credit" of the government and it is "legal tender". Bitcoin will never be "legal tender" -- which is actually a film-flam term, but does have some relevance as long as we all continue to believe that there is a reason for "money" to exist. It is just a mass hysterical dream that has been useful for thousands of years, but if we really thought about it, would just fall apart. We hold on to that fantasy because we have no alternative.
The value of bitcoin will never be zero because permissionless transfer of wealth has value. Hopefully the reason for this is obvious but if not I can explain.
The politicians and the fed are GOING to inflate the currency. (IMO) It's a 100% certainty. When they do, that hurts the value of your savings and labor. Why would I have my savings in a currency that's losing its value? You want savings to GROW, and 0.5% on your money isn't cutting it.
This brings us back to permissionless transfer of wealth. I don't need a bank. I don't need blessing of anybody at all to use bitcoin. Although I'm American myself, I understand how much this means in the rest of the world. (Who, by the way, are also suffering under governments debasing the central currency)
Now, it's down to each individual person to decide if their government is ruining the value of their money fast enough to take a risks on something like bitcoin. People in Venezuela made a different calculation than the average American does, because they more directly see the effects of inflation. Although a lot of Americans are seeing this now as government floats the idea of even more multi-trillion-dollar bills. Americans also have the option of the stock market or land purchases, which are also completely reasonable choices.
The value of bitcoin is derived completely on trust, I 100% agree with that. But I would rather have a system that's ruled by math than ruled by people. Because it seems that when you have rule by people, the printing never stops until the currency collapses.
As always, I am open to the argument that we will reign back the money creation.
Remember when our saving were "only" getting 6% interest, and then they were "temporarily" cut to 0.5% on a "temporary basis" only ? Seems that "temporary" is a euphemism for "permanently".
What happens to Bitcoin when there's a liquidity crunch and people need cash?
Remember, Bernie Madoff's empire was worth tens of billions of dollars... until the economy stumbled and people all wanted to cash out at the same time.
I believe the expression was "Friends of Angelo". The original Orange Man. A 2% mortgage was only a phone call away -- in exchange for a favor to be named later.
"Someday, and that day may never come, I’ll call upon you to do a service for me."
I subscribe so obviously enjoy Greenwald, but I think he's selective about who he chooses as his enemies. Greenwald has no problem challenging the powerful and even risking his life so this is not about courage.
Greenwald keeps a list of those like Bari Weiss and Pierre Omidyar who are beyond criticism. He'll instead go after Lorenz Taylor and Mark Zuckerberg as proxies. They both deserve the criticism too, but it's worth noting who he chooses to leave off his list.
What would you consider about Chris Hedges’s ideas for a better society to be “victim mentality?” I think it’s offside to criticize system bashing, also. The system is not working well at all, wouldn’t you agree? Civil disobedience and non-violent revolution seems to me very far from victim mentality cure. That is what I take from Chris Hedges. But maybe you prefer embedded journalists?
I simply don’t understand your comment. Maybe I’m missing something. Can you give examples or reference?
Points out all the politically correct villains. Couldn’t agree more. But I don’t see his civil disobedience and non-violent revolution gaining much traction lately. In fact, your 21st century Progressive revolutionaries seem to be taking the exact opposite tract. Know why?
Because Hedge’s and leftist ‘uber-intellectuals’ like him refuse to acknowledge the big picture. Besides the fact that there will be no ego boosting, revenue generating book signings and speaking engagements in doing that from *where* he’s coming from- the motivations, illusions and failures on the part of our individual and collective citizenry play just as big a part in allowing themselves to be swallowed whole by mega alpha predators as does the predators endless scheming to swallow them up.
Hedge’s various citizen classes are blameless, innocent, victimized, and ever-oppressed by forces outside of themselves, owed the world right now and must be made whole in every way by an all knowing, omnipresent, benevolent and anointed Administrative State. It’s the same old limp wristed, power grab of the powerless approach with no real empowerment, no real solutions except that of propping up our self-interested, self-dealing, politically connected savior caste to continue it’s ever unabated and exponential growth.
I totally agree...I grew up an empathic person...now and always independent. Used to look at contempt at comments about the uniparty...no longer. Every policy issue is "how much am I gonna make?". $6 Trillion potentially in the last 7 months. I am conservative economically but even the most lilly livered leftist must see the risks we are taking. These two guys definitely do....they both have my utmost respect.
I have to tell you that I have a love/hate relationship with Johnstone.
The love part you probably already get.
The hate part is her condemnation of landlords which has no nuance to it. She puts the owner of a single house in the same category as someone like Trump or Gates who would rather keep their places empty so the rents will rise and they can screw tenants.
Yes. Please do. Another feature which would be cool would be either allowing x share codes for friends (TheInformation does this) or have a "make public" price where a person can pay $x to make a private article convert to public.
Perfect summation. Matt was harder on Obama than even I -- an ardent critic of that administration -- would have been. I wish there was a way to disseminate this more widely.
Taibbi, Greenwald, Weis, and others here are guerilla journalists. They are mobile, agile, and motivated. Their important work is spreading under the radar. This revolution will not be televised.
Sigh. Another Weiss toady. Her name doesn't belong anywhere near that of Taibbi or Greenwald. She's an empty vessel spouting received opinions with no regard whatsoever for freedom of speech.
I think the Weiss thing is proof that "the resistance" to corporate entertainment media is now forming their own tribe.
It's a stretch from Weiss to Greenwald and an ocean to Matt Taibbi. The only thread joining the 3 is that they are all on Substack. In fact, when Weiss was at the NYT Greenwald would criticize her her ultra orthodox views. That all ended when she joined Substack.
I enjoy and appreciate Glenn and even subscribe to him, but he is a businessman in the way Taibbi is not. If it is in his best interests, Greenwald will not criticize Weiss. It's why I love Taibbi so much. He is the last of the hopeless romantics.
Seems like every article Matt puts out has a Bari name drop in it now, and it doesn't feel natural. I can't see such unaccomplished mediocrity generating buzz organically. Something's off.
Well. I'm 68 years old and this is the first time someone, or should I say "Nobody" has called me a "toady." I am the antithesis of a "toady." Good day.
I agree but if a truly awful politician was to descend on our country would he talk like Pres Obama or like Trump. You folks always need to degrade DJT but who is the only President out of the rest that clearly spoke his mind and fulfilled many of his promises. You talk about T Gubbard and say that those who get victimized by the press are clearly over the target but not for Trump. What do any of you actually know about him other than what the intelligence community and the main stream media tell you. If you don't want to be duped over and over, believe what you see not what you are told. If not, don't complain years later. Sorry ckbravo, not disagreeing with you...you just happened to be the comment that triggered this thought. Send this article to all of the people you love that you can't figure out how such smart people such as these can be so easily duped.
Excellent piece, Matt, but wish you had included the fact that Obama, after collecting a totally undeserved Nobel Peace Prize, proceeded to expand the two wars he inherited into five, or six, or seven depending on how you count them. Doubled down with a surge in Afghanistan, then onto turning Libya, Syria, and Yemen into failed states. He normalized all the war crimes committed by Bush and Cheney and added a number of his own.
Obama is the sleaziest of dirtbags and I hope writers like yourself always keep reminding us that.
"Awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to US President Barack Obama in 2009 failed to achieve what the committee hoped it would..."
Once upon a time accolades were given to those who actually achieved some milestone, not on the promise of what might be. What a perfect metaphor for this imposter.
Thanks for highlighting that. I hadn't heard of the secretary having morning after regrets. Then again, the NPP lost and and all credibility back when they gave one to the world's leading terrorist. For something that never was.
After Alfred Nobel invented dynamite, he imagined it in terms of all the lives it would save (the Mark Zuckerberg in the 18th century)
They wrongly thought he died and wrote an obituary excoriating him for all the harm dynamite had done and the number of people it killed. He read this and was horrified. He set up the Nobel peace prize as the ultimate indulgence to the approval of the elite for how his invention was actually being used in a way that made him incredibly rich.
Given those terms "Really Good At Killing People" Obama seems like the perfect sociopath for the Nobel Prize.
@Matt Taibbi - Let's not forget who sold us out to get her senate seat. Kamala Harris was AG of California. California was the last holdout that refused to drop its case against the big banks. It would have won, and broken everything open. Kamala proved she was just like Barack Obama. She dropped the case in return for some federal funding for the state to make up part of its deficit. And, she was assured they would make her senator from California. They did. That is who Kamala is. This makes more sense of why Obama pressed Biden to take her on as vice president.
I strongly suspect that the plan is that Biden will either die or be declared unfit due to senility. I think the plan is that Kamala will live out the plot of VEEP. She has to get into office and "prove her presidential timber" with some symbolic acts of presidentiality before the election. She won't win except as incumbent, and even then she is unlikely to. Kamala is the singular Democratic candidate who decisively lost the presidential primaries. Nobody liked her. Nobody trusts her, and they shouldn't - especially black people.
Come, come, now. That pedophilia has been going on for FORTY YEARS now with the full protection and abetting of the Pope. It *continues even as I write. Apparently these things take TIME? They damned sure seem to when the Pope is COMPLICIT in the gang rape of children.
Hmmm, seems to me that I remember voting against Harris, both in the primary and in the general, in her first run for Senate. But more people voted for her.
So how exactly did "they" "make" her a Senator? Those votes were fake?
Kind of the same way “they” made Biden the presidential nominee last year, despite (or because of) the fact that Bernie won four of the first five primaries. Understand now?
I dunno that the DNC was “manipulated” by American and Global corporations. I’d say it’s more a case of all of them having the same priorities, which are money and power.
When we have *LAWS such as Citizens United LEGALIZING the straight-up purchase of elections, it seems almost naive to think that the same crowd who were buying elections *before that was legal, would *suddenly develop actual scruples ! ;-D
Who got her through the primaries? Once that's done whoever is on the D ticket will win in California. You get to vote thus providing the illusion of choice, but the elites get to choose who you vote for.
Exactly. The primaries are the gate. Candidates either must court single-issue support groups, or get major support that can direct major single-issue groups to get out and vote in the primaries. It's a quite different game. I know this from direct experience. There are all sorts of games played, including the "fake out" where a political operator will pledge their support so that another leading candidate will anchor their strategy on getting those votes - but that operator is lying, and just doing it to hollow out the competition.
Single issue groups start with police and firemen. Then there are groups that vary by region. In CA's cities it's people like Sierra Club, FoE, etc.. To get a new candidate in, they have to get endorsed by multiple such groups. Then, the campaign has to figure out which groups actually delivered votes. But the DNC can talk to all those kingmakers and tell them how to vote in return for some bone. Often, the bone never really comes. But once that first breakthrough happens, incumbents rarely lose.
Reading this reminds me of that Pete Holmes routine where he wishes there were some kind of involuntary response (like laughter) that people would emit when encountering magic. Except in this case, i am doing that imaginary whatever thing in response to the massive tidal waves of relief washing over me as i vigorously agree with every sentence.
After these last couple years i've been thrown constantly off-balance - it's like everyone's playing some kind of elaborate The Game-style society-wide prank on me. Feels like all these left-politics dudes i used to respect are now very invested in telling me how great shit tastes and how they love to eat it and in fact have always loved it and it's very healthy even, yum yum. Biden has a gimlet intelligence, Jen Psaki is an angel of truth, Obama accomplished so much, George Bush is our cute painty grandpa, and Bill Kristol and Stephen Colbert are linking arms and doing a friendship jig on the table, now pull up a chair and chow down with us!
Makes me feel genuinely crazy - i keep trying to process it and move on, but every day brings a brand new wolf pounding on my door demanding i let it in. i can't put into words what a balm it is to my soul reading something that isn't either impenetrable traumatized jargon glop, or please-clap histrionics where every word is bent mathematically toward flinging cheap ownage at the world's easiest targets. Thank you for staying oriented around principles rather than parties - even when i don't agree with the principles, it helps me get my bearings at least. Also thanks for not writing ugly boring shit, turns out most writers suck ass at writing, appreciate you
Great article, Matt — I voted for Obama in 2008 with such enthusiasm, only to watch him do the exact opposite of what I lent my vote for (the “troop surge” in Afghanistan being a big one). Then, I let media and partisans scare me into voting for him again in 2012 as a last line of defense against a potential President Romney.
I remember being at a bar in 2012 and some guy bragged to me that he was a staffer or something for Obama. He asked me if I voted for him and when I said yes, he was like “cool! Good man.” But when I followed that up with how reluctantly I cast that vote considering he did nothing he pledged to do re: Iraq, Afghanistan, Patriot Act, Gitmo, etc., the guy instantly shrugged me off and clearly didn’t give a shit to hear any more from me. It felt very instructive in how their attitude was towards people like me: we’ll take your vote and then expect you to fuck off.
“Fool me once, shame on you — fool me twice, shame on me” indeed.
Nuh uh! Now he paints! And he and Michelle Obama are really good friends! He’s awesome! What? War crimes? Psshhh, that was like fifteen years ago… If Michelle Obama says he’s okay, that’s enough for me!
Thank you for your stellar dissection of this empty suit if an ex-President! I consider him one of the greatest con artist to ever enter our political world. Can’t imagine the BS library his donors are funding! Never have I had higher hopes that were dashing quicker than with Obama. A real tragedy for the American people!
That library is a cherry on his BS sundae. Check out this interview Glenn Loury did with the lawyer of Friends of the Park who are suing over destroying Jackson Park. Reveals even more repulsiveness and how he just used Black people on the south side to advance his career. Can't even put a library in their neighborhood-too beneath his greatness
When the design for his "library" was revealed, I was interested in reading an architectural critic's review of the plan and found one, in the Chicago Tribune, I think. I am certain it was NOT The Onion. Anyway, this critic's review described the plan as (somewhat) "Pharaonic." Priceless.
Your article reminded me once again. America does not need to see the tax returns of a billionaire who became a public servant, rather America needs to see the returns of public servants who became millionaires while being public servants.
Donald Trump? A public servant? If that was meant as humor and even if it wasn't, I know a guy with orange hair who would be highly amused with being characterized as a "public servant."
You can argue whether he was a "good public servant" or a "bad public servant", but you're just lashing out at the definitions of words to pretend a president doesn't meet the definition of "public servant".
Fauci has been playing around with natural immunity (in more ways than one) for decades. I can’t help but think of “Sympathy for the Devil” every time I see him.
if it is proven that the NIH did fund gain-of-function research, and that the virus did escape from said lab... I'm all in for the ambulance chasers to go after that fucker.
