Pepe Escobar writes:
The American right’s “road map” for these past two years has been to declare Obama an abysmal failure since January 20, 2008, and to do absolutely zilch to help the country out of its political/economic/cultural quagmire. Now – at least in theory – their bluff has been called by the American electorate.
Or has it? To talk about incoherence is a huge understatement. Americans have told exit polls they almost equally blame Wall Street (35%), Bush (30%) and Obama (23%) for the current economic disaster. Obama royally screwed up by bailing out Wall Street the way he did. But now the electorate has decided to reward a whole bunch of clowns and crooks who caused the debacle in the first place – among other things by endorsing George W Bush’s tax cuts and two trillionnaire, unwinnable wars. The tearful John Boehner – probably the next speaker of the House – is very tight with (what else is new?) financial lobbyists. Angry Americans voted – once again – for Wall Street.
The heart of the (sorry) matter is that Obama and the Democrats did not even strive to meet the great expectations awakened by the 2008 “Change we can believe in” collective rapture. They sowed the seeds of their own doom instead. No wonder they were deserted en masse by young people, ethnic minorities, pacifists and environmentalists while at the same time masses of enraged centrists, moderates and independents sought refuge in the right. Add to it the electorate’s gullibility in its manipulation by corporate media.
[…]
Flash forward to 2012; to the sound of Aretha Franklin singing Don Covay’s See Saw – “going up, down, all around/ like a see saw” – scores of US voters will have finally noticed they threw the bums out just to bring in another basket of equally lame bums.United States corporate media is not emitting a peep about it but Obama should really start worrying about his white mirror – Marco Rubio, who has just won a senate seat for Florida. Rubio, 39, intelligent, good-looking, good orator, promises the world to people and has “American Dream” written all over his bio.
Born in Miami, raised in Vegas (where his Cuban exile parents worked hard in a hotel), good football player, hard-working college student, law degree, Catholic, blonde wife from a Colombian family, four kids – as a bonus to the establishment Rubio is not a wacko (although Palin loves him unconditionally). Mike Huckabee – former presidential candidate and now Fox News pundit – says he’s “our Obama, with more substance”. And crucially, his political godfather is none other than Jeb Bush. Establishment Republicans won’t allow Palin to grab a presidential nomination even over their dead bodies. Thus Rubio may be their savior for 2012.
An inept/indecisive Obama allowed Republicans to get away with murder – as in not being held accountable for the monster financial/economic mess and on top of it being allowed to exploit and profit from the all-American rage provoked by their “policies”. Now, after the “shellacking”, it’s about time for the president to show some balls and start playing offense. He could start by firing everyone at the White House. It won’t happen. Get ready; white Obama will eat him for breakfast in 2012.
Obama is a gimmick man, not a ncontempative analyst. This is obvious from his lack of shame in making a speech in Cairo–>taking Noble Prize–>calling for Palestinian-Israel Peace at great risk to Netanyahu&Abbas and then capitulating to the EastEuro gangster-types like Israeli FM Lieberman and his ultraZionist racist Greater Israel supporters. Meanwhile,, purely for political image, he perpetuated the wars of totally incompetent generals and then allowed them to intimidate him into making Afghanistan into a cash cow for their personal PA project– so they don’t face pink-sliping” as did generals after Vietnam was lost– sending our volunteer mom&dad soldiers into a setting where they commit and are victims of war crimes imposing on Afghans what Petraeus himself called “a criminal syndicate” as government.
Obama, of course, was ill served by the Clintonistas, whose tasks as members of his White House was to wreck his presidency so Hillary can replace him in 2012. But others, like Nancy Polosi put in extraordinary efforts to gestate and give birth to legislation that he compromised away and barely bothered to mention in his speeches where he spoke about “I” and “me.”
Perhaps we are the fools in that we did not grasp the obvious when he dumped Rev. Wright, an ex-Marine who fought for his country, merely because of Wright’s disappointment with neocon-led “World War IV” against Islam which is, in Christian terms, as sinful as what the original Crusades turned into: BLOODY PLUNDER!
Fact is we didn’t see through it, nor when he sought to create hope in Muslims while supporting Zionist anti-Muslim (both outside and inside America) anti-Semitism. The hidden anti-Semitism of the current neophytes in Congress is scary, for the current Republican Congress is riddled with conspiratorial secret notions– both against Jews and Arabs– xenophobia which will manifest in further weakening our national unity. They will be uncontrollable once Obama again bends over further for Israel emptying America’s pockets into its coffers. As Obama faces popular opposition he will bend down ever further seeking “compromise” (sic) with the paroxysmal Republicans until, like the Dodo Bird, he disappears up his own anus. This is tragic and I can only pray that “Dorothy” (his wife Michelle) clicks her heels in time to get him a heart and courage. He is a president of great potential if only he decides to stand up to “Whitey” and be THE MAN!!
It will be interesting to watch. I for one found his campaign full of vagaries and he allowed people to imagine whatever they wanted when he spoke of change. It’s a shame no one was willing to listen to Kucinnich, Gravel, Nader, McKinney nor Paul in ’08.
We’re running into Tolstoy’s conundrum. An honest forthright politician can’t win against lying charlatans. Who will vote for the hard reality when someone’s offering you a fairy tale?