Arianna Huffington stopped by last night to talk about her new book, Third World America, and what the heck's going on in this country, anyway. When did we forget that what's good for everybody is good for everybody? Ms. Huffington:
It's like a country without a middle class. It's a third world America country. You know, it's not good for anybody. It's not even good for the very rich. We're going to be behind Gates protecting their kids from kidnapping with armed guards. It's not good for anyone.
And this, which the Huffington Post excerpts and which seemed to divide the audience into angry and adoring.:
Maybe progressives and the middle class need to sort of face up to the fact that the president is not that much into them, that he would rather hang out with Larry Summers, or flirt with Olympia Snowe, or play wargames late into the night with General Petraeus.
You?
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I consider myself middle class, and I still believe Obama is trying to do the best he can for everybody. Everything takes time, and people just want a quick fix for all of this country's problems. It took a long time for us to get in this predicament.....and it will take a long time to get out of it. Give him some more time. He will get it done.
I totally agree with you Kelly!!! It amazes me the short term memory loss so people have... remember when Clinton left office, there was a budget SURPLUS which GW Bush promptly pissed away? Obama does not have a magic wand, but I do pray with all my heart that he calls on Bill Clinton for economic advice - Clinton did a fantastic job balancing the budget and making the economy grow for EVERYONE - not just Halliburton shareholders!!
Asking Clinton for advice would be a good idea.
But I agree with Arianna Huffington that Obama is just not into the middle class. He has kept most of Bush's conservative policies, and expanded on the Patriot Act. He *may* be trying to placate the conservatives, but the conservatives are so dogmatic and so extreme that meeting them in the middle still leads toward conservative policies. Just look at DADT, legalizing marijuana, and putting stimulus money where it really belongs, in the hands of the not-well-off who will spend it immediately on necessities, and spur this economy more than the best business-tax-breaks ever could.
With friends like Arianna Huffington we may not be able to win. We need to begin celebrating what we have accomplished. Is it all that I want? NO! But I also need things like Social Security and Medicare and I don't want to see the republicans take them away.
This is a dangerous time and we need all the help we can get to move ahead. I sure hope that Obama keeps up his attacks on the republicans and drags the rest of the Democrats into campaigning on their success and stop being afraid of the big bad tea party!
Absolutely right, Kelly. Ms. Huffington has it wrong, I'm afraid. I agree, President Obama has not always followed what I think would have been the best course of action, but I do think he sees clearly that the U.S., and perhaps any nation, requires a thriving middle-class to operate effectively. The Health Care Law, the new regs on banking and Wall Street, and the stimulus funding all make this pretty clear to me. Why Ms. Huffington does not see this, well - I cannot tell.
What is possible, maybe even likely, is that she is trying in her own way to goad the President into a more aggressive approach than trying to cut deals with the Olympia Snows of the world. Chris Matthews had on another progressive guest yesterday who echoed these sentiments by saying that he could have fought for the more progressive single-payer option, for example, than just diddling around with the moderate Republicans on a compromise. I agree with this - but in the end, it strikes me that the health care law is a good thing for the middle-class (it certainly is for me), and that in her approach she is being disingenuous on purpose.
I agree. Obama is exceptionally smart. We are fortunate to have him as President at this time. The Republicans are responsible for what has failed in the past and they are responsible for what is not working right in the future, for they did everything possible to block the great work of this President. This country and the world would be a far better place had the Republicans readily participated in helping the Democrats create the best Health care reform possible, the wonderful Jobs bill and state of the art green technology bill.
If you are referring to the Bipartisan White House Summit on health insurance regulation, the President actually said to McCain, "We're not campaigning any more. The election's over." This was in response to McCain's suggestion to essentially start over with the process of developing legislation to address health insurance. It seems Obama felt, and I think correctly, that McCain's comments were only repeating the Republican talking points, not offering real ideas for moving forward with the draft legislation that had been developed after extensive hearings and debates, and which included numerous ideas from both sides of the aisle.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hruMuZvvUs4&feature=player_embedded#!