When Obama was re-elected in 2012 I had the anger in this article. By 2014 I was just very cynical. I did not vote for Trump in 2016 (did not vote for Clinton either) but I sure as heck understand completely why others did and I can’t say I blame them. After 6 months with Biden I can only say God help us
Biden is definitely "problematic" as a "friend" of the banks and the Corporations.
But then, he has been for the hundred years he has *already been in office of one kind or another.
The only thing most people *really expected of Biden was simply to be a "placeholder". The "unTrump". So far he has not mucked *that up, but I must say, I think that we got *more with Biden than we expected, and certainly not *all of that is good !
Like some of French Kings in the past, Obama and his wife have the utmost disdain for us common folk. They join the Clintons as the greatest grifter couples in American history. You also have to ask what did he do for Black America? He did nothing but make things worse. He was a pox on all of us.
Too bad you didn’t get to go to the party. I could imagine a piece worthy of the late Tom Wolfe!
Obama made race relations worse b/c he couldn’t relate to ordinary black folk, and was unwilling to discuss true policy solutions for ghetto areas. Instead, he simply half heartedly scolded white suburbanites and refused to confront the urban dysfunction in D led cities.
I lost all respect for BO when he threw his pastor Jeremiah Wright under the bus seconds after getting elected . . Wright and I are both ordained ministers in the UCC and I know first hand what Wright had done for hundreds of young black kids in Chicago. BO tossed him aside after praising him to the skies in order to let some of Wright's reputation in the black community rub up against him. Remember he and Michelle were married by Wright and BO used him to get his foot in the black door as it were. He then allowed the media to portray this incredible human being as an "angry black man" .Right then I knew what kind of man he really was. It took a while but finally others are beginning to see it as well.
Wright also told us that Obama was a politician band would say whatever he needed to get elected. Most of us dismissed the statement but it made me even more leery of Obama.
Obama’s embrace of incredibly divisive identity politics and early woke
narratives paved the way for Trump. That isn’t really addressed in this otherwise great piece but it’s the key factor of what ensured we would swing from Obama to Trump.
In many ways that's worse, because he capitalized on identity politics when it benefited him as president, and his speeches decrying it post presidency have had no impact whatsoever. Would certainly be nice for the political class to think seriously about Obama's legacy, which is why that's the last thing in the world they want us to do.
I think this is where Obama and Trump have a similarity: both men speak to as many sides of a given issue to garner as much allegiance as possible, though I would say Trump, while more of a buffoon, is far less a cynic.
At some level, I think they both appealed to a lot of people who knew, in their guts, that our social and political structures are deeply rotten. They wanted, want, to believe in “something different.” It creates openings for charlatans.
Well that gamble didnt work out did it. That belief costs. Time for reality. Look to the future-- dont support the old constructs and systems. Dont vote. Support local businesses and structures. Work new things through volunteer organizations. Most social and financial models have the US not existing in the same structure by 2032.
By 2032, we will be under a racist-religious authoritarian dictatorship; after which there may be a possibility for survivors to create an actual, bottom-up, community-focused democracy rather than the pretend republic created by the capitalist-imperial constitution written by our conquest-focused, colonial rulers in the 1780s.
That don’t even stop the spread of the virus as they are non-sterilizing. On the plus side though, the mass non-sterilizing vaccination campaign is spurring the rapid evolution of vaccine resistant mutants (https://news.yahoo.com/vaccine-resistant-lambda-variant-us-193100413.html), so we’ve got that going for us. Good work all!
Wow. Solid writing. As the illustrator for most of those RS stories I would feel guilty by association except for the fact that RS ran Matt's bitter reassessments, well cataloged in the above essay, during those 8 years and we did provide some good complementary illustrations to go along with those features. Early on we did run the image of Obama clinking champagne glasses with swines in suits while outside people were stay warm by burning the Hope and Change posters. It's sad. There was such seeming potential.
Victor - your illustrations are truly world class -- among the best I have ever seen. They remind me of the incredible Oto Reisinger in Europe - yours are of course in color. I am so happy that you are working again with Matt
I was living in Chicago in 2008. I remember being in tears as Obama spoke in Grant Park; it appeared that after the horrors of the Reagan, Clinton and Bush eras, we as a nation had turned a corner. Then three weeks after the election, Obama named Tim Geithner as his Treasury Secretary nominee, Larry Summers as the director of the National Economic Council, and Hank Paulson as an economic adviser. It was then I knew we had been deceived in the most egregious way.
Yeah, the appointment of Geithner was key for me too, knew it meant business as usual. The way 'single payer' healthcare was dropped like a hot rock without much debate was the next clue. I follow a blogger, John Michael Greer, who predicted Trump's victory in Jan 2016 and explained in great detail why he would win. Greer didn't support Trump, merely explained him. His recent book _The King in Orange_ goes into greater detail.
Most Americans aren't afraid of hard work. And they don't resent other people getting rich by hard work, talent or even dumb luck. But they do resent that highly paid executives who drive their company (or the entire nation) to the brink of destruction either retire with a golden parachute or get another highly paid job. No consequences for failure if you are rich. Meanwhile the kid who drops a tray of hamburgers at Mickey D's or the part-time teller whose drawer doesn't balance one day are let go.
Obama got on a plane and flew to Ohio to personally strong-arm Kucinich into dropping his bill. That was pretty defining, too!
Yup the famous AF1 trip ... not only did K drop his bill but he expressed support for the ACA (that he had been critical of), and apparently convinced other progs to do so also - When asked by his astonished supporters (I worked on 2 of his campaigns) why - he said "For Pres. and Party" - at that point I realized there was no point in electing "progressive" Ds, because, when push came to shove, they folded like a cheap suit ....
Hey, that isn't always true, I mean, look at Bernie Sa...oh, dear.
However, as a rightish, libertarianish, NON-Democrat, I must also say that the Republicans, as an opposition party, as ethical human beings and as strong proponents of a prosperous and peaceful country...are crap. Wrapped in a cheap suit that has just folded. Into a pool of urine.
The only time I don't viscerally hate the Republicans is when the Dems (and their lackeys in the press) are so insane, hateful and outrageous it distracts me from looking at their opposition party.
Back when I was so proud of myself for questioning the blind, "My country right or wrong!" red-white-and-blue patriotism they were doling out in civics classes, it NEVER occurred to me how bitterly disappointed I would one day be in my own government. I was so naive, it's painful to recall.
Amen :) - that's why I have voted 3rd party since '96
That'll learn 'em.
Everyone folds like a cheap camera. They are in business for themselves and not for you. Was true in Classical Rome and true now. They posture for votes, not ideology.
Cicero on the “moral duties” of politicians:
“… [L]et those who are to preside over the state obey two precepts of Plato, — one, that they so watch for the well-being of their fellow-citizens that they have reference to it in whatever they do, forgetting their own private interests; the other, that they care for the whole body politic, and not, while they watch over a portion of it, neglect other portions. For, as the guardianship of a minor, so the administration of the state is to be conducted for the benefit, not of those to whom it is intrusted, but of those who are intrusted to their care.”
The U.S. used to produce better elites.
Great advice and literally the opposite of how democracy works, but then Rome was never a democracy.
@HBI
They are a veritable nest of vipers, all !
Once they get a taste for the system, yes. Some go in with some kind of idealistic notions, they either don't last long or learn their lesson shortly.
"Was true in Classical Rome..." a slight digression, but on that though it has always amazed me how reading a modern English translation of Cicero's written advice "On running for the [Roman] Consulship" sounds basically indistinguishable from what a modern American politician of some wit and maximum realist-cynicism would write today:
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/On_running_for_the_Consulship
I was reading YA work on Cicero this week so it came to mind. Nice.
This is cynicism. Cynicism is self-defeating. Go home & sit.
"A pessimist is an optimist in full possession of the facts."
Arthur Schopenhauer
It has the merit of being true. A succession of figures I have known have not dimmed this in me. The only person I knew involved in this process who had idealism that I would call bulletproof was a newspaper editor, sadly dead. Maybe some military officers, but it depended on the topic.
We need candidates who truly understand not only the stakes, but also what it takes -- that is, the likelihood of today losing everything to stay real, yet when going down in flames, staying true and keeping the faith that the "arc of justice" will out.
You're looking for a revolutionary, not a politician.
Beware revolutionaries. They rarely do what they say beforehand after they gain power. Except Hitler.
This is not exclusive to revolutionaries at all. There are people who are willing to sacrifice their lives in an (ostensibly) just war; while small numbers of people everywhere sacrifice their reputations and livelihoods doing what's dangerous but right. Somewhat recently, Tulsi Gabbard's calling out Hillary Clinton's smear with strong language while an active candidate was, for me, one good example. People will remember this. Likewise, Perot, Nader, Ron Paul, also went down, sending messages while sticking to their guns. Eventually, a watershed level of public awareness is reached. The true practical selfless goal.
HBI, except Castro, you mean.
The revolution already happened, and corporations won. They now run the government and don't care who happens to get elected.
That's true. It's also irrelevant to going forward. These are times that try our souls.
You got it.
He also faked a sip of Flint water. (Classic sociopath.)
That stunt was depraved, as sick as anything you could witness from a politician. I was unaware of it until Jimmy Dore featured it on his show. The crowd was stunned. You could see the enormous pain and confusion on their faces as they wrestled emotionally with the incomprehensibility of witnessing their hero do something so shallow and disturbing. That's when I went from seeing Obama as just another self-serving, albeit brilliant, con artist to recognizing him as truly evil.
It was horrid and revealing of his true nature, but it does fall behind W's making a video of his looking for WMDs in the Oval Office before a crowd of amused WH correspondents after the very reason for our invasion of Iraq had been proven false, and this by a Vietnam draft dodger, who also had fellow draft dodger as VP.
The contempt the elite feel for us, as perhaps they should, cannot be overestimated; after all, we keep voting them into office.
When the average person can spot, and be repelled by, narcissists and psychotics, we will progress. Not until.
I wonder if the Bushes got an invite to the birthday bash. Best of pals, apparently. In the UK Blair finished it for many people who still harboured hope - 100% cynicism from Blair onwards. No doubt Obama had a similar effect in the USA. To extinguish people's last vestiges of hope is yet another evil to add the Blair and Obama catologues.
I'd forgotten about that. I was probably still pondering Clinton stealing the Republican's law and order playbook while "ending welfare as we know it" to get elected. I still wonder about the psychology behind Clinton having been raised in dire poverty by a single mother then going on to throw millions of people like himself and his mother off public assistance and into poverty, again all for the purpose of winning the presidency. Judging by just the last few presidents, including the present one, I'm convinced one has to be a sociopath to even consider a run at the Oval Office. And maybe the people who keep voting them in are just as bad.
Because at some point in all of our lives, we want someone or something else bigger than ourselves to take the ultimate responsibly for all of the really big, bad, hard stuff. Most people still live and die in that mindset. It's hard to imagine, but even as we shed tears over narcissistic con men's beautiful words, (they, who will happily walk away with both our fortunes and our blame) we have only ourselves to hold accountable for the eventual outcomes attached to shirking reality in favor of a privilege that belongs to only to children. This vast, ravenous political-military-industrial apparatus we despise has only arisen in response to our biggest subconsciouswish come true.
Well *somebody* votes them into office. Honestly doubt we citizens are the only ones voting. 2020 vote was obviously manipulated. Because the Deep State that gladly manipulated votes in 3rd world countries for decades will now gladly manipulate votes inside the USA. Ohio may as well be Burma to the globalist class.
What are you prepared to do about it?
At a White House Correspondents' Dinner Obama also joked about sending predator drones to kill some popular band that Sasha and Malia liked. The guests thought that was pretty funny too.
Trump did mean tweets but I don't remember him ever joking, ever, about killing people or starting wars on false pretences. Does anyone here remember anything like that?
Cognitive dissonance is a bitch but also a gift for those whose wherewithal allows for a full grappling w it
According to this piece, a clip was falsely edited to give that impression, but wasn’t accurate.
https://factcheck.thedispatch.com/p/did-barack-obama-mock-the-flint-water
Here we go. Ugh.
Ah, I sipped, but I didn't swallow ....
Hi Rita! I follow John Michael Greer pretty religiously, and I remember a lot of your comments! I agree, JMG truly just *explained* Trump, but the number of people who accused him of supporting Trump, and the number of times I was accused of the same thing whenever I tried to talk about it, led me to believe that they were only making said accusations because the explanation wasn't something they wanted to hear.
I agree, by the way- I think Americans by and large don't resent wealth, but they do resent unfairness. And our rigged casino of an economy is becoming impossible for the average American to ignore.
I truly resent politicians getting wealthy. It’s called public service.
Exactly. If they want to get rich, the should go into business, not capitalize on their bullshit rhetoric with sleek documentaries or shows or whatever the hell he’s doing at Netflix. Try saving the kids in Baltimore first.
It is astonishing that Members of Congress and their spouses are allowed to trade stocks. How messed up is that?
Nice try. What Congress did was vote themselves exempt from insider trading laws. The kind of thing anyone else goes to jail for: https://theintercept.com/2015/05/07/congress-argues-cant-investigated-insider-trading/
I resent wealth. Not because I want to be wealthy, but because it creates psychopaths.
Viewing our government as an ongoing experiment testing that hypothesis, all the data points to verification.
I disagree. Many people who earned their wealth have done much good in the world and given much of that wealth away. I think you're on to something, but i believe it is POWER that creates psychopaths.
Did you read Jon Ronson’s “The Psychopath Test”? Hilarious.
I think Geitner was 3rd choice for the folks who pulled the strings - the first, it seems to me, was Rubin - but by that time he and Citigroup were, shall we say, under a cloud. The second would have been Summers - but he had been making an AH of himself with comments about women, etc - so the 3rd was Geitner - the guy who at his hearing said he had counted on his accountant to fill out his income tax from, which was done improperly - so here's a guy up for Sec of the Treasury who couldn't even do his own income taxes - pitiful, but the Big Banks wanted one of the 3 (gee, wonder why) and though he was the runt of the litter, he was the only one left standing ...
Or if you are a man of principle in a government agency, you get pushed out the door and black balled to make room for younger, more compliant employees.
The title of that book is an obvious play on The King In Yellow, a evil stage play in the Cthulhu Mythos that creates a magical gateway to the Court of Hastur when it's performed.
