| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: Politix |
| Progressives Ask: Is It Obama, Or Is It Us? |
| 2010-06-08 |
| Left-wing activists described the year leading up to Barack Obama's election as exhilarating, empowering and exciting. Now, if you ask progressives gathered for the America's Future Now conference in Washington, D.C., about the first year and a half of his presidency, they say: "Frustrating." "Sobering." "Brutal." At least, those were the reactions of, respectively, union activist Nick Weiner, University of Minnesota political science professor Dara Strolovitch, and Steve Peha, who heads an education reform consultancy. "I had hoped for something different," Peha explains. "I had hoped for the president who ran for office, and not so much the one who's in office." Peha says he's a pragmatist — he knows that campaigning and governing are different. But "what I wish is that President Obama had worked a little less for his ideal of bipartisanship and a little more for the people who elected him," he says. This is the prevailing feeling at this week's America's Future Now conference. And no one is hiding it. "It seems like yesterday, doesn't it? Barack Obama was going to take office, he was going to change the world and we would just go home and hit the couch," liberal blogger and pundit Arianna Huffington said during the conference's very first panel of speakers. The head of the Campaign for America's Future, which runs this conference, called the new White House an uncertain trumpet. For example, its financial reforms, he said, are too timid and too readily compromised. And "the handling of BP has been atrocious at best," added Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, the head of Green for All. While trying to keep positive, speaker after speaker showed deep frustration with how things have gone so far. The audience of about a thousand is pretty sparse compared with past years, and their conversations sound less like a movement and more like therapy. In fact, when the audience was asked to discuss the central problem at their tables, they were told the essential question was "Is it him — or is it us?" Activist Marquis Jones' answer: "It's definitely us. I mean, we can't look at our elected officials and feel like it's their responsibility. We put them in office to be a representation of us, so it is our responsibility to make sure that they're fulfilling those obligations." But Bob Kuttner, the editor of the liberal magazine American Prospect, had a different answer. "We criticize [Timothy] Geithner; we criticize [Lawrence] Summers; we criticize [Rahm] Emanuel; we criticize the oil companies; we criticize Wall Street; we criticize everybody but Obama," he said. "Because we feel a little bit goosey about criticizing Obama." Kuttner said progressives must hold Obama accountable. Piecemeal accomplishments are not enough, he said, to keep the movement going. "If he doesn't do more on jobs, and on mortgage relief, and on a handful of things that affect regular people where they live, it all goes down the drain in the midterm," he said. "And then the moment is lost and the crazies take over." That is the greatest fear of the progressives at the conference: losing completely the momentum and promise they felt just 18 months ago. So if 2008 saw a dramatic romance between Obama and the left, it appears the honeymoon is now well over. Progressives hope that some new goals — and a little therapy — will hold the marriage together. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #27 People in flyover land are a little suspicious of Ivy league educated-MBAs and lawyers. These folks gravitated to Wall Street and government in the 1990s and basically turned both upside down. A lot of people lost a lot of money because they trusted these people; in many cases they lost their life savings. no mo uro makes a lot of points which reflect what many people think. Being an Ivy league graduate doesn't preclude someone from knowing anything but it certainly doesn't insure that they know more than anyone else. As no mo uro said there are many schools that are not Ivy league that turn out competent people, able people. I've kicked around engineering schools for about 25-30 years. Interviewers have told me they like people who have good communication skills, can work with others, have good analytic skills/problem solving skills. All that said, an engineer coming out right out of college is not particularly useful for several years. We had an engineering/MBA program and the same can be said of that. The companies that have survived often hire someone who can improve their position, i.e. someone who can do something. Experience is important. Being able to show what you are able to do for an organization is important. Computer specialists, electronics technicians, mechanics, etc. are often the people who are most needed. A man whom I admire very much is now aging. He flew the Burma Hump during WWII. He returned here and started a company which has been highly successful. He once told me that he would rather hire an engineer than an MBA. I asked him why and he said the MBAs are not particularly useful to him. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2010-06-08 16:57 |