If this isn't what you were considering, please provide your reference.
I believe Mrs. Huffington is spending far too much time with Joe Scarborough!
I have to disagree. The draft legislation did include Republican input. In a contemporaneous Washington Post piece, Ezra Klein enumerated several examples as follows:
(1) Let families and businesses buy health insurance across state lines.
(2) Allow individuals, small businesses, and trade associations to pool together and acquire health insurance at lower prices, the same way large corporations and labor unions do.
(3) Give states the tools to create their own innovative reforms that lower health care costs.
(4) End junk lawsuits.
In addition, the single-payer/public option was taken out of the draft legislation, in an (ultimately unsuccessful) attempt to woo Republican support.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/02/five_compronises_in_health_car.html
It is so hard for me to understand how so many people are still under the delusion that Republicans weren't in on the health care discussion. The problem was that they were TOO MUCH involved in the process! That is why we still do not have a public option. This holds true in every piece of legislation the Democrats have put forward and why we wind up with the watered down slop that everyone wants to convince us are good bills.
Mannjhn - You totally miss the point here, the republicans didn't WANT to be involved in the process, they made a calculated political decision the day after President Obama was elected that the best thing they could do politically was to oppose and obstruct at every level and wait for the mid terms. Healthcare aside there is no other reasonable explanation for the fact that they have filibustered a record 101 times in the past year alone!! How many times did I hear during that Healthcare roundtable "we need to start over with a fresh sheet of paper"...OMG it was like they were all reading from a script (which they pretty much were). It had nothing to do with having input...it had to do with bogging down the process....delay and obstruct. The president saw through it as did democratic leadership. My hope is that the American people will see their actions for the self serving, cowardice that it has been, putting their own political agenda ahead of the pain and suffering of the American people. We could be so much farther along in our recovery had the republicans chosen instead to work WITH the president, even in a nominal way!
I saw Rachel's interview with Ms. Huffington - I agreed with many things she had to say, most certainly with the statement she made about not having a middle class. We seriously need to stop and notice how people in other countries without a middle class have to live. We also need to remember that corporate greed will completely destroy a democracy and a country. I WOULD like to see some proof that President Obama really is a middle class advocate, but I wouldn't have worded it as strongly as Ms. Huffington did. I'm hoping two more years in office will prove her wrong.
Once again Arianna nails it. And, it is already happening. Just look at any American suburb: gated communities designed to keep out undesirables surrounded by throngs of the unemployed. People are too stupid to see that this is a bad thing. They just want to be on the right side of the gates.
Arianna is right; without the middle class this country will fail. We don't need a revolution; rather this country needs restoration and modernization. Those individuals lucky enough to make money should be taxed. Most of the tax cuts enacted by the Bush administration were for his and Cheney's buddies - not the working class, who really keep this country moving. The bonuses and salaries given to Wall Street, the insurance giants, the pharmaceutical companies, as well as sports and Hollywood, are obscene. These people should be giving back to the country that allowed them to plunder for their own personal desires.
Don't forget Big Oil they were making obscene profits and he/George W. Bush, gave them more tax incentives. The Politicians in Washington need to take a minimum of a 10% pay cut, just like our local politicians, and no pay hikes unless they are voted on by all the people. Also 'pork' needs to be cut across the board. Those fat cats on wall street need huge tax hikes!on all the bonuses, pay and profits they made(since they didn't do it on the 1st go through). Mortgages written by/through( for the last 10years and possibly 20 years )Wall Street all need to be evaluated and reapportioned so that people are paying for the true value of the home not the inflated values And that alone would put much more money back into circulation. There needs to be true Banking, Wall Street Regulations and legislation, the FED needs to do its job and not protect Wall Street/Banks as does the SEC.