While The King In Orange didn't really seem to spend as much time talking about the magical thinking surrounding the electing as I expected it too, it was still a great read analyzing the mass psychology behind the 2016 election and contained a lot of astute observations. I've been reading ADR and Ecosophia for about a decade now and honestly Greer's ability to observe/document the ebb and flow of current events astounds me.
But yeah, my "okay, this is a load of BS" moment was when the Obama administration massively expanded the drone program in the wake of winning a nobel peace prize for...being inspirational? For not being named George Bush? I don't know. But my forever-D relatives still seem to think he was great, despite not really accomplishing a whole lot. He talked a good game, and really knew how to deliver an inspirational sounding speech. And being handsome probably helped. I don't know. But I'm sorry, as far as I'm concerned waging warfare from 1000s of miles away using murder planes you can't even retaliate against is just wrong.
This is a great comment.
I was looking for mention of his Senate vote for immunity for telecom. providers --breaking his campaign pledge--because (1) Matt did not in his article and (2) because it happened before the general election. It's an important point in the timeline for all the people who still seem to believe it was reasonable at the time they voted for him to believe Obama intended to bring about "change," represented "hope" for a new kind of government/politician, or was just meaningfully different than other Democratic Party candidates for President. (I'm not attributing that to anyone here, not even Matt; that said, it is a sentiment I encounter regularly and assume others do, too.)
No one, looking at evidence available, should have believed Obama would be a transformational or progressive President. The unfortunate truth is that politicians always promise positive change in some form, and most voters continue to believe it despite years and years of evidence belying it (in the case of Obama, the history of the Democratic Party since at least 1992), even especially relevant evidence calling it into question coming directly from the politician himself (such as breaking the immunity pledge and getting more money from Wall Street than any other candidate). When the candidate ultimately doesn't bring change, shame on those who believed it would be different "this time."
It is easy to look back and admit you made a mistake. It is harder to accept the obvious beforehand--that the Democratic candidate will betray you--because you will stand almost alone and face criticism. You will be told you have no choice and are naive if not stupid for thinking otherwise. You will be called, at least by implication, worse: you're racist/you don't like Obama because he is black. You won't get to revel in and share the happiness your friends feel. Etc. And that, in part, is why nothing will change--most people are passive cowards.
That telecom vote completely gave his game away right before the 2008 election and almost everyone chose to ignore it.
Yep
Yeah, when he backtracked on the FISA bill, that was a huge clue that he was full of shit. I started doubting him then. And when he picked his cabinet, I knew we had another Clinton on our hands.
Cowards is too strong. I don't mean that. Sheepish, or they lack the courage of conviction, something like that.
No, “cowards” is spot-on, unfortunately.
Don't forget his promise to vote against the FISA bill before he voted for it.
Yeah, I saw yours after I posted, was glad to see someone else remembered.
And Obama personally killed “The Public Option”.
That honor went to Joe Lieberman, Senator from Cigna & Aetna.
He was just the public face of something that went much deeper than him.
@Mango M3 Huffy
Thanks for the reminder on the "look forward not backward" ON the Bush/Cheney war crimes. That seems to have been the veritable *model for the handling of the 1-6 ruckus. "Nothing to see here, folks, nothing at all. Let's just move on !"
Do you remember the Hillarycare adventure of 1993-4?
He probably could have appeared like he was fighting harder, but he took what he could get. The health insurers had enough votes to kill the bill. Do you not realize that?
Obama could have championed “Medicare for All” with a fireside chat and a few graphs. He could have asked ALL Americans to contact their members of Congress.
But he didn’t. He was owned then and he he owned now.
Brings to mind an image of a vaudeville stage and a puppet. Mr Fish could draw it.
Does anyone really believe in smash mouth politics where politicians do things not in their own interest because they get phone calls because they are frozen in fear in their offices?
Do you believe in the Easter Bunny and Santa too?
I didn't know health insurers could vote in Congress. Anyway, using sortition instead of voting for members of Congress could clear up the lobbying mess. Also wouldn't need to flush billions of dollars on political campaigns every few years. ...
A vanguard revolution and overthrow of the current US government--which now is just a front for the dozen of so richest people in the world--will eventually happen. A strongman or group (the ideology doesn't matter, left or right, as long as it is authoritarian) will find the key to starting a populist uprising in the U.S., and then the real fun will start.
Members of the military gunning down protestors by the dozens, like is done in other nations. Concentration camps, thousands of people "disappeared", mass graves, the whole nine yards. This is what's coming and Obama, after Bush, set the country up for it. It's surprising people don't say this. Maybe they don't realize how bad it is in the nation. I suppose they think the NSA is listening.
Of course I could be wrong. Maybe we just gradually sink into the mire until China takes over, and everyone stays happy at home, watching sports and playing videogames. I am though almost 99 percent sure elections don't matter anymore. You can't vote against the interests of Goldman Sachs.
Anyone this stupid should probably be euthanized for the sake of simple humanity.
He wasn't there to send a message. He was there to accomplish something to burnish his own legacy. It's a consistent theory of people acting in their own interest. Divining that interest is the hardest part, and usually not that hard. Do you not think that if he could have instituted a NHS he would have? It would have been a better legacy. He took what he could get.
With the de facto fascism inherent in the system in the US, I don't think anything like the NHS or M4A is possible. Where is the money that is going to make it in politicians' interest in the short term to do this? That's right, it doesn't exist.
Both are based on a fantasy of people acting not in their own interest.
These kinds of histrionics are exactly why Dem voters are such dupes. The signs were ALWAYS there if you looked closely enough. But voting to feel good about yourself trumps doing what’s good for the country. Obama is a narcissistic menace and apparently it’s contagious because all of his apostles are now similarly afflicted.
I trust many of Taibbi’s subscribers are sophisticated enough to understand that criticizing Obama doesn’t imply support for trump
Support for Trump? Heck no. Sympathy for Trump supporters is more like it. Time to build bridges. We've all been screwed.
Trump's base is suburban homeowners and his 2016 coalition was wealthier than Clinton's. We must build bridges with half of the country that doesn't vote. Fuck the Trump voters. We need to get poor people to vote, but understandably they don't when they know nothing will change.
Every time a topic like this comes up, I highlight why horseshoe theory is unworkable. See above.
He didn’t say Trump, he said trumps. Like feelings trumps logic. Jesus people really have TDS. 🤙🏼
ha I missed that the first time. TDS trumps reason.
I voted for Trump both times. In the past I voted Clinton 2x and Obama 2x. But after '15 I woke up and realized the system is broken. For me a Trump 2nd term would have at the least (or so I hoped) force the Democratic party to break up.
Most, but far from all. Some are just that reflexive - and yet they are sure they are deep thinkers.
There is an awful article about a former Cuomo-sexual (I threw up in my mouth typing that) that was in Elle or Vogue this week coming to terms with being duped, but the whole thing is about his sexual assaults (which to be clear should lead to impeachment and if possible criminal charges) instead of the massive nursing home deaths he covered up.
I think that's the point.
Agree. I used to be duped until 2006, then joined Greens, now Greens are Dem-lite. They all suck. I don't vote at all now. Not putting my stamp of approval on their rigged corporate and intel agency shit show.
Interesting - did you vote for Stein in '12, '16?
I have critiques of the GP, but Dem-lite isn't one - curious to know what you mean ...
The trans agenda took it over. They are backing surgeries for kids and hormones for life, against their previous anti-big pharma stance. Among other things.
Ah, wasn't aware - have lost touch ....
You’re not the one who lost touch.
Even worse, at least he was much of a Stalin reigning over the USSA like what the Dems are turning this country into.
I pray everyday for the sort of organization Stalin was able to impose on Russia. Remember, the Russian peasant was even more ignorant than the typical racist from Bumfuck, Neb.
And to that I say AMEN!
I agree.
Unfortunately, Rep dupes fell for John McCain in 2008 and the signs were also always there.
“Weeping” over Obama is puerile melodrama. It’s excessively theatrical. So, yes. Everyone sharing their Obama Anonymous stories of hitting bottom is possessed by a fit of histrionics.
Humbled!? You jack asses voted for him for a SECOND TERM! He pissed in your face and you just asked for more of the same. He fooled you once and then you were bamboozled yet again.
It’s easy to be humble after the fact, after all the damage has been wrought. Death bed regrets are empty gestures. If you die with regrets, it’s because you were an asshole up until the moment you were about to croak.
The contributors here are mostly right wing authoritarian with a few notable exceptions.
I think Matt is genuine in his disappointment because he has an undeniable paper trail, but I suspect most of the "I loved Obama and he let me down!" crowd here are the same as you, but less honest about it. They were the same people listening to grifters like Ann Coulter and Laura Ingram and buying copies of D'Souza's "The Roots of Obama's Rage" for family and friends at Christmas who would not shut up about politics during Thanksgiving dinner. They were already warming up their Glenn Beck inspired "cultural Marxist" talking points they continue to use against anyone they don't approve of to this day.
Imagine, people calling the ultimate crony capitalist Obama a "cultural Marxist." No wonder no one took his critics seriously.
One of the things that drove me away from liberal thinking was all the mind-reading. I'm really impressed with how you know what's in other people's minds and hearts, without even meeting them. That's quite a skill.
Me, I can't be entirely sure of what my own "true" motivations are, let alone any else's. I'm an agnostic, but the older I get, the more impressed I am with the Christian notion that we all pretty much have bad intentions, and our intentions are most suspect when we are judging others and enjoying that warm glow of intellectual superiority and moral self-righteousness.
Here's another way: Let's decide what forces seem to be dragging down the middle and lower classes, and take allies wherever we can find them to fight back. Even if they watch Tucker Carlson! Even if they voted for that commie Bernie!
There's way more overlap than people realize. And there are forces that want to keep you from noticing that.
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.“ - CS Lewis
"....I'm really impressed with how you know what's in other people's minds and hearts, without even meeting them."
Nobody here, or anywhere, "knows what's in other people's hearts and minds." Speaking for myself, and I assume many others, my words are meant to assess other people's opinions and convey my opinions of those opinions. We're all clumsy with this arrangement because we have, alone among earth's organisms, complex brains that are wont to go many places at once.
And I agree wholeheartedly that "there's way more overlap than people realize." Though I might correct you slightly and add that I think there are many people indeed who "realize" this, but are frustrated by their perceived lack of agency and feel stymied as how to remedy this state through a series of steps that might lead to concrete action.
That is the great task before us, is it not? How to combat the inertia, forge a few alliances, leave behind the trivial squabbling, and get on with it? The bad news is that "there are forces that want to keep [us] from noticing that." The good news is that more and more people are doing just that---noticing. And desire to somehow respond accordingly.
I think Thucydides was on to something when it came to human nature not changing much, which is what I'm talking about here. The "can't know hearts and minds" speech along with your version of original sin is more convincing when applied to individuals, which is not at all what I'm talking about here.
My overlap is with people who no longer think politics will provide the solution. A small group here, but very influential.
Anybody calling ANY American politician a "cultural marxist" is pretty much on their hands and knees begging to not be taken seriously; and in many cases, to my good fortune, extending a broad invitation for ribald ridicule.
You’re like watching a panda trying to fuck a wall.
Ya, but it sounded so convincing over the radio when Rush Limbaugh used it!
"The contributors here are mostly right wing authoritarian with a few notable exceptions."
Whoa. Are we both reading the same comment section?
I'll take "right-wing" if not "mostly"; MT implicitly encourages commentary from all across the political spectrum.
"Authoritarian," though... if there's anything that stereotypes a TK News reader, be they right- or left-leaning, I think it's anti-authoritarianism.
I consider the vast majority of both the left and right authoritarian, so it's important to identify which authoritarian group I am refering too.
I think you and I would both agree that the commentators here are only a drop in the bucket and you're right that Matt encourages diverse viewpoints on all topics. He certainly did when he wrote this brilliant article:
https://taibbi.substack.com/p/the-overlooked-factors-in-police
Now read the comment section. It seems pretty clear to me based on this the Taibbi book most commentators here would be the least comfortable with is "I Can't Breathe: A Killing on Bay Street"
I consider a reflexive assumption of valorious truth telling and puppy dog goodness on the part of all law enforcement authoritarian right, but we may read that differently and have a different viewpoint on this.
Yeah, I've noticed this too. It's because when Matt first started his Substack, he was writing anti-woke articles, so that drew in a lot of men's rights and otherwise conservative types, or self-exalted intellectuals who have watched every second of every Jordan Peterson video. Or they think that the one thing they know about is the answer to every problem. To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail. To a man who just done saw Tucker Carlson talk about immigration, everything is about that.
What's worse, most are just interested in scoring points: politics-as-football-game, and exhibit absolutely no imagination. Threads here are like being frog-marched past an exhibit of Ayn Rand's underwear collection (all gray). So what could be an interesting and entertaining exercise is instead a drag.
And they sob and pout and kick and scream when you take a pass on participating in their "debate" skirmishes. Instructed---or baited---to build an "argument" and to defend a light comment that wrly or casually dismisses an obviously ludicrous conspiracy theory, or some banal cribbed propaganda from The Daily Caller. Lack of imagination in spades, cubed.
Uh-huh.
I never voted for him even once. Matt's "one of the great political liars of all time — he fooled us all" is patently false.
He struck me, from the first, as a thoroughly empty mass-media creation lacking all substance. And, for anyone who cared to listen, those who'd known him during his university and law school days reported their experiences with him which amply backed that appraisal with direct first-hand testimony.
It's a bit of hyperbole of course. He doesn't mean every single person in the United States. And Matt's experience came mostly from his long hours on the campaign trail.
Here's a link below that provides sources---friends and colleagues---to "those who had known [Obama] during his university and law school days."
These appraisals are also "amply backed....with direct first-hand testimony." Now, if you disagree with these "amply backed appraisals," perhaps you could be so kind to provide your own, unquestionably meticulously compiled and collated "amply backed appraisals" that you strongly hint are somewhat unkind to, or even disparaging of, Obama.
And you seem to be staking a claim as one of those alert political analysts "who cared to listen," or perhaps even a special someone "who'd known him during his university and law school days." Please share your "reported...experiences" with the studio audience. I, for one, care to listen.
https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2011/feb/14/donald-trump/donald-trump-says-people-who-went-school-obama-nev/
I smell a whiff of ok Boomer?
If so: Hilarious, since Millennials have so enthusiastically embraced their role as cheaper and more compliant replacements for government officials who develop scruples.
