When most folks talk about the Obama administration and Cloward & Piven's strategy of collapsing the system by overwhelming it, I'm pretty sure they were concerned with big things like government welfare, food stamps and unemployment benefits.
Not a little-read blog.
But that's what happened to your truly last week.
After seeing Obama heckled at an appearance in Pennsylvania last Sunday, I started writing - in the back of my mind, as I often do. The subject of the piece would be about how poorly Obama responded to the heckler and how much difficulty he's having in TelePrompter free zones. For goodness sake, the President of the United States had to have a full TelePrompter rig set up for a talk with 6TH GRADERS.
His handling of the Pennsylvania heckler was far from the polished Obama we were sold during the campaign for office. You can judge for yourself here.
I thought the prez really failed to take control of that situation, and the fact that he stepped away from the podium for some snapshots just didn't feel right.
I hadn't got much further than that in my writing gestation process when polls started appearing all over Massachusetts that showed Scott Brown had a very real chance of winning his special election. Hmm. Maybe something was bubbling in Boston...
Then MSNBC's Ed Schultz said he'd cheat to keep Brown from winning and Obama's stumble at the podium began to blossom into a bigger multi-tiered story about political machines versus the will of the people.
Then they counted the votes and the health care bill looked doomed. But wait! Harry Reid said he'd seat Brown 'when all the proper paperwork was received" and it started looking like the Dems were prepared to cram a bill through no matter how dirty the politics was going to have to get.
I started prepping something about how out of touch the elitists in Congress are. For example,
Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson (he of the infamous Cornhusker Compromise) is STILL so out of touch with the speed with which the health care bill is crumbling around him that he placed BRAND NEW ADS explaining his vote in yesterday's NFL playoff games. Ben, sidebar... IT'S OVER!
We're just to Tuesday... I haven't even mentioned the nationalization of student loans, the bank tax, Keith Olbermann's anti-Brown meltdown, Air America calling it quits, raising the debt ceiling by $1,900,000,000,000.00, the Supreme Court's death blow to McCain/Feingold, retiring politicians or Senator Arlen Specter's "Act like a lady" command to Rep. Bachmann of Minnesota.
It's more than one fellow can digest and opine on short of posting five missives a day. And as overwhelming as it's been, it has also been one of the best weeks ever.
It's the first week of the 2010 political season and the water is going to be getting mighty hot for a lot of politicians in the coming months.
I just hope I can keep up.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Obama: The 101st Senator
Much has been made over the last 48 hours about Candidate Obama's pledge to televise the negotiations for Health insurance Reform. Folks with the time and determination to count such things have found eight separate instances when Mr. O pitched that some sort of coverage of the inner workings of Congress should be televised by C-SPAN.
Much more needs to be made of Nancy Pelosi's response when questioned by a brave member of the press who pointed out these pledges.
"There are a number of things he was for on the campaign trail."
That comment belies a deep problem with the current Administration's relationship with the House - and with Capitol Hill in general.
It's not just the Conservatives on Talk Radio. Congress doesn't respect Obama either.
His complete lack of experience in an Executive role is showing. His instincts are that of a legislator.
He is ignorant of the power of the Bully Pulpit. I submit 'Exhibit A' - Obama's neophyte response to the Fort Hood shootings. With the media and many Americans waiting for a some sort of encouraging, empathetic message from their President, we were instead treated to several minutes of shout outs and personal messages to the organizers of the conference he was attending. A man who understood the power - and the ROLE - of the presidency would have known instinctively it was time to set aside the personal stuff and speak directly to the nation from the top of his address.
'Exhibit B' - Obama's September address to a joint session of Congress (the one of the infamous "You Lie!" outburst.) Obama spent a long time that night discussing the details of his alleged Health Care plan. I say 'alleged' because the truth was, he had no plan. Now, he may have had a list of things he wanted, but there was no bill for him to submit to Congress. In short, apart from a laundry list of broad concepts, Obama has had absolutely nothing to do with the bills passed to date. The depth of his participation has been to twist arms for votes. He hasn't insisted that Congress pass his version of the legislation because he has never had his own version of the legislation. He hasn't fought for his bill. He hasn't led the way.