Arianna is full of crap as usual .
the crap came from the Supreme Court 5 and their rulings--who has provided them with money, one has to ask? Their needs to be reform in regards to political finance and also they need to look at the the C street group(THe Family)- the DeMints', Doyles', and Coburns'( his connection to Senator Ensign) and why are we paying for our Senators to take trips oveseas to "preach".
Obama has to realize that as much as he tries with the GOP they are the party of NO!/he also needs to toot his own horn more, he has accomplished more good than George did in 8, but he really needs to protect the Middle class who actually work and produce growth in this country( when the middle class is working for a reasonable wage they invest in this country--they don't hide their monies in off shore accounts, they pay taxes also. The idea that trickle down works has been proven wrong over and over- it didn't work under Reagan or Bush(who skewed the tax breaks for the riches)
GOP- ie Romney created his own health bill in his state that is much like the one Obama and Senators/Reps supported and it was touted as great until our National health care came out. The group of Rep/GOP in their right now are so far up the Back side of Big Business etc. they can't see the light of day, they need the money to stay in Washington, to rule like Kings of old, we will all be serf's-
The delusional average folks that vote GOP are voting against their best interest out of the fear and listening to the hate mongering group like Sarah Palin, Glen Beck et a. If you listen to the actual rhetoric that is all they do and they keep repeating the same phrases over and over. Do they really want the Koch Brothers and Rupert Murdocks' pf the world running America? Then we will be a 3rd World Country.
Look at the vicious resistance Obama is fighting on even modest change. Can you imagine the pitchforks if he tried to force the entire progressive agenda? Progressives have to understand that a president can't do it all by himself--he needs congressional support.
The war on the middle class has been waged through taxation. Right now, Obama is pushing for just the very slightest return to the more progressive taxation Bill Clinton had won, and congressional members of his own party are opposing even this.
The fault, dear Ariana, lies not with Obama.
Indeed. Miss Arianna is an effective counterweight to the Dick Armeys and Jim DeMints, the Sarah Palins and Christine O'Donnells of the world. She needs to pull hard left against their hard right -- just to keep us heading sort of down the middle. I agree with a lot of what she has to say about the vanishing middle class in America and I certainly disapprove of the white-bread, gated community suburban bubble in which so many children are raised to expect instant gratification. But the POTUS doesn't rule by fiat. He is not King or Dictator. Our government grinds slowly and works on a consensus basis that frustrates the hell out of firebrands from the left and right alike. It was MEANT to do so. That is the chief thing I have learned over the 40+ years I have been active on political issues. Don't stop just because you didn't get your way this time...it takes steady pressure over time and LOTS of both.
I find it hard to take advice from Huffington given her abysmal judgment on matters scientific.
This.
Too harsh, but on many issues Obama wants to compromise with the power brokers and the purveyors of DC centrist conventional wisdom. He is much more likely to attack his principled supporters who are disappointed in him than Republicans who only want to see the Democratic Party destroyed.
On constitutional law, the bailout of the banks, foreign policy, the defense department, he has continued the worst of the Bush policies. Even on health care he campaigned on the one clear difference between HillaryCare and his plan was individual mandates, then embraced individual mandates once in office.
I still support him, but he and much of the Democratic Party are not sticking to all of the principles that got them elected.
the "free-traders" & union haters have succeeded in weakening our middle class. truthfully, consumers do NOT have a "right" to the lowest possible walmart price regardless of defective design, toxic chinese materials, child labour, environmental damage, & destruction of our middle class. >but all politicans prefer to sweet-talk voters instead of warning we're gonna pay more to support american production.