If not, carry on.
Harsh but wholly accurate.
It's almost as if there were such a thing as human nature? huh
My response was "What a fucking disappointment." The end. Who are these sad people who make politicians into their romantic super heroes? Some people haven't addressed their misplaced lovesickness for Sanders and AOC yet, either. It's politics as entertainment, as Matt has written about.
Same. And I knew better to start with. I had worked on Kucinich's campaign. Now? You couldn't pay me to vote for a Democrat.
even Kucinich? What about Tulsi? Nader? Grayson? Buttar?
Right now, as Jimmy Dore likes to say, The Squad could bring the House to its knees. But they choose to play nice with Queen Pelosi. Why? Because all they care about is power and being re-elected.
I am in Maxine Waters’ district and I have written to her many times. Never a letter back. They can ignore the common man who are not writing big checks.
Almost ALL corrupt political whores.
I get answers back from my Congressmen all the time. They are completely empty of any information. You should consider yourself lucky.
form responses loosely affiliated with what you’ve written them about. the fact of the matter is they really don’t care about you or me.
my wish is that in the midterms, everybody just decides to vote out all incumbents, cause havoc on the hill and maybe we’ll start to see representatives actually listening to us, but probably not.
Hope springs eternal. I've been there and done that.
Who are the good guys we're suppose to vote for?
I was going to say something like this.
My grandfather got a form response back from JFK when he was a Senator. I keep it just for nostalgia value.
Hate them all. Fuck the Democrats. Twice.
And Republicans. I supported Kasich yet his underlings put the knife in my back. But they all get rich.
The few small glimmers of hope I get in life come from "left" and "right" commentators talking to each other here and acknowledging we all hang together.
MT's a journalist; his job is to shine the the light. He's not a politician; it's not his job to "fix shit." That's up to us.
Kucinich and Tulsi are still good in my book, the rest can go to hell.
Tulsi just came out with anti-censorship video. She is slowly recovering in my eyes after the "sorta endorsing Biden" betrayal.
I was in love with Tulsi politically until the Biden endorsement. Unemployed, donated to her many, many times. But she's been dead to me ever since and, ultimately, proves that EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THESE POLS has a price. Even the Tulsis. Even the Lincolns and Kennedys. The price is Silver. Or Lead. The ancien regime is just irredeemably corrupt and I leave it with Thomas Jefferson: "The Tree of Liberty must from time to time be watered by the blood of Patriots and Tyrants."
If Gabbard's error there makes her an outcast untouchable, I wonder:
where do you go? with whom are you left?
My understanding is that the Biden "endorsement" was perfunctory, the one thing standing between living to fight another day and being financially/legally/etc. destroyed. You know, the way they are now doing to Trump and co.
The Tree is incredibly thirsty today.
Please keep your guns in the gun rack and don’t attempt to hang or threaten politicians or anyone else. That Jeffersonian quote is being used far too often for my liking.
Sadly, I think you are right. The rot is just too deep, and there are no negative feedbacks in the control loop to self-correct the US political system to even keel. Few (somewhat) bright spots here and there won't change much, and even those are tarnished, like Tulsi.
FWIW: Tulsi's brother posted on FB that Bernie turned her endorsement down.
Given all we learned about Bernie, I have no doubts he is right. Still, doesn't excuse endorsing Biden. Really nothing does in my opinion. Was is a lapse of judgment? Blackmail from DNC? If the latter she should have exposed that, but I also understand that it is easy to criticize from sidelines when in reality we cannot even imagine all the ways the queen of warmongers can ruin your life and career, and of the people near and dear.
Please reconsider Buttar.
He got framed. Gloria Berry explains. (You might want to research it more, don't take my word for it.)
https://gloriaberry.substack.com/p/white-supremacy-in-san-francisco
Quite the story there, but yeah, he seems to have gotten a raw deal.
Really ? why are you looking for saviours-- get the US break up over and focus on your local/regional areas. Stop trying to save a dying system.
The Soviets lasted about two years after Afghanistan. I give the US that long. At maximum.
I agree with your sentiments, but I think the timeframe is a tough call. However, things that grow fast, die fast. This is almost a constant in the natural world, and relative to history, what we call America happened very fast.
There's a flower that blooms from a cactus in Hawaii called Night Blooming Cereus. The cactus is ugly, thorny, and spindly all year, then on a perfect full-moon night, it blooms an extraordinary flower...you can watch it bloom. Before the sun comes up, the flower is already withered and dying. That's America...and it has bloomed. Now we have to watch it die.
An interesting proposal. You might be very, very right.
Of course, that opens up a completely new line of debate. I'm willing to accept that Obama is the emperor (Nero) who fiddled while Rome (USA) burned.
I acknowledge that I am no longer proud to be an American, and that I really despise those stupid enough to sing that stupid song.
I am in SoCal and I am refusing the jab. I am a retired R.N. who worked my ass off for forty years. I used to like going out to dinner but the LA City Council just passed a resolution where only the vaccinated can eat out or shop etc.
So I decided to move back to Ohio in the fall but then today I see where the Biden admin. is seriously considering no fly lists and a ban on Interstate travel for the unvaxxed.
But my tax dollars will allow thousands of illegal aliens to come into the US and be flown and bused all over the country with no jabs!
And Bill Gates says our SS benefits should be stopped if we refuse the experimental jab. Money I earned breaking my back!
Damn! I never dreamed this country could go full Woke Gestapo (Democrats!) in a few short months.
Beyond depressing.
Instead of a procession of decrepit, old men and a rapid succession of state funerals we’re getting con man after con man.
The pressures will increase until it’s too little, too late.
“I’m proud to be un-American”
Holy shit, I think you're onto something, Phisto.
We see the pillars of our system already being knocked down. The Constitution in shreds. The gov't being unable to fulfill its first duty: to provide for the welfare of the people. The decay though will be masked constantly by all of the media, who still have ads to sell.
I agree w/ your take; I think it'll be 3-5 'regions' too. I see it happening after the dollar takes a major hit and Wall St becomes irrelevant. It won't be pretty, but I think it's inevitable. Phisto sez 2 years, I was thinking about 5 but I think he's right. Post midterms it's gonna get UGLY.
What am I trying to save?
I am a nihilist when it comes to politics, but every once in a while I want to hold out at least "some hope".
I guess you missed that I voted for the American Shopping Party last election.
The two parties are theater for the masses. They are the same. Two heads of the Hydra.
Nader - 3rd party - the rest Ds
Yes, Buttar is a Democrat trying to unseat Pelosi. Isn't it important to understand the "playing field" he is on? The CA primaries are now rigged for "top-two". I support Buttar. I understand your skepticism.
Without election integrity all else is futile. Yet, we don't hear much honest discussion about that. Why?
Well, I hear what you're saying and don't disagree.
Why? I donno. I certainly bring it up all the time.
I get it - Pelosi is a schmuck - but, since what happened with Kucinich; I don't think there is any point in electing progressive Ds, if that is what (s)he is - it seems to me this top two thing sucks - do you like it, who decided that? (I live in NY)
What will happen when Warden Newsom gets recalled on September 14th and Larry Elder becomes governor?
You wanna see Democrat heads exploding?! Teachers unions and on and on.
It. Could. Happen.
This isn't a Tucker endorsement (I like the guy), but he had an interesting interview with Kucinich recently. Worth watching.
Huh. No kidding? I’m from his district.
Meaning you've lost faith in Kucinich or something else. Should I not support his effort to become mayor?
Just making an observation is all.
Yes because that's worked so well - lol
Dee, saw the same thing. When Obama didn't create healthcare for all the first day of office and then chose his cabinet, I knew I'd been duped. He could have been the best and, in my mind, turned into the worst. Always thought Michelle was smarter than her husband, but, no, she didn't influence him into being a better president, not for a moment. Thanks for a great and needed article, Matt.
No way is Michelle smarter than Barack - she couldn't make it as a lawyer which is why she became a 'diversity officer' at a Chicago hospital making $125K a year UNTIL Barack landed some federal $$$ for the said hospital and they in turn shoved Michelle's salary up to $300K plus (as reported in The New Yorker magazine circa 2009). No matter, Michelle remained angry and was never really 'proud' of her country. Both the Obamas are grifters of the highest order.
"Pride" in one's country is a condition that ideally should be extirpated by the 6th grade for any citizen in any country..
"I love my country, but I fear my government." Critical distinction my friend.
One that is essentially meaningless.
Be honest, it's how you resolve your participation in a system headed by greedy, crooked murderers.
No.
So edgy and original. Bet you have the coolest tats.
Yes plus infinity. I win! You lose! Neener neener!
And what do you think or your authoritarian country that supports your government without question regardless of their open contempt for all of us?
The government shows nothing but disgust for us every day, yet our unquestioning worship keeps them in power.
"your authoritarian country that supports your government without question"
So... you never heard of Donald Trump?
Says who?! lol
Sez ME! Touch black no talk back too!
I am not sure how anybody could think Michelle is the smart one.
This is an article on Michelle's job at the U of Chicago hospital that the McCain campaign used to criticize the Obamas. But is should have been used as an example of why we need a national health care system instead of the corrupt insurance scheme we have now. https://archives.cjr.org/campaign_desk/the_obamas_and_the_chicago_hos.php
Quadriped, I now agree with you!
She probably can't be spending energy on such tasks since she shared in interviews the pandemic put her into a low level depression. So fortunate she had two houses to fly back and forth between to help her cope.
You wanted Obama to create healthcare for all on his first day in office? Did you ever learn anything about the Legistlative Branch and its powers in school?
Yep, on his first day. On that day 86% of Americans wanted it. Obama had the wind at his back and both houses. It was the perfect time. Everyone was behind him exept the AMA, the banks, big pharma, for-profit medical. He could have swept it in. After a week, it was impossible.
I think the first luncheon Obama had as President was with Liz Fowler of AHIP (America’s Health Insurance Plans).
Done and done.
Liz Fowler - Baucus, the Sen running the hearings on health care praised her for her great contributions to the process - Baucus, who, during the hearings, when he refused to seat any M4A panelists - had some docs, yeah legitimate MDs, who stood up and protested, arrested and removed form the chamber - saying what we needed was "more police" Baucus, who was able to get M4A for his constituents in Libby MT - because of the widespread asbestos contam. there ...
I's too bad it has taken this long for Matt's piece, putting it all together, to come out ....
Liz Fowler was on Baucus staff. His laughing at arresting Dr. Margaret Flowers and other Docs for National Healthcare should have made it clear where this whole thing was headed.
He was already a member in good standing.
That 2 1/2 year stint as a community organizer was nothing but deep cover for this man who has always been more comfortable with the comfortable. Back in 2007, the recently departed Glen Ford wrote an article telling us who this man was and he was dismissed as an out of touch man stuck in the 70's. Obama was the long ago hand picked insurance policy for the establishment, the go to guy when the shit had hit the fan, as it did in 2008, and just the man needed who would lull libs to sleep even as he infuriated cons, neither seeming to notice that the polices remained the same, only the package had been changed, as meanwhile they bickered over inconsequential cultural issues.
The reason Obama was able to keep his cool for 8 years of verbal abuse is he knew the prize waiting for him; all the rest was just background noise.
Great post!
Wasn't it Adolph Reed, as well, who had a few things to say about him as well?
What I figured was that the folks who were behind the D establishment, were, shall we say, a bit nervous about Hillary as "the heir apparent" (nervous not because she wasn't "their gal" but because they doubted she could carry the electorate) - so they brought O up from the ranks, promised him backing if he played ball - Hillary, smug as she was, never saw him coming until it was too late
I have always wondered how he ended up in Illinois. Not born here, not educated here, no family here at the time of his move. Somewhere during the Tony Rezko investigations I thought I read where he had something to do with Obama choosing Illinois. Supposedly Rezko helped facilitate the acquisition of the Obama home in Chicago, among other things.
If you are successful in Chicago/Illinois politics, there's a good chance you are morally fine with doing things The Chicago Way.
He had joined before that - look at his donors, his choice of advisers, as well as his cabinet picks ... I am really not sure how anyone who was paying attention could have been fooled - methinks too many wanted to be fooled and simply suspended their disbelief ....
One of my favorite journalists, Ken Silverstein wrote "Barack Obama, Inc" for Nov 2006 Harper's Magazine. The subtitle was "The Birth of a Washington Machine."
@Wally
FDR, of course, sneaky Dem that he was, was *already a member of the aristocracy, and so felt less pressured to go in that direction. ;-D
Why not? Biden opened the floodgates of our southern border in one day.
Dems held the House and Senate in 2009. He could have at least proposed it.
As much as progressives are astounded to learn this, the Democratic Party has more than one wing.
Two wings; the only one with power being the corporate one.
When progressives are headed by people who signal they'll compromise from the get go, while people like Manchin, Tester, Sinema draw a line in the sand and mean it, the outcome is preordained.
The Squad are grandstanders and everyone knows it.
Keep talking. I need a warm place to shit right now and it’s probably the best use of your mouth.
+1 astounded progressive
Medicare got done in about a year. So all of his feigned lack of agency and being a hostage to a system is revisionist bullshit. He’s just a petulant, lazy child who doesn’t governing.
He went a long way in validating many of the stereotypes people have of blacks.
Intelligence and dignity? Ability to deal with birtherism without losing his shit? That sort of racial stereotype?
Which stereotypes do you speak of?
I suspect when Obama showed up asking for "change," EM grabbed his wallet and crossed the street.
Yes.
On that first day, he could have declared that's what he was going to do and hell awaited anyone in HIS party that didn't go along with it.
Would've cemented his place next to Jefferson, Abe and FDR.
Instead, he went for the self-aggrandizing money post-governing.
As bad as fucking Reagan in the Bad President Sweepstakes... Jr. still leads that one.
Personel is policy. You knew Obama was a fraud when he named Larry Summers and Michael Froman to his cabinet. Not in retrospect surprising from a guy whose whole schtick was being the first black president of the Harvard Law Review.
@MarkS
Not since St. Ronnie gutted public grade schools beginning in 1980 of what used to be called Sixth Grade "Civics" classes. Caused Sandra Day O'Connor to start teaching her *own Civics classes to kids after her stint on the Supreme Court.
He abandoned M4A in the primaries - "Yeah, it would be nice if we were starting from scratch, but we have to work with what we have" - that did it for me, and then I paid more attention - noted who was funding him - and a cascade of other things - I said I realized it would be hard to explain, as "progressive" why I was supporting that old white guy Nader, over the young charismatic black fellow - to me, it was a no brainer ...