Obama entered into this process by handing the ball to Congress and telling them to come up with something that hit as many of his points as possible. At that point, he virtually abdicated his position of authority and returned to being only one more voice in the maelstrom, the 101st Senator. He could have avoided this scenario by drafting a simpler version of the bill and driving Congress to pass it. The extra pork and state-by-state bribes could have been eliminated and dismissed as politics as usual. He could have thrived in his promised post-partisan world.
But that would take Executive leadership. It's a concept that is still foreign to Obama even after a full year in office.
Pelosi's remarks reflect the fact that Congressional leaders are driving the bus now. And worse, they know it.
Why defer to Obama at this point? He's just another legislator. And he's in way past his pay scale.
Much more needs to be made of Nancy Pelosi's response when questioned by a brave member of the press who pointed out these pledges.
"There are a number of things he was for on the campaign trail."
That comment belies a deep problem with the current Administration's relationship with the House - and with Capitol Hill in general.
It's not just the Conservatives on Talk Radio. Congress doesn't respect Obama either.
His complete lack of experience in an Executive role is showing. His instincts are that of a legislator.
He is ignorant of the power of the Bully Pulpit. I submit 'Exhibit A' - Obama's neophyte response to the Fort Hood shootings. With the media and many Americans waiting for a some sort of encouraging, empathetic message from their President, we were instead treated to several minutes of shout outs and personal messages to the organizers of the conference he was attending. A man who understood the power - and the ROLE - of the presidency would have known instinctively it was time to set aside the personal stuff and speak directly to the nation from the top of his address.
'Exhibit B' - Obama's September address to a joint session of Congress (the one of the infamous "You Lie!" outburst.) Obama spent a long time that night discussing the details of his alleged Health Care plan. I say 'alleged' because the truth was, he had no plan. Now, he may have had a list of things he wanted, but there was no bill for him to submit to Congress. In short, apart from a laundry list of broad concepts, Obama has had absolutely nothing to do with the bills passed to date. The depth of his participation has been to twist arms for votes. He hasn't insisted that Congress pass his version of the legislation because he has never had his own version of the legislation. He hasn't fought for his bill. He hasn't led the way.
Obama entered into this process by handing the ball to Congress and telling them to come up with something that hit as many of his points as possible. At that point, he virtually abdicated his position of authority and returned to being only one more voice in the maelstrom, the 101st Senator. He could have avoided this scenario by drafting a simpler version of the bill and driving Congress to pass it. The extra pork and state-by-state bribes could have been eliminated and dismissed as politics as usual. He could have thrived in his promised post-partisan world.
But that would take Executive leadership. It's a concept that is still foreign to Obama even after a full year in office.
Pelosi's remarks reflect the fact that Congressional leaders are driving the bus now. And worse, they know it.
Why defer to Obama at this point? He's just another legislator. And he's in way past his pay scale.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
2010: Dormant No More
It's been a very long time since there's been any activity here at JELLY BEENZ. It's unfortunate and pretty much inexcusable.
But much like the Tea Party folks, the long period of dormancy is over.
The political and cultural goings on of 2009 have been difficult to let silently unfold. And truthfully, it's so much easier to pop over to Facebook and drop a snarky status update that stirs the pot amongst my most liberal friends and relatives.
I believe there's something lingering in the air. Something powerful that is about to congeal into a mighty force.
2010 has all the markings of a year of political upheaval, equivalent to the polar ice caps swapping places. Big time change that sees big C Conservatism roaring into power for the first time in 15 years.
The liberals who are currently in power in Washington have revealed the true nature of the system and of their souls. In a period of absolute power, they have tended to govern from positions further left than mainstream America.
The promises of transparency and of a corruption-free process lasted about as long as the words hung in the air. The wheeling and dealing involved in passage of bills twice the length of ATLAS SHRUGGED has given the American public a court side seat at the sausage factory and the public does not like what it has seen.