I typically love The Huffington Post and use it as one of my primary sources of news... But Arianna says some of the most ridiculous things of anyone in the public eye! Now Obama hates the middle class? Really? More or less than who? "Plays war games with Petraeus into the night..." WTF are you talking about! Where do you live Arianna? Whether or not you're keeping the middle class out, I'll bet you're on the "right" side of the security fence. I don't understand how or why people can't understand that continually denigrating the good side, or at least the relatively better side, does more harm than good. The fact of the matter is that we are faced with a very stark choice. The people that REALLY love the rich, those who seem to demonstrate it at every turn in a shameless and reckless manner, are not on Obama's team. The President may well seem to "not be into" a great many things, because he operates from a somewhat cerebral detached style, but I'm not sure you can make too many meaningful assumptions based on that alone. There's plenty to debate about his performance, or the lack thereof, without resorting to this kind of meaningless crap!
Arianna Huffington is like all the rest of them "thoughtful liberals": Sitting on the fence, waiting for "someone" to do what she strongly believe should be done. And if it is not exactly as she has portrayed it in her thoughtful dreams, then the hell with it. Lets all pave the way for the teanuts...
The effort to eliminate the Middle Class has been happening for decades. They are so annoying to Politicians, Corporatists, and the Uber Riche! See- they end up having spare time to read and think and then vote against the interests of the top 2%. How inconvenient to have slaves and serfs rise to a level where they can't be controlled.
Obama is not the problem, he just is removed enough to think that slowing down the demise of the Middle Class is somehow going to prevent the demise. (Sort of like hobbling freed slaves. They can't run north and thrive but they are still freer than they were.)
To turn the country around there would have to be a complete purge and the obscene wealth at the top would never permit that. (We have more paid contractors fighting wars than soldiers... they could easily be deployed back home as they were during Katrina)
So, lets keep hope alive! Yessirree! Hope that the powers that be will relinquish their power, that the Banks will waive all fees, that the Credit Card Companies will decide to lower their rates, Mortgages will be forgiven, Oil Companies will decide that they should stop drilling and turn to making wind turbines. And I will maybe become president by write-in. (I could use the money- it's a recession you know.)
It is not smart for Obama and Biden to mock the Progressives who worked so hard for their election.
Ms. Huffington doesn't have all the answers. Obama is running a country. She's selling a book.
Gated communities are nothing new; they did not crop up in the past two years of Obama's presidency. Where has her head been? She should pull it out of whatever dark place it's been and go and do something more constructive than cast aspersions on our presidential LEADERSHIP of which she has zero.
Yes, it would be terrible for the rich progressives to have to live behind gated communities. Who will protect their precious children?
LOL, the pundunces come up with an even dumber statement from the previous day.
Save us from the 3rd world horrors!
I agree with u 1000%.
Why would she do this now? Very bad timing. Very, very bad timing. Stop now, Arianna.
Hmmmm why would she do this?
Hint: She is a Republican.
Huffington is a Republican? Maybe in another lifetime. She's practically a Marxist! :-D
LOL, I am not sure what she is but she is not a liberal or a Democrat.
You are both right! Arianna embraces the "politic' de'jour" if you will. consevative when it suits her purposes, liberal when it suits her purposes, and her purpose is usually to sell a book or get work as a pundit. I'm not sure where a spoiled rich Greek get's off saying our president (who was raised in much more humble conditions!!) doesn't care about the middle class anyway! President Obama IS fighting for the middle class. If he were not, you can be sure the Rublicans wouldn't have filibustered democratic legislation a record 101 times in the senate this past year!!
"I'm not sure where a spoiled rich Greek gets off saying our president (who was raised in much more humble conditions!!) doesn't care about the middle class anyway! President Obama IS fighting."
You are 100% correct.
As a person who grew up in less than modest surroundings it is easy to spot frauds. AH is as phoney as three dollar bill.
We only need to do one thing to bring back the middle class: stop outsourcing. I know people high up will still be wealthy, but shouldn't they step on us instead of stepping on the Chinese? With the rising cost of fuel and shipping, it makes more sense to produce goods right here. Everyone has the right to employment - there could be some kind of job for every skill level. Give the President a chance. We elected him, and must support him. It's not his fault we are screwed - it is our own fault for not doing something way earlier!