"When Obama didn't create healthcare for all the first day of office"
Were you under the presumption that he was a dictator and not a president?
Rather Crumudgeonly,
See my comment below. Obama had the world in his pocket and quickly threw it all away.
So at best he would have his compatriots in Congress propose such legislation, and as the normal course of things happen, it would be weeks and months before it would emerge. The only way DAY ONE creation would happen would be by diktat.
The Democratic party was far from unified on UHC - in any form (and there is indeed more than the NHS as a model).
That for-profit medical includes most healthcare professionals who aren't keen to be conscripts to the ill-considered fantasies of over-promising politicians.
Lecture more. I learn so much from lying retards.
I'm sure you do.
Conyers already had a 26 page bill for Medicare for All.
With all that world in his pocket, there was no room for the big bucks.
That birthday party suggests otherwise.
Methinks you don't understand the world very well.
12 million dollar mansion in Martha's Vineyard.
You beat me to this slow pitch, damn you!
I’m the fastest snark on the Stack!
Wow. So wonderful to find people that saw those events as I did.
One area Matt missed out on regarding Michael Froman, was that it was he who gave a list of "suggested" cabinet positions to Tony Podesta, the head of Obama's transition team; all but three of them were eventually appointed by Obama.
Froman later became the US negotiator, appointed by Obama, to represent the US in the TPP deal. A further point is that Obama did not even wait for Congress to give him Trade Promotion Authority to begin those negotiations, which, under that format, leave Congress with no role, other than to vote the finished package an up or down vote, and this includes dumping the Senate's beloved tradition of the filibuster.
I always ask libs I know, who still defend Obama to this day, and who insist it was only Repub intransigence that kept their hero from delivering a progressive wet dream to all, if that were so, then why did his hand picked negotiator, with no input from Congress, deliver such a corporate wet dream with zero influence from Congress and thus the Repubs in it?
The answer I would get was like the one I'd get when I'd ask Hillary supporters what was the last use of the US military she opposed?
Silence.
The only way out of this mess is to totally reject the so called two party system and con men like Trump who use our justified anger at it to advance their own agenda and vote third party, a long process, but one that is our only hope.
Until then, we're stuck thinking that con men like Obama and Bill Clinton, who cash in after they leave office, or Trump, who did it while still president, offer some distinction one from the other.
All are scavengers, and they are eating our country alive.
Those are good questions and I agree with all of it.
No, it didn't appear that the nation had turned a corner; it appeared that a bunch of people were hoodwinked by yet another politician. Obama was plainly a politician from the start. It's just that you all were too blinded by the crappiness of Bush, with his advisors who were the closest group to evil personified since the Nazis, and the horrible Iraq War.
I never understood why it wasn't called Bushcare, because Obama had nothing to do with Bush doing such a crappy job as to give the Dems a 60-40 Senate majority in order to pass it. Bush was the biggest threat to world peace in 2003, resulting in Obama getting a "you're not Bush" Nobel Peace Prize in 2008 before doing anything, and then keeping Gitmo open and all the Wars rolling. And we wonder how Trump got elected? It was just people realizing they'd rather be told the truth about policies and lied to about crowd sizes than have promises broken by a media darling again.
Substack Commenter 34,
I had a sign in my car window when Bush was president: "Worst President Ever."
Little did I know when Obama was first elected that I would have to drag it out again.
Democracy has the good characteristic of allowing us to get rid of a crappy leader in a relatively short time, but it hasn't solved the problem of picking crappy leaders one after the other in its current incarnation.
Problem is, they only give us crappy choices. And what do we do about Nancy and Mitch, name any number, as in Pres. Biden. They have not been there for a short period of time. Don't get me wrong. Democracy best. We need to fix the corrosion, just how.
I'm right there with you. Matt's piece here makes plain the way the current system picks crappy leaders in league with corporate forces. Many people want to go far towards socialism to solve that problem, but this piece supports that it's simply the case that capitalist democracy needs a tweak, not to be thrown out with the bathwater.
What we have is a voting process that is mostly democratic, but a governing process that is completely controlled by monied interests, regardless of party. That is not a democracy, or more precisely a democratic republic, but a plutocracy posing as one.
Try calling up one of your so called representatives and see how much time you're allotted with that 23 year old intern/aide and then compare that with the face to face time, unlimited, that corporate interests have with the actual politician, and that will answer why we have what we have.
When a Supreme Court judge can say with a straight face that money contributions have no impact on how politicians vote, we are being told things that both we and they know are false.
You have a good job.
Using a lottery system to choose leaders, like the ancient Greeks. Democracy doesn't need voting.
Nah, there's no "vote of no confidence" like there is in a parliamentary system. Presidents are in for 4 years no matter what they do, with rare exception. The Democrats pretended to want to impeach Trump, but they didn't really.
They don't really want him to go to jail, either.
That's why MSM (i.e. Democrats) brought him back as the permanent Republican punching bag. And they'll keep pushing him back on stage, forever. He radically energizes their half of the country into deranged hate.
If Republicans (the rank-and-file that is) were smart, they'd admit he failed his promises (i.e. failed to be willing to sacrifice everything for this cause); do everything they could to find a much better rebel (seasoned politically, in some way; knows when to speak and about what and how to deliver it; etc.)
And now under Biden, all of the neocons have been on-boarded. It's one big party, with two identity clubs, controlled by mobster gangs who periodically unite to rape and pillage different parts of the population.
That’s pretty good.
I appreciate it but any ideas about what we do about it all?
I'll cop to not having any good ideas politically. It's monumental...an inflection point, as the SmartPeople™ like to say. I'm open to suggestions. In the meantime, I work on my building and grow vegetables.
I didn't mean to put it on your shoulders! Glad to have likeminded souls to commiserate with.
You didn't put anything on my shoulders. I get cranked up occasionally and wrangle on the interweb, but it's just steam. We live in the country club of the world; my problems are picayune compared to most of humanity.
If I actually had to subsist on the vegetables I grow, I would be in bad trouble. I hope you are doing a little better.
You won't do anything. From here on you should consider what will be done to you, because Americans have no say in how the nation is run. This is the greatest delusion of all: That things like voting and attending town halls matter. Voting is the opiate of the masses. What will be done to you and me will be determined in corporate boardrooms and by the thugs that surround the coming American Fuhrer or People's Kommissar.
"All" is a tall order. For the time being, I'm hunkered down, watching, and figuring.
I wasn't in Grant Park, but I did shed a few tears--proud that the American people could elect a black president to bring (((CHANGE)))! Everything went down hill from there. The fact that he was a conman was not our fault, perhaps. But not facing up to who he really is, is our fault.
I don't really think of him as a conman. He might've been doing the best he could given his knowledge of all things political/governmental. He just wasn't nearly knowledgeable enough.
I felt the same way when Trump started naming Goldman Sachs alumni to his administration before taking office after the election. Good feeling gone a week after the election.
😢
Don't feel bad. Democrats love beating their chests in self glorification of their own magnanimous, airbag virtue.
He seems to be kind of missing the whole point of this blog, doesn't he?
He didn't produce any evidence. Pot and Kettle.
I told him he's preaching to the choir.
Well it turned out that much of what he said was the truth.
1. No Russian Bounties
2. No Fire extinguisher attack
3. No Russian Interference
4. Biden DID the Quid Pro Quo for $1B to have the Ukraine PG fired for investigating Burisma.
5. China COVID epicenter: like Jon Stewart declared Bat Virus coming from Wuhan Lab is similar to “an outbreak of chocolatey goodness near Hershey, Pennsylvania” you can safely assume “it’s the fucking chocolate factory,”
6. Lowering Interest rates would create more commerce - housing starts at 13 year high.
7. FALSE POSITIVE TEAST At 0.1% prevalence, the PPV would only be 4%, meaning that 96 out of 100 positive results would be false positives. Health care providers should take the local prevalence into consideration when …
https://www.fda.gov/medical-devices/letters-health-care-providers/potential-false-positive-results-antigen-tests-rapid-detection-sars-cov-2-letter-clinical-laboratory
8. CDC Director: ‘I Think You’re Correct’ About Inflated COVID Death Statistics. Hospitals Counted Heart Attacks as COVID-19 Deaths.
https://www.cnsnews.com/article/washington/melanie-arter/cdc-director-i-think-youre-correct-about-inflated-covid-death,
9. Did not pay for dirt on Hillary. She paid a spy for dirt on Trump.
10. The COVID Vaccine has skipped the last step in the Clinical Trials. There should be NO mandates till the trials are finished but Biden is going to fire the head of the FDA and put in his own man so he can start PASS PORTS and PENALTIES.
And notice there is no push for finger stick antibody screenings for Covid plus T and B cells. Cleveland Clinic did a study finding natural immunity is likely lifelong.
They would rather shove swabs into our brains and our kids brains and likely soon they will charge us for THAT privilege!
@placeholder
You are at least *half correct in that observation ! It IS all about Kabuki Theater. ;-D And Trump did "make no bones", etc.
That's why Matt did the whole dissertation on how bad the US media is. You should read it.
Whatever anyone thinks of Trump, this was the main effect of his presidency: The veil dropped. The truth is now obvious. We have a permanent, uniparty ruling class in this country. Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer play for the same team. If you can't see it now, you're really not trying.
I’m in Chicago, and yeah, I saw the same charade.
I, too, was living in Chicago in '08. I was thrilled we elected (not me) our first Black President. What a beautiful family! But while living there, I saw what happened to Jack Ryan in the 2004 IL senatorial race against Obama. I actually knew Ryan's brother. Obama's team convinced a judge to unseal divorce documents exposing personal marital details in order to ruin what was otherwise a "clean" candidate. Jack Ryan has an autistic son---but that was irrelevant to ruining at all costs. I lived in Chicago and the suburbs for more than 30 years. The "community organize"r was actually a hit man (of sorts) and no one within his sights is untouchable. Chicago politics is notorious for very good reason!
Ryan was Obama's opponent in the general. Ryan had been married to the actress Jeri Ryan, and Obama got a judge to unseal sealed divorce documents that included her accusations against him--which were really no big deal but got played as if they were and Ryan dropped out over a weekend. The State GOP having no back-up, recruited Alan Keyes from Maryland, just to have someone on the ticket, and, predictably, he was crushed. He had done the same thing in that year's Democratic primary against an investment banker, Blair Hull. It was Obama' go-to tactic that year--if he couldn't disqualify the nominating petition as he had done to Mary Flowers in his first run for State Senate, get sealed court records opened up, and it was Daley connections that got the judges to do what they shouldn't have done--unseal sealed court records for no compelling reason.
Given the national situation in 2008 and the lameness of Mitt Romney in 2012, arguably Obama never won a tough election. Bobby Rush crushed him when he ran for Rush's Congressional seat in 2000.
He was never anything close to what he pretended to be--heck, he wasn't even descended form slaves like most African-Americans. His white mother was descended for the original Massachusetts Bay colonists, and his Black father was a tribal prince from Kenya brought over by the government to study here because he might be a bigshot one day. (Turned out not to be.)
Obama never showed any loyalty to American Blacks or progressives beyond what he did to get elected and maintain a false reputation. He and Michelle met through her Daley connections, which also got him his virtually no-show jobs as a U of C lecturer and associate at Davis-Miner law firm where he did work for Tony Rezko (who got them a super sweet deal on the side lot at their Hyde Park mansion)--and they always knew o whom they owed their careers--and probably who had information that could hurt them.
And now he even pissed on his long-time political allies like David Axelrod, to hobnob with people like Beyonce, instead.
His daughters seem nice and that is a big thing, but otherwise he is a pretty repellant person.
His mentor was Valerie Jarrett, a razor sharp real estate exec tied into Rezko and every other hard edge in the super development surge in the 90's and into the 21st century, and was about as connected throughout Chicago as any one individual coming from the bottom up can be. There was a reason she went with him to DC; she's as shrewd as there is, and he knew it.
I worked for Valerie for several years in the early-to-mid 1990s--about 3 levels down the org chart. I didn't see her every day, maybe about once or twice a month on average. Very sharp.
She was an attorney in the City Corporation Counsel's Office, and then Commissioner of Planning before she went to Habitat and became a developer. Pretty typical career path in Chicago, except she linked up with a President-to-be.
I love it when the real Chicago heads come out to play.
Chicago is easily much worse than the worst anyone has written or thought of it. Whatever you've read, figure it's worse. But it's a surprisingly vibrant and active city with major development that's working; it's not Detroit by a very long shot.
My Serbian American friend at a little Catholic college up in WI was expelled twice for poor grades and allowed to return because his dad was connected to Chicago alderman "Fast Eddie" Verdolyak in Chicago. The cavern of corruption goes to the craziest places. I think the third time was just too much!
I lived in Detroit for 3 years and loved it. Great rock-'n'-roll scene -- real fin-de-siècle vibes. People party hard when there's no tomorrow.
Plus the rent was cheap.
All true.
Not black enough for you, eh?
I don't care all that much, but not as black as he pretended to be.
Excellent. Thanks.
He wasn’t even a community organizer. That was another con. He opened an office and made sounds like an organizer, but didn’t do squat and took his first chance to get out of 83rd and Harvey.
Everything about BO is manufactured and fake. He's a CIA construction.
I don't go that far. He's a very competent liar and self promoter. He didn't need the CIA.
No one does what he did on their own. That's ludicrous.
Way too much coinkydink for me. https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2012/07/04/barack-obama-his-mother-and-the-cia/
OK, that's mildly compelling. Anything is possible.
His family is CIA. People need to wake up and understand that no one gets into office that isn't controlled by the deep state. Trump, included.
I don't doubt that Trump was allowed to win the R nomination, but he was not supposed to to win the election. If he was controlled why not have him throw it? The deep state was a thorn in his side the entire 4 years he was in office, are you suggesting that was a ruse?
After several years, his only accomplishment was setting up one get-out-the-vote drive. But the press never called him on it
I wish Obama had deployed the same kind of ruthlessness against the GOP. Unfortunately he shared too many of their beliefs, as we now can see
The only belief he held was in his own advancement into celebrity and money.
Yes. Would a true statesman throw a lavish million dollar birthday bash for himself, and invite celebrities rather than statesmen/women and those who helped get him to where he is? He's a piece of absolute garbage.
He was trained by the best in propaganda. And suckered you all.