| #26 no mo uro: Make public sector employee unions illegal and a lot of this takes care of itself, lex. Dynasties require loyal footsoldiers. Remove them, and the dynasties wither on the vine. Absolutely true, and utterly necessary, but American federalism falls down here. I doubt this can even be done legally in more than a few states in the union. Indiana's one, as Mitch D has shown, but I don't see it happening in the worst offender states-- CA, NY, NJ, IL, MI etc, compared to which Indiana's small potatoes. If anything, the states are even MORE screwed up, more inept, more incompetent and more fiscally ruined than the federal government. (btw, this, plus the fact that free markets need a strong regulatory apparatus to function effectively (if you don't believe me, try doing business in a place where rule of law and regulatory bodies are weak), explains why I'm not a conservative). We don't need a conservative party. We need a new political class altogether. As to your bias against Ivy Leaguers, I don't see the logic. There are plenty of very capable, sensible, experienced Ivy League/elite grads-- Mitch Daniels for starters (Princeton '70, Georgetown Law), or, among the punditry, Dr. Krauthammer (Harvard Med School)-- and plenty of dopey or loony-tarian conservatives/populists who went to third-rate schools. Mickey Kaus would make a superb senator; he's a Harvard Lw-educated journalist-turned-blogger. Basically, we need sober, mature grownups who are not professional pols, who don't need the job, who have a clear grasp of national interests and power politics and who have a basic grasp of how you create wealth. |
| Posted by: lex 2010-06-08 15:25 |
| #25 These people are pissed because Obama hasn't been radical-left enough. Well guess what leftus, all those college surveys, community dudes and dudettes, talks with professors, all that info was gathered ran through a computer formula points given to words and chatch phrases and processed, sliced, and bulk wrapped into Obama's presentation team. You were studied and sold a product by the machine you trust. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2010-06-08 14:08 |
| #24 The man is a fraud. Agreed. His utterances on interstate relations are simply fatuous, he has no grasp of economics, zero management skill, and even in his sole area of (supposed) experience, the law, he has repeatedly made a hash of simple criminal and conlaw concepts. His one area of distinction is in analyzing, pondering on, and writing elegant essays on the grand subject of his Most Amazing Lifestory. We have elected a lightweight, poetic narcissist to lead the free world through the worst sh*tstorm anyone under 70 can remember. Heaven help us. |
| Posted by: lex 2010-06-08 13:41 |
| #23 I thought he was going to pay my mortage for me. I'm pi$$ed. |
| Posted by: gorb 2010-06-08 12:47 |
| #22 President Obama won't you rescue me? The question many of the left are asking. The truth is, those of the right and other persuasions ask the same of their affiliates and leadership. The balance, over time, is something of a 'ying and yang'. Each point of view influences the other, and hopefully the median is somewhat near the desired outcome. For most all, this 'feels' very unsatisfactory. And I agree. Yet, are the established power structures pliant enough to allow for a political 'maverick' to yield enough influence for significant changes? It appears not - no matter what your idealogical preferences. It is what it is, at this time.. |
| Posted by: CB 2010-06-08 12:43 |
| #21 if you took an average to slightly more than average person (in terms of intelligence) Sorry I still don't see it - and if it were true we'd be looking at his grades and reading his papers. The man is a fraud. |
| Posted by: Hellfish 2010-06-08 12:37 |
| #20 "And then the moment is lost and the crazies take over." Look who's talking. |
| Posted by: gorb 2010-06-08 12:22 |
| #19 who before coming to DC had never held a serious job in his adult life Somehow I doubt that he takes his current job seriously. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2010-06-08 10:49 |
| #18 "We criticize [Timothy] Geithner; we criticize [Lawrence] Summers; we criticize [Rahm] Emanuel; we criticize the oil companies; we criticize Wall Street; we criticize everybody but Obama," he said. "Because we feel a little bit goosey about criticizing Obama." A little buyer's remorse showing? Yeah, can't criticize BO because it would be racist--no matter that his policies, if anyone can identify what they are, suck. He has been too busy running for office during the last year and a half to do much but screw things up. Let's hope the |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2010-06-08 10:44 |
| #17 Is It Obama, Or Is It Us? 1) It's you. 2) You're crazy. |
| Posted by: Free Radical 2010-06-08 10:00 |
| #16 #5 Careful - criticism of Obama is racism. Not really, most say they have contempt for his white side too. |
| Posted by: HammerHead 2010-06-08 09:55 |
| #15 Making public unions illegal would be an excellent start. I was musing about voting on the drive in as well. Maybe limit voters to only those that pay taxes (excemptions will be for retired, disabled, etc.) so basically if you don't put into the system, you don't get to vote on how it is run. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2010-06-08 09:44 |
| #14 What 'bad boys' are for far too many women, the slick politic is for too many in the general population. Their modus operandi and results are strikingly similar. What's even more amazing is in both cases their followers go running back to them rationalizing that it had to be something the rube did that made it all so messy rather than acknowledge the base corruption of the perp or life style. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2010-06-08 08:27 |