I agree with Arianna that the middle class, if not dead already, is certainly on life support. That being said, I think that there is very little chance of turning the tide, as that would require a true progressive movement, and let's face it, it just doesn't exist. This country has been moved so far to the right by repubs and talk radio and Faux Nooze that what is considered "left" by most people today would have been considered to be very conservative 50 years ago. If you look at the political landscape today, you have just about every part of the righthand side of the political spectrum represented today, from the fringe right of the Tea Party, to the establishment conservatives, people like McConnell and Boehner, and Blue Dog democrats. But where, exactly, is the progressive left? They have almost no representation politically, and they are virtually excluded from themedia. Obama has struggled to get even centrist legislation passed, sometimes because he himself didn't try hard enough, and usually because repubs and blue dogs blocked anything meaningful. Obama deserves some blame for naively trying to get repub support over and over again when it was obvious the repubs had no interest in anything but destroying him, but none of that would be possible if it weren't for voters that are too lazy and ignorant to do anything but get their views and ideas from wack jobs like Palin, Beck, Limbaugh and Fauz Nooze. Rather than blame the democrats and Obama for destroying the middle class, or not coming to its aid, Arianna should look to the factors that make doing so next to impossible in the current political climate. If any of us true LIBERALS, (yes, I am a liberal, and am not afraid to say so, unlike most, who are so afraid of the label that they prefer to be called progressives), were to run for office, with true liberal ideas and policies, we'd get a vanishingly small number of votes. Liberal positions have been so demonized by the right and its mouthpieces that only right-leaning ideas can get even lukewarm favorable treatment from the media. Arianna, don't blame Obama for his failure to do more to help the middle class. Blame the voters who have been manipulated to vote against their own self interests.
Spot on!
Amen.
I agree.
FOX and the fear mongers use people who are unsure and afraid. Just like a cult they suck people into doing and thinking things they would normally not think or at least think thru. for themselves. Right now lots of folks are afraid and are lured into taking comfort in the propaganda. What FOX and friends do is psychological abuse.
Question mannjhn, why are you always playing the Devil's advocate?
Mannjhn, if the voters were not manipulated into voting against their own interests, how else do you explain their actions? They voted for people who outsourced their jobs, took their money and redistributed to the wealthy in a heist of historic proportions, exceeded only by the Wall Street bailout that rewarded the rich and their greed-induced failures by giving them trillions of dollars of taxpayer funds, money that came directly from the people they voted for. They have been manipulated into thinking the President is a secret muslim, a socialist, someone who isn't even eligible to BE president because he is from Kenya and refuses to show his birth certificate! They've been manipulated into thinking that tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans will bring prosperity to all, despite all evidence to the contrary. They've been manipulated to the extent that it is now de rigeur to denigrate education and learning, that "ordinary" folks like Joe the Plumber can run this country far better than people who actually went to college.
Of course, I may be wrong on this, or just too charitable. Perhaps our degraded and dumbed-down education system has just turned out an increasing number of ignorant people.
Well said uffdaguy (love the handle), and don't forget manipulated into thinking that there should be no separation of church and state and that the government can crawl into our beds and doctor's offices to dictate our morals and personal decisions.
mannjhn,
It is because whatever the topic (aroound the Vine) you manage to take an oppositional stance. You play deliberately dumb and then want to call it a discussion, but enough of that.
I already stated why people are acting crazy and it is because their fears are being exploited. Who's doing the exploitation?? hummm, let's see......