Oh, he was a gift though. Look how many eyes have been opened, and how easy it is now to identify eyes still closed.
You were living in Chicago in 2008, but I would wager you either were not a long-time Chicagoan or were not paying attention, because those of us who were, knew that Obama was above all a product of the Daley Machine, and people with that background ALWAYS remember where their true loyalty lies.
The Chicago Way is a thing.
Yes indeed. I had been living in CA for 12 years by then, but I was a Chicagoan and I didn't know anything about Obummer but my dad (a lifelong Democrat) sure did. He voted for Nader.
what about the Pritzker's?
Part of the Cook County/Chicago Democratic Party money machine. A big part, they have their place and when they speak people listen. And when someone needs a job outside of govt, the kid of people who can deliver.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjOPLTTjnwc The Chicago Way (Obama didn't figure this out)
Oh yeah, Adolph Reed nailed Obama back in 1996 (I think that was the year). Paul Street of Chicago was also on the hunt.
Don’t forget his support of telecom immunity post-Snowden. That was my first clue something was amiss.
Same here. He also flipped on campaign finance once he became the candidate.
I misremembered. Obama supported immunity after the Bush stuff which was before Snowden.
“Me too” and have come under lots of fire for despising Obama and HRC who aided and abetted the rise of the orange wonder elected per our convoluted undemocratic process in 2016. I’ll go on record as voting for them while holding my nose. Will go on record that M Williamson was the only honest primary contender in 2020.
It was Tulsi Gabbard. She scared the PTB so much that immediately lies about her began to spread, same as they did with Jill Stein. Notice how easily Americans fall into believing lies? If they hear them a few time, voila, it's the truth.
Gabbard is a saint. Watching the machine slander her and delete her website post-debate was a kidney punch. Her take down of Kamala was priceless.
I had a similar feeling for Jim Webb a couple cycles ago, though his party seemed to not even notice him.
Yup, people forget about Webb-he was a D candidate who didn’t make me barf on instinct.
It is funny that people with actual military experience -- as opposed to faux military experience or none at all -- tend not to make it to the semifinals, much less the finals, in the D and R circuses.
The wondrous thing is that those with actual time in the military seem to be slandered as u patriotic or cowardly while the draft dodgers make a virtue of their fealty to God and country. It is puzzling and astonishing to behold.
In the same way, you can preach hope and change while shovelling sacks of government gold into the hands of those who treasure the status quo.
The Founding Fathers were right-standing, corporatized armies are a bad thing and inculcate a bad mentality into the populace. America will always support combat veterans, but training corporate killers with nowhere necessary to go isn’t a good thing.
I’m generally of a mindset that a strong navy is of far more importance than a massive army-and it’s accompanying corportiz d bureaucracy.
Yes. Stand corrected although Williamson was honest. Recall now that Gabbard was accused of being a Russian operative or dupe or some such HRC nonsense
Hillary led the charge against Tulsi hurling the ludicrous "Russian spy" accusations.
"Asset." Russian "asset." Please give Hillary credit for performatively cosplaying a Langley bureau chief.
I stand corrected. :)
Sick and tired,
Tulsi was accused of "liking" Bashar al Assad; Jill Stein was accused of being a Russian operative. One could almost know for whom to vote by the accusations against that person.
Obama spent three hours talking Sanders into stepping aside; Bernie should have stayed in. He was the one who could beat Trump, not Hillary. When Obama and Hillary ran against each other, Kucinish was shoved way off to the side, while they took front and center. Yet, when Dennis spoke, he was the one who made perfect sense. It was a terrible thing when the League of Women Voters got kicked out of running the presidential debates.
Non-important point: The LWV refused to be party to a 'debate' in which the questions were supplied ahead of time to the candidates.
League Refuses to "Help Perpetrate a Fraud"
WASHINGTON, DC —"The League of Women Voters is withdrawing its sponsorship of the presidential debate scheduled for mid-October because the demands of the two campaign organizations would perpetrate a fraud on the American voter," League President Nancy M. Neuman said today.
"It has become clear to us that the candidates' organizations aim to add debates to their list of campaign-trail charades devoid of substance, spontaneity and honest answers to tough questions," Neuman said. "The League has no intention of becoming an accessory to the hoodwinking of the American public."
Neuman said that the campaigns presented the League with their debate agreement on
September 28, two weeks before the scheduled debate. The campaigns' agreement was negotiated "behind closed doors" and vas presented to the League as "a done deal," she said, its 16 pages of conditions not subject to negotiation.
Most objectionable to the League, Neuman said, were conditions in the agreement that gave the campaigns unprecedented control over the proceedings. Neuman called "outrageous" the campaigns' demands that they control the selection of questioners, the composition of the audience, hall access for the press and other issues.
https://www.lwv.org/newsroom/press-releases/league-refuses-help-perpetrate-fraud
Simulation Commander,
Thanks for posting this. I remember it well. Everyone should know this background.
Wasn't there something about part of that fraud being the elimination of third party candidates from the debates? The corrupt CPD that took it over from the LWV essentially just allowed R and D candidates.
Wow! Thanks for this!
I did a bit of googling- a HRC spokesperson said of Gabbard if the “nesting dolls” fit. Quite frankly I’d be inclined to favor a candidate who didn’t want to sanction or bomb my country to death
Any movement built around a person is going to be vulnerable. For a reform movement to work it needs to be a thing people want in and of itself, regardless of leadership so that it can survive successful smear campaigns against any of its leaders or members. It needs to be about the movements goals, not about good v. bad people.
Even the most anti-celebrity, non-egotistical leader we've seen recently, Corbyn, was successfully kneecapped despite already being party leader.
Obama helped nudge Sanders to the sidelines in part because he had some affinity for Sanders. And to save him from being mangled. And he would have been mangled. Perhaps not as badly as Trump was mangled, but mangled nonetheless. The Omegas ultimately don't cater to any breed of Delta misfits, whether they be dotty Vermont socialists, or loudmouth New York real estate barons. The sanctity of the fraternity must be preserved.
What a shame that a few bad apples have to spoil a good time for everybody by breaking the rules.
Yeah. I stayed up late to watch her announcement live on FB. First time I ever donate to a presidential campaign and I don't regret it. She's not perfect, but man oh man is she principled.
Jim M,
Thanks for your comment.
I didn't vote for Clinton or Trump. I voted for Gabbard, writing her in in the last presidential election. I vote for the person I think best (even when s/he has been kicked out by the Dems and Repubs who are determined never to let a good person win).
Even before the election, Obama announced that Geithner and Summers were on his economic advisory team. The day he announced that, the Dow Jones went up more than 600 points. Wall Street traders knew what we all later found out to be true: Santa Claus is back in town.
Obama was possibly one of the greatest frauds foisted on America. Were there to have even been a remotely genuine picture of Obama painted, the following fun facts would have been included:
-This is a guy who sat with his CIA chief John Brennan every Tuesday and went over a "kill list" where Obama was a defacto judge, jury and executioner, often ordering drone attacks that resulted in many innocent victims, including bombing crowds at weddings. That's actually the kind of guy we're talking about here
-Obama, along with the help of the French, ordered the assassination of the Libyan head of state, overthrew the government of one of the most prosperous African nations. Open slave markets filled with Africans followed.
-The majority of the 16 Trillion dollar bailouts of the Wall Street and European banks happened under Obama. There was a bill in both the House and Senate to re-instate Glass-Steagall, break up the banks, and cancel the toxic debts. In that case, Americans would not have had to pay for the purchase of trillions of toxic paper, and could have had a real massive infrastructure and rebuilding program. Obama and his team tried did everything to prevent the bill from advancing and instead forced all of America to foot the bill for Wall Streets totally worthless financial paper.
Because of that, we're now looking at an even more epic financial bubble. However, thanks the Obama's Dodd-Frank financial "reform," Title II of Dodd-Frank authorizes bank "bail-ins" where financial institutions can directly seize depositor accounts, and yes, depositors would also be responsible for covering derivatives contracts:
"As unsecured creditors, depositors and bondholders are subordinated to derivative claims. Derivatives are the investments that banks make among each other, which are supposed to be used to hedge their portfolios. However, the 25 largest banks hold more than $247 trillion in derivatives, which poses a tremendous amount of risk to the financial system. To avoid a potential calamity, the Dodd-Frank Act gives preference to derivative claims."
-https://www.investopedia.com/articles/markets-economy/090716/why-bank-bailins-will-be-new-bailouts.asp
As the bubble pops, all the financial wizards and heads of the zombie banking system will tell us there is no alternative, the worthless debts have to be paid, or else the whole system will crash. It's a lie. Hopefully people don't fall for it. We need an orderly bankruptcy re-organization and bank separation.
In the financial crisis, the bondholders needed to take the pain of the defaults, even though that would have had severe consequences for large public investors like pension funds and thus pensioners. Although it would have been painful, it would have reset debt levels to something sustainable. What Obama did by bailing out the bond holders is the same thing Biden is doing by extending eviction moratoriums (moratoria?) — kicked the can down the road and creating a much larger problem in the end.
I would have been happy to deal with the “severe consequences” if a few of the people responsible would have gone to prison. The fact that nobody did disgusts me as much as the crimes themselves.
I think it's important to remember it's government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Before the Renaissance, nations didn't really exist. Europe was just a collection of "regions" run by a small hereditary ruling class. If your parents were serfs, you were a serf, and that was pretty much it.
Despite this disgusting oligarchical system of organization, creative individuals got together and actually overthrew that system, because it was inherently rotten and evil.
I think those who have usurped government power need to be reminded that it's not actually their government, and they can be removed, regardless of how secure they believe their hold on power to be. If nations collapse and governments collapse, you have no more international trade, no more international law, no more basic rights. It just becomes feudalism again, with small isolated communities, subsistence farming and agrarian societies. This is actually what the reigning oligarchical class prefers. It becomes infinitely easier to control and manipulate when everything is fragmented and isolated. It has taken the insidious financial parasites of Wall Street, the City of London, and that whole merchant banking class a long time to actually penetrate nations and usurp power to the point we see today.
I think it's a mistake to believe they have everything in the bag and now just need to all break off into local feudal-type economies. In fact, those in power would probably like that to be the perception, because it would mean people no longer believe in representative government, or their ability to self-govern. These were fundamental and revolutionary concepts which got us out of the dark ages, and were cemented with the Renaissance, the Wesphalian system, and later the American revolution.
One could argue that much of the arc of world history since that time has been an attempt to turn the clock back, and to bring us back under a feudal-type system of organization. Now it's just 21st century feudalism, "technocratic feudalism." They call it the "Great Reset."
I think it's important to have this broader historical process in mind if we're to really situate where we are today, and what's the actual best way to transcend the current doomed system.
A Sweeping History of the Great Reset (NOT the BBC with Matt Ehret)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHtfqrydZzU
The Great Reset Fraud:
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/07/15/the-great-reset-fraud/
@Dave Gosselin
"I think it's important to remember it's government of the people, by the people, and for the people."
That is certainly the *ideal, but like most ideals, rarely put into actual practice.
The two party system has long offered a faux choice between Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum for ages. It makes the peasants *feel that they are part of the system, and usually prevents them from picking up pikes and charging the Capitol. They are to rationalize, "well, my guy didn't win THIS time, but just you wait four more years, and *then we'll show 'em." The Wizards behind the Curtain, with their Citizens United Laws making Corporations "people" under the law, and outright bribery, ah... I mean, MONEY "Political Free Speech" have long since *so badly bastardized the quaint notion saying "of, by and *for the people" to the *reality: "of, for, and by Global Corporations" as to obviate and extirpate the original "ideal".
I just don't think that this quote, as true today as when it was written, *can be shared *too often:
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free" ― Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
Well, after reading these comments, We The People are 330MM strong, of which 200MM or so would outnumber even the multi million members of the federal government. Strength in numbers.
Moratoria is correct.
As a former bond trader, the desecration of the written laws of bond indentures takes away the assumed protections have of lending capital within our markets. Whether it be the giveaway of assets to the UAW in the GM imbroglio or the Puerto Rico Tax Receipt haircut, it destroys confidence in the Capital Markets that were the envy of the entire globe...and nobody gives any care. We are taking our strongest strengths and blowing them off as if they are not important....it is lunacy. Next we will be destroying the municipal bond market as the idiots we elect ignore the clearly written legal protections for lenders to get the far more numerous state pension holders their $$ though it doesnt fit the narrative. I get it, the average state worker didnt plan on having their pension swiped because dumb politicians sold the farm with no plan to pay it back. But cant we agree that there should be some reform from letting these folks make promises they can mathematically keep? Always screwing up and playing the heart strings of the electorate later doesn't cut it?
solid comment, thx
I don't know what this comment is about. There is no 'law of bond indentures' which I wrote many of during a long legal career. There is the law of the bankruptcy code which will determine your haircut if you invest in bonds your debtor can't pay. One of the blessings of American law is a forgiving bankruptcy system for debtors, why we threw out the British and their debtor prisons. Do you propose we bring them back? Behind every dumb borrower is an even dumber lender.
EDITS: "they can't keep" No '?" in last sentence
Brilliant summary! No morals, ethics or values. Just a perfect black/white face to make Americans think they were progressive forward looking people. Now Biden. Start to look forward to see what will replace the very broken (for a very long time held by tape ) system. Think local and regional. Set up alternative structures and systems. Move private-- dont depend on any level of govt.
If history tell us anything, it’s that Wall Street banks own the US government.
No, not the Wall Street Banks; the OWNERS of the Wall Street banks, and the London banks, and the Singapore banks, etc. Anyone who can't see that the capitalist-imperial governments are ruled by the owners of banks and investment houses is blind, blind, blind.
Of course it’s the owners. But who exactly.
@Geowhizz
Along with Global Corporations by this time, yes.
Dave, you should write with Taibbi.
Excellent! This is the stuff that most Americans apparently find it difficult to hold in memory for more than two day—if they ever realized what was going on it in the first place. And so the country is where it is today, and will be until the final collapse. I think that Obama's sole accomplishment was being elected while black—well . . . sort of black.
Well said. Makes my head hurt and my stomach churn.
bitcoin is the revolution you're looking for.
they can't print more of it, they can't seize it from you.
Like all money, bitcoin is made up out of nothing. The reason the dollar is more substantial (where "substantial" hardly means "strong") is because it is backed by the "full faith and credit" of the government and it is "legal tender". Bitcoin will never be "legal tender" -- which is actually a film-flam term, but does have some relevance as long as we all continue to believe that there is a reason for "money" to exist. It is just a mass hysterical dream that has been useful for thousands of years, but if we really thought about it, would just fall apart. We hold on to that fantasy because we have no alternative.
