If you ask a democrat today why the liberals have abandoned their support of Obama, the most likely answer you'll get, or at least the most common thing I hear, is that they don't really know. I hear things like, "We all knew Obama was a centrist when he was running", or "He said he was going to work across the isle". I did hear the "centrist" line before Obama was elected, what I didn't expect was that he was in the center of the right. I also approve of the idea that he might work with both parties, but his attempts have been rejected by the republicans whose only concern is getting control back. Even without their cooperation, Obama has given them what they want at the expense the left who were his boots on the ground in the election. In fact, I am hard pressed to find anything that Obama has united the left and right on outside of opposition to himself.
In Obama's defense, the criticisms from the left and right have nothing in common. In fact, I find myself regularly defending Obama against the rabid right because they are so absurdly wrong that no one who looked past the typos on the tea party banners could possibly believe them. "Socialist"?? Capitalist on steroids would be more accurate. He bailed capitalism out of a failed mess. If he were a socialist, he would have nationalized the banks and left peoples mortgages to be renegotiated with the government. So while the right wing has gone completely overboard with unwarranted criticisms that the corporate media has played like they were fact, the complaints from the left get no play at all. The offense however is that they get no consideration at all from Obama.
Here are my top two issues with Obama-
#1- While in KC in August of 2008 (see photo I took at his appearance) Obama was handed the question, "Will you hold the previous administration accountable for their crimes"? Obama's reassuring answer was, "We will not have two forms of justice in America". That was a bold face lie that IMO is a large part of why the left won't trust anything he says and will base nothing on "hope" until it manifests itself in reality. When (DOJ) Eric Holder refused to allow the public to see the photo evidence of the brutal torture Bush illegally doled out in our name, the issue died. So did my trust in Obama. Of this Obama spun "We are looking forward not back". What he really meant was "we are looking the other way" both to Bush's crimes and the potential not prosecuting these crimes leaves for a return to state sanctioned torture under a future president.
#2- During the election Obama ridiculed the idea of a forced insurance mandate. (see video below) But when the election was over and Obama had won, he not only approved of the mandate, he refused to use his pulpit to support a public option. He sold us all into servitude to the same industry that spent millions to defeat meaningful reform. This dealt a blow not only to Obama, but to the basic idea that the democrats are the party who defend us from corporate abuse. By signing a corporate only insurance mandate into law, Obama made the democrats look like cowardly corporate servants who served the nation up on a platter.
So Obama lost the support of this liberal and deservedly so. In the immediate he is a liar. In the long term he has damaged the democratic principles that separate dems for repubs.
In Obama's defense, the criticisms from the left and right have nothing in common. In fact, I find myself regularly defending Obama against the rabid right because they are so absurdly wrong that no one who looked past the typos on the tea party banners could possibly believe them. "Socialist"?? Capitalist on steroids would be more accurate. He bailed capitalism out of a failed mess. If he were a socialist, he would have nationalized the banks and left peoples mortgages to be renegotiated with the government. So while the right wing has gone completely overboard with unwarranted criticisms that the corporate media has played like they were fact, the complaints from the left get no play at all. The offense however is that they get no consideration at all from Obama.
Here are my top two issues with Obama-
#1- While in KC in August of 2008 (see photo I took at his appearance) Obama was handed the question, "Will you hold the previous administration accountable for their crimes"? Obama's reassuring answer was, "We will not have two forms of justice in America". That was a bold face lie that IMO is a large part of why the left won't trust anything he says and will base nothing on "hope" until it manifests itself in reality. When (DOJ) Eric Holder refused to allow the public to see the photo evidence of the brutal torture Bush illegally doled out in our name, the issue died. So did my trust in Obama. Of this Obama spun "We are looking forward not back". What he really meant was "we are looking the other way" both to Bush's crimes and the potential not prosecuting these crimes leaves for a return to state sanctioned torture under a future president.
#2- During the election Obama ridiculed the idea of a forced insurance mandate. (see video below) But when the election was over and Obama had won, he not only approved of the mandate, he refused to use his pulpit to support a public option. He sold us all into servitude to the same industry that spent millions to defeat meaningful reform. This dealt a blow not only to Obama, but to the basic idea that the democrats are the party who defend us from corporate abuse. By signing a corporate only insurance mandate into law, Obama made the democrats look like cowardly corporate servants who served the nation up on a platter.
So Obama lost the support of this liberal and deservedly so. In the immediate he is a liar. In the long term he has damaged the democratic principles that separate dems for repubs.