Mannjhn, you might be interested in Thomas Frank's book, "What's the Matter with Kansas?", as it takes a close look at the phenomenon of people voting against their own self interest. It's not Faux Nooze that is entirely to blame, but it is the mentality of their ilk that is responsible. Repubs have been experts at using wedge issues to distract voters from looking closely at the other issues they really want to avoid. Bush and his repub predecessors ran up budget deficits that were massive, but there was no anger from the Tea Party crowd until now, despite the fact that the ill effects of such deficits were just as applicable then as they are now. Why weren't people blasting them then? Well, a good part of it is that it was white male repubs that were doing the damage, rather than a black male dem, but they were also obscuring their actions with wedge issues that distracted from their vulnerability on that issue. We saw the rise of Falwell's Moral Majority, the clamor by social conservatives on issues like gay marriage, abortion, the culture wars and the war on Christmas. They got voters so worked up on these issues, and others that were either peripheral or manufactured, to convince voters that the dems were evil, and couldn't be trusted. ONLY the REPUBS could save the country! Sprinkle that with a few lies, intimations that dems were somehow anti-American, and you had an electorate that was downright AFRAID to vote for anyone but repubs for fear of being labeled as some kind of traitor to the country. Remember the runup to the Iraq War, where anyone who opposed it was labeled as a terrorist sympathizer, traitor, or worse? The Dixie Chicks banned from many radio stations, and their CDs burned? Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon virtually blackballed by the media?
Too many people are lazy and ignorant out there, and they turn to Faux because it offers them simple, black and white answers, spoonfed for easy consumption. Too many people are unable or unwilling to look beyond the surface of any issue to understand it, and so they want someone to tell them that they have the simple answer, if you'll just trust them and follow them. Faux offers that like no one else, along with Limbaugh, Beck, Palin and others. They tell you the problem is illegal immigrants, terrorists, big-spending dems, godless liberals and imposter presidents. The masses gobble up those easy answers, and vote for those who promise the easy answers, chased down with the perennial promise of tax cuts to sweeten the bribe.
Repubs will gain a lot of seats this election cycle, maybe enough to once again prove to the ADHD-addled voters that they have no agenda other than power for themselves and riches for their already-rich friends. Eventually, though, probably by spring, the people who put the Tea Partiers in power will open their eyes and see that they were lied to once again, and then I fear they really WILL act on some of those "Second Amendment remedies" that Sharron Angle spoke of. Only this time, I don't expect their rage will be directed solely at dems.
Not you mannjhn, FOX and company. It's all spelled out in my post and more eloquently in Uffdaguy's posts.
Yep, and the Rep./ Tea Party are using the ignorant, the religious, the gullible, and the naive to push it all right along as I said.
mannjhn: This is what I was talking about- you playing dumb. You are deliberately being obtuse. All parties use tactics but the Reps. are masters of spin, propaganda, smear, underhandedness, abusing religion, inciting hatred, sleight of hand money backing, and instilling fear. The Dems. are really dragging their asses in this regard.
Now I hope you are not going to play coy and ask me what I mean.
You are a master of twisting thoughts. Maybe the Rep. campaign will hire you to play more of their nasty mind games. You'd be great at it. A real plus to your cause.
Now really, how is saying that the Dems. are not as good as the Reps. in being deceitful mean I want them to catch up in this area? I am proud that the Dems. have more integrity than that.
You are not being coy. That's just your petulance showing.
Well, I'm a bit perplexed at politics-savvy Arriana missing the whole point of commissions and blue ribbon panels. They serve a couple of useful functions: to educate the "public" about an issue, and more importantly, to diffuse responsibility. I would be very concerned indeed if Obama threw the jobs issue to a commission... By NOT appointing a commission to "study" the issue of jobs, I take that to mean the jobs issue is still on Obama's desk.
The deficit, on the other hand, is an issue that cannot be effectively addressed during a recession, so a commission is an appropriate tool to deal with it.
Arianna is an incisive voice. Everybody knows what's up with her statements. Obama does not need to be protected from her, he will be ok. At a certain stage of evolution its quite easy to appreciate her voice and Obama's political dilemma.
This woman is a very engaging, charismatic, intelligent talking head. Talking heads make their living by stirring up the pot, getting people buzzing about....whatever they can get us to buzz about. Does that necessarily have much to do with anything other than calculated manipulation? Not so much. We are like little children who expect their parents to be gods. When the poor hapless parents turn out to be just people, we rebel. Predidctably we try to replace them with who- or whatever might turn out to be all-powerful enough to snap their fingers, rearrange a bunch of molecules, and give us everything we desire with as little required of us as possible....maybe it's time we grew up.