What wouldn’t fall apart if we really thought about it? That’s what I want to know.
apparently Obama's support among certain types of people...
You can ride the dollar all the way to zero if you want.
Yep, and you can have the same experience with bitcoin.
Seriously, give me a reason bitcoin is more "concrete" than the dollar -- for that matter gold.
As for not being able to seize bitcoin from you -- wanna bet?
The value of bitcoin will never be zero because permissionless transfer of wealth has value. Hopefully the reason for this is obvious but if not I can explain.
The politicians and the fed are GOING to inflate the currency. (IMO) It's a 100% certainty. When they do, that hurts the value of your savings and labor. Why would I have my savings in a currency that's losing its value? You want savings to GROW, and 0.5% on your money isn't cutting it.
This brings us back to permissionless transfer of wealth. I don't need a bank. I don't need blessing of anybody at all to use bitcoin. Although I'm American myself, I understand how much this means in the rest of the world. (Who, by the way, are also suffering under governments debasing the central currency)
Now, it's down to each individual person to decide if their government is ruining the value of their money fast enough to take a risks on something like bitcoin. People in Venezuela made a different calculation than the average American does, because they more directly see the effects of inflation. Although a lot of Americans are seeing this now as government floats the idea of even more multi-trillion-dollar bills. Americans also have the option of the stock market or land purchases, which are also completely reasonable choices.
The value of bitcoin is derived completely on trust, I 100% agree with that. But I would rather have a system that's ruled by math than ruled by people. Because it seems that when you have rule by people, the printing never stops until the currency collapses.
As always, I am open to the argument that we will reign back the money creation.
@Simulation Commander
Remember when our saving were "only" getting 6% interest, and then they were "temporarily" cut to 0.5% on a "temporary basis" only ? Seems that "temporary" is a euphemism for "permanently".
What happens to Bitcoin when there's a liquidity crunch and people need cash?
Remember, Bernie Madoff's empire was worth tens of billions of dollars... until the economy stumbled and people all wanted to cash out at the same time.
Look, excuse me for being really stupid but bitcoin is just an algorithm on some computer some where right?
Just for argument, lets say all the computers in the world no longer function.
Now, where is your wealth in bitcoin?
You said that I could ride my dollar to zero. Seriously, why can't that happen to bitcoin?
Let's travel back to a caveman.
Is he going to take your bitcoin?
Is he going to take my dollar?
Is he going to take charlie's gold?
The obvious answer is no.
So maybe when I talk about money, I don't make this point obvious?
....but it can collapse on you if you're the last sucker holding the bag. Bitcoin is a ponzi scheme. Nothing more, nothing less.
Haven't you heard? This time it's different...................
I wouldn’t count on that last part…
It’s ok. Equity means only black people deserve to get their deposits back and if you disagree you’re racist.
I believe the expression was "Friends of Angelo". The original Orange Man. A 2% mortgage was only a phone call away -- in exchange for a favor to be named later.
"Someday, and that day may never come, I’ll call upon you to do a service for me."
"I'll gladly pay you Tues for a hamburger today "...
Wimpy!
Genius. I have not heard that since I was a child. Thank your for bringing it into context for an adult.
Everything "old" is "new" again :)
@SH
Thank you, Wimpy.
:D - was wondering how many, if any, would get the reference. The question is, how many of us will be "strong to the finich" ...
Please continue to do what you’re doing. There is no one else like you in media. There’s not even a close fucking second. Thank you.
Chris Hedges is doing what Matt's doing. And so is Glenn Greenwald, Jimmy Dore, Aaron Mate, and Max Blumenthal.
Matt paints a literary picture. GG is bluster.
I couldn’t disagree regarding GG more. He’s truth to power all day long, even when I don’t agree with him.
I subscribe so obviously enjoy Greenwald, but I think he's selective about who he chooses as his enemies. Greenwald has no problem challenging the powerful and even risking his life so this is not about courage.
Greenwald keeps a list of those like Bari Weiss and Pierre Omidyar who are beyond criticism. He'll instead go after Lorenz Taylor and Mark Zuckerberg as proxies. They both deserve the criticism too, but it's worth noting who he chooses to leave off his list.
Beyond criticism has been Ilhan Omar.....for some strange reason.
Have you ever heard of Glenn Greenwald?!
Yes. I’m following them all. I’m 67 years old and I’ve been blessed with a life long enough to see through the MSM Leftist bullshit.
Change that to Corp BS and i would agree ...
Chris Hedges for sure, too. He's the real thing
If your into systems bashing and victim mentality as the cure.
What would you consider about Chris Hedges’s ideas for a better society to be “victim mentality?” I think it’s offside to criticize system bashing, also. The system is not working well at all, wouldn’t you agree? Civil disobedience and non-violent revolution seems to me very far from victim mentality cure. That is what I take from Chris Hedges. But maybe you prefer embedded journalists?
I simply don’t understand your comment. Maybe I’m missing something. Can you give examples or reference?
Oh, he talks a good game.
Points out all the politically correct villains. Couldn’t agree more. But I don’t see his civil disobedience and non-violent revolution gaining much traction lately. In fact, your 21st century Progressive revolutionaries seem to be taking the exact opposite tract. Know why?
Because Hedge’s and leftist ‘uber-intellectuals’ like him refuse to acknowledge the big picture. Besides the fact that there will be no ego boosting, revenue generating book signings and speaking engagements in doing that from *where* he’s coming from- the motivations, illusions and failures on the part of our individual and collective citizenry play just as big a part in allowing themselves to be swallowed whole by mega alpha predators as does the predators endless scheming to swallow them up.
Hedge’s various citizen classes are blameless, innocent, victimized, and ever-oppressed by forces outside of themselves, owed the world right now and must be made whole in every way by an all knowing, omnipresent, benevolent and anointed Administrative State. It’s the same old limp wristed, power grab of the powerless approach with no real empowerment, no real solutions except that of propping up our self-interested, self-dealing, politically connected savior caste to continue it’s ever unabated and exponential growth.
But hey, it’s made him a living.
Sharyl Atkisson
She is honest and reliable. A little dry. Lee Smith is good too, and he uncovers some very interesting stuff.
Anyone remember Bartcop?
I totally agree...I grew up an empathic person...now and always independent. Used to look at contempt at comments about the uniparty...no longer. Every policy issue is "how much am I gonna make?". $6 Trillion potentially in the last 7 months. I am conservative economically but even the most lilly livered leftist must see the risks we are taking. These two guys definitely do....they both have my utmost respect.
Michael Anton
There are several others; Glenn Greenwald most obviously- AND please include Caitlin Johnstone for a very honest and genuine thinking journalist too.
I have to tell you that I have a love/hate relationship with Johnstone.
The love part you probably already get.
The hate part is her condemnation of landlords which has no nuance to it. She puts the owner of a single house in the same category as someone like Trump or Gates who would rather keep their places empty so the rents will rise and they can screw tenants.
It’s weird, but I always think of Jack and the Beanstalk when I read her.
In addition to the list Jeff Weskamp put up, I'll add Michael Tracy. I just joined his substack.
Holy shit his article on Cuomo’s accusers is a bombshell!!
Glenn Greenwald is up there.
“The Fat Elvis of neoliberalism.” This is a prime reason I pay to read Matt. Hilarious wordsmith.
Reading “Fat Elvis” triggered “Vampire Squid” flash. Nice touch.
Matt should take this out from behind the paywall.
Yes. It will cause a shitstorm. Can't wait.
Yes. Please do. Another feature which would be cool would be either allowing x share codes for friends (TheInformation does this) or have a "make public" price where a person can pay $x to make a private article convert to public.
Agree
He is on such a roll!
It's a masterful piece...brilliant portrait....
I stopped reading Maureen Dowd years ago. All smarm, no substance. And your right, she has always been a cheerleader for the Democratic Party elite.
Well, she still fawns over Hillary and George HW Bush
Matt Taibbi has both balls and brains. But, his intellectual honesty, his integrity, is what makes him one of the top journalists of our time.
Perfect summation. Matt was harder on Obama than even I -- an ardent critic of that administration -- would have been. I wish there was a way to disseminate this more widely.
Taibbi, Greenwald, Weis, and others here are guerilla journalists. They are mobile, agile, and motivated. Their important work is spreading under the radar. This revolution will not be televised.
Sigh. Another Weiss toady. Her name doesn't belong anywhere near that of Taibbi or Greenwald. She's an empty vessel spouting received opinions with no regard whatsoever for freedom of speech.
I think the Weiss thing is proof that "the resistance" to corporate entertainment media is now forming their own tribe.
It's a stretch from Weiss to Greenwald and an ocean to Matt Taibbi. The only thread joining the 3 is that they are all on Substack. In fact, when Weiss was at the NYT Greenwald would criticize her her ultra orthodox views. That all ended when she joined Substack.
She just started on Substack. Give Glenn some time. Geesh.
I enjoy and appreciate Glenn and even subscribe to him, but he is a businessman in the way Taibbi is not. If it is in his best interests, Greenwald will not criticize Weiss. It's why I love Taibbi so much. He is the last of the hopeless romantics.
Nobody, totally agree. She's despicable, and doesn't belong anywhere near Matt and Glenn. She's stupid; they are intelligent.
Seems like every article Matt puts out has a Bari name drop in it now, and it doesn't feel natural. I can't see such unaccomplished mediocrity generating buzz organically. Something's off.
Unnecessary name-calling hiding behind your keyboard trolling MT comment threads. Not nice:(
He has a point that she’s nowhere near their league. But she did have the wherewithal among her peers to jump off the Titanic first.
Bari had no problem with cancel culture until the woke mob came for her. Also, google 'bari weiss toady' if you missed the reference.
Well. I'm 68 years old and this is the first time someone, or should I say "Nobody" has called me a "toady." I am the antithesis of a "toady." Good day.
You missed the reference as well I see. Go to your favorite search engine and look up "bari weiss toady".
Areslent
just now
While I thought what you said about Bari was true on its face, I didn't get the reference either. Thanks for bringing my attention to it:
https://sputniknews.com/society/201901231071755360-NYT-Columnist-Calls-Gabbard-Assad-Toady/
I was more aware of this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jS-sxJFn6O0
I agree but if a truly awful politician was to descend on our country would he talk like Pres Obama or like Trump. You folks always need to degrade DJT but who is the only President out of the rest that clearly spoke his mind and fulfilled many of his promises. You talk about T Gubbard and say that those who get victimized by the press are clearly over the target but not for Trump. What do any of you actually know about him other than what the intelligence community and the main stream media tell you. If you don't want to be duped over and over, believe what you see not what you are told. If not, don't complain years later. Sorry ckbravo, not disagreeing with you...you just happened to be the comment that triggered this thought. Send this article to all of the people you love that you can't figure out how such smart people such as these can be so easily duped.
Excellent piece, Matt, but wish you had included the fact that Obama, after collecting a totally undeserved Nobel Peace Prize, proceeded to expand the two wars he inherited into five, or six, or seven depending on how you count them. Doubled down with a surge in Afghanistan, then onto turning Libya, Syria, and Yemen into failed states. He normalized all the war crimes committed by Bush and Cheney and added a number of his own.
Obama is the sleaziest of dirtbags and I hope writers like yourself always keep reminding us that.
Nobel secretary regrets Obama peace prize
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34277960
"Awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to US President Barack Obama in 2009 failed to achieve what the committee hoped it would..."
Once upon a time accolades were given to those who actually achieved some milestone, not on the promise of what might be. What a perfect metaphor for this imposter.
So it's given out as a bribe to people whom you WANT TO STOP BEING NON-PEACEFUL??? hahaha
What a joke the Nobel Prize has become.
Sorry, you misspelled "become" as "has always been."
https://www.livescience.com/40188-dark-history-alfred-nobel-prizes.html
Well put.
Thanks for highlighting that. I hadn't heard of the secretary having morning after regrets. Then again, the NPP lost and and all credibility back when they gave one to the world's leading terrorist. For something that never was.
You must be referring to Henry Kissinger.
This is actually closer to its real origin.
https://www.thoughtco.com/history-of-dynamite-1991564
After Alfred Nobel invented dynamite, he imagined it in terms of all the lives it would save (the Mark Zuckerberg in the 18th century)
They wrongly thought he died and wrote an obituary excoriating him for all the harm dynamite had done and the number of people it killed. He read this and was horrified. He set up the Nobel peace prize as the ultimate indulgence to the approval of the elite for how his invention was actually being used in a way that made him incredibly rich.
Given those terms "Really Good At Killing People" Obama seems like the perfect sociopath for the Nobel Prize.
"Obama Told Aides He's 'Really Good At Killing People,' New Book 'Double Down' Claims
By Mollie Reilly"
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/obama-drones-double-down_n_4208815
@Matt Taibbi - Let's not forget who sold us out to get her senate seat. Kamala Harris was AG of California. California was the last holdout that refused to drop its case against the big banks. It would have won, and broken everything open. Kamala proved she was just like Barack Obama. She dropped the case in return for some federal funding for the state to make up part of its deficit. And, she was assured they would make her senator from California. They did. That is who Kamala is. This makes more sense of why Obama pressed Biden to take her on as vice president.
I strongly suspect that the plan is that Biden will either die or be declared unfit due to senility. I think the plan is that Kamala will live out the plot of VEEP. She has to get into office and "prove her presidential timber" with some symbolic acts of presidentiality before the election. She won't win except as incumbent, and even then she is unlikely to. Kamala is the singular Democratic candidate who decisively lost the presidential primaries. Nobody liked her. Nobody trusts her, and they shouldn't - especially black people.
Apparently Soros was the big investor in Mnuchin's One West Bank. The Intercept did a whole series on articles on it.
https://theintercept.com/2017/01/05/kamala-harris-fails-to-explain-why-she-didnt-prosecute-steven-mnuchins-bank/
She also deep-sixed the investigation into the Catholic Church and the pedophilia crimes.
@Abbywood
Come, come, now. That pedophilia has been going on for FORTY YEARS now with the full protection and abetting of the Pope. It *continues even as I write. Apparently these things take TIME? They damned sure seem to when the Pope is COMPLICIT in the gang rape of children.
100%!