The pressure to pass massive bills quickly, without time to discuss, digest or even read - let alone debate - has made for a wary public.
And then there's the legislative bribery.
Ah, but that's just Washington being Washington, right? Maybe in a different climate, yes. But not in the promised climate of HOPE AND CHANGE.
A more generic term has never captured the hearts of so many. A more unexplained directive has never swept the country into a celebrity worshiping frenzy. Heck, Conservatives who thought George W. Bush was too liberal, or too weak, or too passive wanted some of that change too.
But nobody got it.
For all the promises of HOPE, the jobless claims continue to mount up and Obama's economy looks more and more like Jimmy Carter's every day. For every promise of CHANGE, there's yet another DC lobbyist taking over a brand new Czar position in an Obama administration that reveals its true transparency in its sealing of the president's birth certificate. (But that's a discussion for a different day.)
A full year after having a liberal conservative foisted upon them by the media (and liberals who crossed party lines to ensure McCain's nomination), Conservatives are beginning to feel the true depth of their power. A year after their national ticket (which was more appealing when viewed from the bottom up) went down in the flames of the folly of moderation, the silence is beginning to fade away.
After a year of being called racists, homophobes, red necks and tea baggers, the American Conservative has had enough. The Uprising is about to commence.
There is a song by the group Muse called UPRISING. There's some question as to the true politics of the group, but I don't care. The lyrics apply to 2010.
They will not force us.
They will stop degrading us.
They will not control us.
We will be victorious.
Like I said... the long period of dormancy is over.
But much like the Tea Party folks, the long period of dormancy is over.
The political and cultural goings on of 2009 have been difficult to let silently unfold. And truthfully, it's so much easier to pop over to Facebook and drop a snarky status update that stirs the pot amongst my most liberal friends and relatives.
I believe there's something lingering in the air. Something powerful that is about to congeal into a mighty force.
2010 has all the markings of a year of political upheaval, equivalent to the polar ice caps swapping places. Big time change that sees big C Conservatism roaring into power for the first time in 15 years.
The liberals who are currently in power in Washington have revealed the true nature of the system and of their souls. In a period of absolute power, they have tended to govern from positions further left than mainstream America.
The promises of transparency and of a corruption-free process lasted about as long as the words hung in the air. The wheeling and dealing involved in passage of bills twice the length of ATLAS SHRUGGED has given the American public a court side seat at the sausage factory and the public does not like what it has seen.
The pressure to pass massive bills quickly, without time to discuss, digest or even read - let alone debate - has made for a wary public.
And then there's the legislative bribery.
Ah, but that's just Washington being Washington, right? Maybe in a different climate, yes. But not in the promised climate of HOPE AND CHANGE.
A more generic term has never captured the hearts of so many. A more unexplained directive has never swept the country into a celebrity worshiping frenzy. Heck, Conservatives who thought George W. Bush was too liberal, or too weak, or too passive wanted some of that change too.
But nobody got it.
For all the promises of HOPE, the jobless claims continue to mount up and Obama's economy looks more and more like Jimmy Carter's every day. For every promise of CHANGE, there's yet another DC lobbyist taking over a brand new Czar position in an Obama administration that reveals its true transparency in its sealing of the president's birth certificate. (But that's a discussion for a different day.)
A full year after having a liberal conservative foisted upon them by the media (and liberals who crossed party lines to ensure McCain's nomination), Conservatives are beginning to feel the true depth of their power. A year after their national ticket (which was more appealing when viewed from the bottom up) went down in the flames of the folly of moderation, the silence is beginning to fade away.
After a year of being called racists, homophobes, red necks and tea baggers, the American Conservative has had enough. The Uprising is about to commence.
There is a song by the group Muse called UPRISING. There's some question as to the true politics of the group, but I don't care. The lyrics apply to 2010.
They will not force us.
They will stop degrading us.
They will not control us.
We will be victorious.
Like I said... the long period of dormancy is over.
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