And, when you say "we", you mean everyone but you, right?
It's like this: if Arianna wants to make her paycheck representing a certain point of view, she needs not to try so hard to make a splash that she ends up failing to represent and doing what could be a catastrophic disservice to those who also hold that point of view and who, consequently, support her website and buy her books.
Teresa,
Predictably we try to replace them with who- or whatever might turn out to be all-powerful enough to snap their fingers, rearrange a bunch of molecules, and give us everything we desire with as little required of us as possible....maybe it's time we grew up.
Well said Teresa. Your statement shows some profound thinking in that head of yours. Far, Far more thought than the Fox News and extreme conservatives, are what ails us crowd.
PS, Well written to boot, one powerful sentence.
Arianna is definitely overstating her complaints. Yes there is a shrinking middle class, yes there is a growing gap of more rich at the top, and a lot more people falling away from the middle class moving into being a lot poorer. However, stating that Obama is not "their guy" is absurd. Shame on her for that remark - she knows better - or should! Obama has accomplished more progressive legislation in the half term he has been in office than the last 3 or 4 presidents combined. That was a cheap shot from Arianna...
The middle class has been shrinking for decades. Many in the middle class voted against their own self interests decades ago. These people voted for Reagan and Bush and now they blame Obama for their choices. It is laughable.
As far as huff lady, I am not sure why she is allowed on shows to speak about anything. What in her background gives her expertise on the poor and the middle class? Is she a former union leader? Is she a former advocate for an organization that dealt with the poor/middle class? If I am wrong please inform me but I am not understanding her celebrity. Other than having a website and being married to a republican man who was gay, what exactly are her credentials?
I agree with Arianna Huffington that the middle class in our country is fading into nonexistence, but I do not agree that Obama doesn't care about the middle class. Unfortunately I also don't believe there is very much he and his administration can do to prevent the increasing polarization of wealth and non-wealth in the United States. Passing the tax cut extension (sans the top end) may gain some political capital but in the big picture won't mean too much.
And Obama "flirting" with Olympia Snowe? Given her penchant for hyperbole, I think i can grasp what Arianna is trying to say, but give me a break!
What does Adrianna propose:? Letting the right wing ideologues and Wall Street fat cats have complete control? I get tired of her and other progressives who criticize the progress that has been made. I consider myself progressive, but I understand that since Reagan started giving big corporations a blank check 30 years ago it is going to take time to get things turned around. Give the President and Congress a little bit of a break. There has been a lot accomplished and there is much more to do. Turning things over to Boehner and McConnell would be a huge step in the wrong direction.
The President is tooooo nice. You can't negotiate with the Reps. as they would be willing to sell out the entire country to see the Pres. fail. I think he's caught between a rock and a hard spot and Arianna is being a bit harsh. My feeling is that once you get into power with a good agenda as Obama had it is just not that easy to implement. It seems as if a giant battle has to be fought before issues can even be discussed- if they even get that far.
As for the middle class- we're getting it from both ends.
Arianna is not spot on, but she is looking in the right direction. Her statement to the middle class that Obama "is just not that into you" should be a wake-up call. The Dems and Obama seem to have finally realized what the GOP figured out years ago. That is, which side of the bread the butter is on. Corporations and the rich rule. This is not a future concept. It is the way it is now. If it were otherwise, we would have had real health care reform, a repeal of DADT and an economic recovery plan that included people other than bankers and insurance executives. Either Obama is experiencing a failure of leadership (not likely), or he is doing what he intended to do all along. In either case, it is not in the best interest of the people who supported and voted for him, and it's certainly not what he promised. He's "just not that into" us. His interests are elsewhere. Time we saw that, and acted accordingly.