Hmmm, seems to me that I remember voting against Harris, both in the primary and in the general, in her first run for Senate. But more people voted for her.
So how exactly did "they" "make" her a Senator? Those votes were fake?
Kind of the same way “they” made Biden the presidential nominee last year, despite (or because of) the fact that Bernie won four of the first five primaries. Understand now?
@minitiger
"Them" being, of course, American and Global Corporations manipulating the DNC.
I dunno that the DNC was “manipulated” by American and Global corporations. I’d say it’s more a case of all of them having the same priorities, which are money and power.
@minitiger
As in: they were *already holding hands to begin with ?
Certainly likely.
@minitiger
When we have *LAWS such as Citizens United LEGALIZING the straight-up purchase of elections, it seems almost naive to think that the same crowd who were buying elections *before that was legal, would *suddenly develop actual scruples ! ;-D
She made a deal to get the nomination, and have the DNC's support. It was written up in the Sac Bee.
Who got her through the primaries? Once that's done whoever is on the D ticket will win in California. You get to vote thus providing the illusion of choice, but the elites get to choose who you vote for.
Exactly. The primaries are the gate. Candidates either must court single-issue support groups, or get major support that can direct major single-issue groups to get out and vote in the primaries. It's a quite different game. I know this from direct experience. There are all sorts of games played, including the "fake out" where a political operator will pledge their support so that another leading candidate will anchor their strategy on getting those votes - but that operator is lying, and just doing it to hollow out the competition.
Single issue groups start with police and firemen. Then there are groups that vary by region. In CA's cities it's people like Sierra Club, FoE, etc.. To get a new candidate in, they have to get endorsed by multiple such groups. Then, the campaign has to figure out which groups actually delivered votes. But the DNC can talk to all those kingmakers and tell them how to vote in return for some bone. Often, the bone never really comes. But once that first breakthrough happens, incumbents rarely lose.
Fake votes, partisan electorate, brain-dead opposition. It all adds up...
Reading this reminds me of that Pete Holmes routine where he wishes there were some kind of involuntary response (like laughter) that people would emit when encountering magic. Except in this case, i am doing that imaginary whatever thing in response to the massive tidal waves of relief washing over me as i vigorously agree with every sentence.
After these last couple years i've been thrown constantly off-balance - it's like everyone's playing some kind of elaborate The Game-style society-wide prank on me. Feels like all these left-politics dudes i used to respect are now very invested in telling me how great shit tastes and how they love to eat it and in fact have always loved it and it's very healthy even, yum yum. Biden has a gimlet intelligence, Jen Psaki is an angel of truth, Obama accomplished so much, George Bush is our cute painty grandpa, and Bill Kristol and Stephen Colbert are linking arms and doing a friendship jig on the table, now pull up a chair and chow down with us!
Makes me feel genuinely crazy - i keep trying to process it and move on, but every day brings a brand new wolf pounding on my door demanding i let it in. i can't put into words what a balm it is to my soul reading something that isn't either impenetrable traumatized jargon glop, or please-clap histrionics where every word is bent mathematically toward flinging cheap ownage at the world's easiest targets. Thank you for staying oriented around principles rather than parties - even when i don't agree with the principles, it helps me get my bearings at least. Also thanks for not writing ugly boring shit, turns out most writers suck ass at writing, appreciate you
Probably best to just let it not be any kind of priority in your daily life.
I second that emotion!
Great article, Matt — I voted for Obama in 2008 with such enthusiasm, only to watch him do the exact opposite of what I lent my vote for (the “troop surge” in Afghanistan being a big one). Then, I let media and partisans scare me into voting for him again in 2012 as a last line of defense against a potential President Romney.
I remember being at a bar in 2012 and some guy bragged to me that he was a staffer or something for Obama. He asked me if I voted for him and when I said yes, he was like “cool! Good man.” But when I followed that up with how reluctantly I cast that vote considering he did nothing he pledged to do re: Iraq, Afghanistan, Patriot Act, Gitmo, etc., the guy instantly shrugged me off and clearly didn’t give a shit to hear any more from me. It felt very instructive in how their attitude was towards people like me: we’ll take your vote and then expect you to fuck off.
“Fool me once, shame on you — fool me twice, shame on me” indeed.
I believe the saying is,”Fool me one, shame on me; fool me twice… Can’t get fooled again.”
“Meet the new boss, same as the old boss”?
@Ricardo
YeeeeeAAAAAAAAAHHH ! ;-D
Pete for President
@We would have to use ASL ! Poor Pete no longer hears that well.
After seeing The Who live about 5 times, my hearing ain’t so great either anymore!
Pete had a drum kit blow up on him on stage early on … that and all those Marshall’s
LOL, Dubya really was a tool
Well to be fair he is still a tool, but he was then too
Nuh uh! Now he paints! And he and Michelle Obama are really good friends! He’s awesome! What? War crimes? Psshhh, that was like fifteen years ago… If Michelle Obama says he’s okay, that’s enough for me!
And Ellen! Don’t forget Ellen!
Ellen was cancelled almost immediately after cosigning on the W renaissance. Coincidence? Probably...
Did Ellen really have Dubya on as a guest? Jesus Christ…
And repeatedly used as one by President Dick Cheney
Thank you for your stellar dissection of this empty suit if an ex-President! I consider him one of the greatest con artist to ever enter our political world. Can’t imagine the BS library his donors are funding! Never have I had higher hopes that were dashing quicker than with Obama. A real tragedy for the American people!
It's not a library. It is a Presidential Center. National Archives website: https://www.archives.gov/presidential-libraries/information-about-new-model-for-obama-presidential-library.
That library is a cherry on his BS sundae. Check out this interview Glenn Loury did with the lawyer of Friends of the Park who are suing over destroying Jackson Park. Reveals even more repulsiveness and how he just used Black people on the south side to advance his career. Can't even put a library in their neighborhood-too beneath his greatness
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WuwR3PE5qP0
The presidential documents are in an old furniture store near O'Hare airport.(Hoffman Estates). "What’s That Building? Why This Hoffman Estates Warehouse Stores Barack Obama’s Presidential Papers." https://www.wbez.org/stories/whats-that-building-why-this-hoffman-estates-warehouse-stores-barack-obamas-presidential-papers/403ad644-8934-4ee6-85d9-97812af484e6
Why not just have Oprah pay for it?
She probably is one among a cadre of sycophants!
LOL! LOL!!!
When the design for his "library" was revealed, I was interested in reading an architectural critic's review of the plan and found one, in the Chicago Tribune, I think. I am certain it was NOT The Onion. Anyway, this critic's review described the plan as (somewhat) "Pharaonic." Priceless.
Your article reminded me once again. America does not need to see the tax returns of a billionaire who became a public servant, rather America needs to see the returns of public servants who became millionaires while being public servants.
Donald Trump? A public servant? If that was meant as humor and even if it wasn't, I know a guy with orange hair who would be highly amused with being characterized as a "public servant."
Not humor at all. I bet Obama never donated his salary to charity?
https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2021/02/27/president-donald-trump-probably-donated-his-entire-16m-salary-back-to-the-us-government--here-are-the-details/amp/
@Dennis D. Duffy
Consider that Trump's annual "advertizing" budget.
Or all the money he saved stiffing hotel and casino staff over the years when he would declare bankruptcy.
Mind you, there is no requirement you not pay a maid with 2 kids making minimum wage when you declare bankruptcy. It was a moral choice on his part.
You can argue whether he was a "good public servant" or a "bad public servant", but you're just lashing out at the definitions of words to pretend a president doesn't meet the definition of "public servant".
@aunt martha
How about if we threw in "Orange" public servant ?" Thoughts ? ;-D
umm why not both?
lol rite?
Yes, please.
Exactly-- because THEY are the ones who really run things. Fauci, NSA head etc.
Fauci has been playing around with natural immunity (in more ways than one) for decades. I can’t help but think of “Sympathy for the Devil” every time I see him.
if it is proven that the NIH did fund gain-of-function research, and that the virus did escape from said lab... I'm all in for the ambulance chasers to go after that fucker.
We know they funded research, we just don't know if it's this particular one.
I don't much care. The crime is funding dangerous research in a shoddy Chinese lab in the first place.
Yeah, ok.
@publius_x
"Gentlemen, start your engines" ! ;-D
When Obama was re-elected in 2012 I had the anger in this article. By 2014 I was just very cynical. I did not vote for Trump in 2016 (did not vote for Clinton either) but I sure as heck understand completely why others did and I can’t say I blame them. After 6 months with Biden I can only say God help us
@KDBD
Biden is definitely "problematic" as a "friend" of the banks and the Corporations.
But then, he has been for the hundred years he has *already been in office of one kind or another.
The only thing most people *really expected of Biden was simply to be a "placeholder". The "unTrump". So far he has not mucked *that up, but I must say, I think that we got *more with Biden than we expected, and certainly not *all of that is good !
Like some of French Kings in the past, Obama and his wife have the utmost disdain for us common folk. They join the Clintons as the greatest grifter couples in American history. You also have to ask what did he do for Black America? He did nothing but make things worse. He was a pox on all of us.
Too bad you didn’t get to go to the party. I could imagine a piece worthy of the late Tom Wolfe!
Obama made race relations worse b/c he couldn’t relate to ordinary black folk, and was unwilling to discuss true policy solutions for ghetto areas. Instead, he simply half heartedly scolded white suburbanites and refused to confront the urban dysfunction in D led cities.
I lost all respect for BO when he threw his pastor Jeremiah Wright under the bus seconds after getting elected . . Wright and I are both ordained ministers in the UCC and I know first hand what Wright had done for hundreds of young black kids in Chicago. BO tossed him aside after praising him to the skies in order to let some of Wright's reputation in the black community rub up against him. Remember he and Michelle were married by Wright and BO used him to get his foot in the black door as it were. He then allowed the media to portray this incredible human being as an "angry black man" .Right then I knew what kind of man he really was. It took a while but finally others are beginning to see it as well.
“ and I know first hand what Wright had done for hundreds of young black kids in Chicago.”
And Hezbollah distributes medical supplies. And the trains always run on time in Fasciststan. Hateful people can do good works.
LOL too bad we couldn't have a democracy of the people for the people and by the people, huh? Nope, we got sold a "dream" instead.
We should go door to door and gather a new party up.
Wright also told us that Obama was a politician band would say whatever he needed to get elected. Most of us dismissed the statement but it made me even more leery of Obama.
Tom Wolfe! Yes!
A Man in Full.
Obama’s embrace of incredibly divisive identity politics and early woke
narratives paved the way for Trump. That isn’t really addressed in this otherwise great piece but it’s the key factor of what ensured we would swing from Obama to Trump.
Actually, I think Obama understands the dangers of identity politics quite well and has spoken about it a number of times. For example https://www.chicagotribune.com/columns/clarence-page/ct-perspec-page-obama-nelson-mandela-identity-politics-0722-20180720-story.html
In many ways that's worse, because he capitalized on identity politics when it benefited him as president, and his speeches decrying it post presidency have had no impact whatsoever. Would certainly be nice for the political class to think seriously about Obama's legacy, which is why that's the last thing in the world they want us to do.
I think this is where Obama and Trump have a similarity: both men speak to as many sides of a given issue to garner as much allegiance as possible, though I would say Trump, while more of a buffoon, is far less a cynic.
At some level, I think they both appealed to a lot of people who knew, in their guts, that our social and political structures are deeply rotten. They wanted, want, to believe in “something different.” It creates openings for charlatans.
Well that gamble didnt work out did it. That belief costs. Time for reality. Look to the future-- dont support the old constructs and systems. Dont vote. Support local businesses and structures. Work new things through volunteer organizations. Most social and financial models have the US not existing in the same structure by 2032.
@Carol Jones
Yes ! There is *much to be said for building an *entirely new system.
All over the Globe, for that matter. And with this system collapsing under the weight of its own corruption and sleaze, there is no time like *now !
By 2032, we will be under a racist-religious authoritarian dictatorship; after which there may be a possibility for survivors to create an actual, bottom-up, community-focused democracy rather than the pretend republic created by the capitalist-imperial constitution written by our conquest-focused, colonial rulers in the 1780s.
@Donald Ganer
TOTALLY behind you on that, yes. Would that it could happen even sooner !
💗😊
@Lucas Corso
Well observed, indeed ! Thx
You nailed it. Trump is a coarser buffoonish version of Obama. Both are inveterate con men who somehow gained a messianic following.
YES! And I voted for both of them. LOL.
MORE than dozens-- so now look forward and dont get fooled again NO one is going to bail you out. You must find the reliance and bail yourselves out.
And we’re all still wearing neck braces because of it.
And enthusiastically lining up to be injected with “emergency use” *experimental* gene therapy.
That don’t even stop the spread of the virus as they are non-sterilizing. On the plus side though, the mass non-sterilizing vaccination campaign is spurring the rapid evolution of vaccine resistant mutants (https://news.yahoo.com/vaccine-resistant-lambda-variant-us-193100413.html), so we’ve got that going for us. Good work all!
@Coco McShevitz
YES ! Thx !
Two of my Israeli patients sent a heavy video today from bit chute. A must watch but not easy. https://www.bitchute.com/video/WsvhxBD4k1uZ/
UGH! Yup that consistent trauma since Anthrax and 9/11 is paid off handsomely for Pharma.
@Carol Jones
Indeed it *has, following precisely the course Naomi Klein originally traced out in her book "The Shock Doctrine".
Wow. Solid writing. As the illustrator for most of those RS stories I would feel guilty by association except for the fact that RS ran Matt's bitter reassessments, well cataloged in the above essay, during those 8 years and we did provide some good complementary illustrations to go along with those features. Early on we did run the image of Obama clinking champagne glasses with swines in suits while outside people were stay warm by burning the Hope and Change posters. It's sad. There was such seeming potential.
Victor, all those early illustrations were great - I still have this one up on my office wall: https://matttaibbi.typepad.com/.a/6a0105369e0d85970b010536aabc90970c-pi
I always thought Obama was difficult to caricature in words and imagine he was a challenge for you too!
Took a while but eventually got him.
I apologize in advance for the cheap shot, but I imagine you as the Ralph Steadman to MT's "Raoul Duke."
i thought of the same thing, but even Steadman did not achieve an O-shaped eagle about to fly up its own butt.
Victor - your illustrations are truly world class -- among the best I have ever seen. They remind me of the incredible Oto Reisinger in Europe - yours are of course in color. I am so happy that you are working again with Matt