| #13 Why blame others.? The American People elected Obama. They deserve what they got. The American people elect what they are and what they are..... has a bad cough. I would get something for that cough....perhaps a sound set of moral values would be a good start. Or you could get a Queer for a Platoon Sergeant and build a Mosque at Ground Zero. See you in Church reading the Gospel according to Newsweek alongside your mother's Pimp. |
| Posted by: Ulith de Medici9452 2010-06-08 08:24 |
| #12 Face it, moonbats and communards, you were used like a groupie at a media convention. |
| Posted by: Atomic Conspiracy 2010-06-08 07:49 |
| #11 I stand corrected, AzCat. Your drift has been received. |
| Posted by: no mo uro 2010-06-08 07:47 |
| #10 There are FYP |
| Posted by: AzCat 2010-06-08 07:33 |
| #9 That should read "military OR the private sector". PIMF. |
| Posted by: no mo uro 2010-06-08 06:07 |
| #8 "And then the moment is lost and the crazies take over." That's it? You're progressive or crazy? So how did the 'progressives' win at the ballot box? And why whill they lose at mid-term? Those 'crazies' elected the same guy for two terms? Maybe there's a large group that are neither progressive or crazy. Perhaps some of them didn't vote for 0 because he was progressive, but only because he wasn't Bush. Perhaps you are blinded by your arrogance. |
| Posted by: Bobby 2010-06-08 06:01 |
| #7 -Make public sector employee unions illegal and a lot of this takes care of itself, lex. Dynasties require loyal footsoldiers. Remove them, and the dynasties wither on the vine. -Break the back of the Ivy League grip on power. Competence is more important than the "brand" of the degree. -In a related way, America, ESPECIALLY the cultural and academic elite, must come to grips with the fact that BHO is an affirmative action hire and AA doesn't work. There are dozens of excellent, talented minorities in this country who could do BHO's job better than he ever could, but they couldn't get elected because they don't have degrees from the "right" schools or don't have the expected left-of-center politics that the academic mandarins demand. The progressive elites tried an experiment. They wanted to show the world that if you took an average to slightly more than average person (in terms of intelligence) with no real-world skills, sent him to "all the right schools" and let him mix with "the quality" (meaning themselves, of course), and sent him out into the world, he'd be highly competent at problem solving and leadership. Their premise is extreme nurturism, the idea that if you send unqualified people to the right schools and they rub shoulders with other elites and form "connections", that this will, by osmosis, make the unqualified highly competent. It doesn't. All it produced was a slick teleprompter reader who could parrot all of the NPR-elite talking points and who was known as a "good guy" among said elite because he went to one of "their" schools and was part of "their" club. (Think Jim as a "king" in Huckleberry Finn and the plantation owner's acceptance of him as an equal by virtue of that claim to nobility.) BHO's inability to lead and solve problems are prima facie evidence of the fallacy of this extreme sort of nurturism. It's not 2006 any more. Americans right now don't care if you went to a self-styled "best" school or not, they want competence and problems solving skills of the type that can only be found by those who are successful in the military of the private sector. Give me someone who went to a community college but can fix something. Where you went to school is irrelevant. And that scares the elite more than anything, because the basis of their status is called into question. |
| Posted by: no mo uro 2010-06-08 05:58 |
| #6 Time for a new political class in this country. No more "progressive" lawyers or identity politics-pushers, or Bushes, or Clintons or any of the other rank little political dynasties scattered across almost every city and state in the nation these days. If we were governed only by reasonably intelligent, non-wacko straight-talking, no-BS non-lawyers and non-MBA types, we'd be in far better shape than we are now. Even lefty types like Wyden and Feingold tend to be more rational and more open to suasion than the lobbyist-pimping professional pols in the GOP. Smash Tweedledum and Tweedledee, and start over. |
| Posted by: lex 2010-06-08 05:10 |
| #5 Careful - criticism of Obama is racism. Things would be so much easier with a one-party state. What |
| Posted by: gromky 2010-06-08 04:59 |
| #4 Face it, dupes: you rallied behind an identity politics pro, a lifelong empty suit who before coming to DC had never held a serious job in his adult life. Back to da couch wit youz. |
| Posted by: lex 2010-06-08 03:00 |
| #3 Hit the couch, Arianna. |
| Posted by: lex 2010-06-08 02:56 |
| #2 What? Not even half way through his term and already a wash-out even with the ones who voted him in? Worst part is for you lefties, you think he gives a darn about you, anyway? You were just his usefull idiots. He feels the same about the boot licking media, whom he now calls in sarcastic tones "talking heads" and "all the hype they generated". Your marriage is a big flop, losers. |
| Posted by: Harcourt Angoger7112 2010-06-08 02:15 |
| #1 "Is it him -- or is it us?" Yes. |
| Posted by: AzCat 2010-06-08 02:04 |