Telecom Immunity

Obama ’s Wholesale Sellout to the Politics of Fear

Cloture, Feingold, FISA, FISA+OBAMA, Hillary Clinton, Obama, Politics of Fear, Telecom Immunity

I’m still in a shocked state from witnessing Obama and Hillary prove today who was the better Democratic candidate. With Obama’s wholesale selling out to fear and politics and even approving cloture on FISA so as not to allow a filibuster, tells me all I need to know about this candidate of change.

I’ve got to tell you Obama-Heads that every once in a while , I get a good vibe when I think about what putting Mr. Obama in charge of this once decent nation would say to the rest of the planet.


After reading and hearing some of the most snarky, mean, hurtful and convoluted critiques of Mrs. Clinton over the past year it still stings to have to start coming around and landing in the Obama camp. It has to be done though and you’re either on the [Democrat] bus or you’re off the bus.

Thirty years of “Oh, all politicians are corrupt” bookended with the other classic”There’s no difference between Republicans and Democrats” put the Grover Norquist/Irv Kristol nail in the coffin when good/smart guy Albert Gore was defeated by a dry-drunk clunkhead who deserted his military duty.


In seven years, George Bush managed to thoroughly ruin my little Avril Rose’s America and I’ll never forget that.

No offense to Luke Russert but deciding to become an Independent just means that the GOP triumphs. I understand why all you Ron Paul-heads and Dennis Kucinich-Heads and John Edwards-Heads really liked your candidate , I truly do-but we’ve got to get this country back into the hands of a party that will stop the dangerous direction that we’re All heading in.

I worry about this obviously good person Barack Obama and always have because of the well-known corrupting power that the District can have on a person. This FISA capitulation/aiding and abetting in the destruction of the Fourth Amendment is devastating. Is this some tough-guy Chicago Politics scheme to Criminally go after the Telecoms after he’s in office, as John Dean and Keith Olbermann posit?
Does Rezko, Donald Young, Larry Sinclair and blackmail do the trick? Did some Senior Adviser convince him to abandon all principles merely to ensure that McCain couldn’t call Obama a friend to the tayerists? Again, Obama claimed that he would even veto a cloture on Immunity for the Telecoms as well as the actual bill so color me stunned.

It just might take a little while longer now to step onto that bus , that’s all

Kos Jumps a Shark

Stories

[Ed. note: I’ve liked Markos since I used to read his baby blog and before he basically
invented the Netroots. With that said, this may not just be his “Jump the Shark” moment but it may also be some of the worst writing in the history of the game]

Daily Kos: State of the Nation

Rewarding good behavior
by kos
Tue Jul 01, 2008 at 11:05:46 AM PDT

So many of you are upset that I pulled back my credit card last night, making a last minute decision to hold back on a $2,300 contribution to Obama. Let me explain further:

First of all, obviously Obama is a great candidate who is running a great 50-state race. That much cannot be denied. But he’s had a rough couple of weeks.

First, he reversed course and capitulated on FISA, not just turning back on the Constitution, but on the whole concept of “leadership”. Personally, I like to see presidents who 1) lead, and 2) uphold their promises to protect the Constitution.

Then, he took his not-so-veiled swipe at MoveOn in his “patriotism” speech.

Finally, he reinforced right-wing and media talking points that Wes Clark had somehow impugned McCain’s military service when, in reality, Clark had done no such thing.

All of a sudden, there was a lot of cowering when, just days ago, we got to read this:

When Mr. Wenner asked how Mr. Obama might respond to harsh attacks from Republicans, suggesting that Democrats have “cowered” in the past, Mr. Obama replied, “Yeah, I don’t do cowering.”

Could’ve fooled me, and maybe he is. Maybe what looks like cowering to me is really part of that “moving to the center” stuff everyone keeps talking about. But there is a line between “moving to the center” and stabbing your allies in the back out of fear of being criticized. And, of late, he’s been doing a lot of unecessary stabbing, betraying his claims of being a new kind of politician. Not that I ever bought it, but Obama is now clearly not looking much different than every other Democratic politician who has ever turned his or her back on the base in order to prove centrist bona fides. That’s not an indictment, just an observation.

Now I know there’s a contingent around here that things Obama can do no wrong, and he must never be criticized, and if you do, well fuck you! I respect the sentiment, but will respectfully disagree. We’re allowed to do that here. But fair notice — I will never pull a Rush Limbaugh and carry water for anyone. Not for the Democratic Congress, and not for our future Democratic president. When anyone does something I don’t care for, I will say so. I’ve never pulled my punches before, so why start now?

Obama will be fine without my contribution, and he may even still get it before this thing is said and done, but it would be at a time when he has done something positive. That’s called rewarding good behavior. And if that opportunity fails to arise because Obama goes on a Sister Souljah’ing rampage, then no worries. Chances are good that the DNC would get the money instead. But at this time, I simply have no desire to reward bad behavior. Some of you don’t care about his behavior, or don’t think it’s bad behavior, or whatever. I didn’t ask any of you to follow suit, and don’t care whether you do or not. I didn’t pull him from the Orange to Blue list. I’m not going to start praising Nader or Barr. I’ll still vote for him. Yadda, yadda, yadda. At the end of the day, I’m pretty irrelevant in the whole affair. Obama is going to raise a ton of dough and win this thing whether I send him money or not.

Ultimately, he’s currently saying that he doesn’t need people like me to win this thing, and he’s right. He doesn’t. If they’ve got polling or whatnot that says that this is his best path to victory, so much the better. I want him to win big. But when the Obama campaign makes those calculations, they have to realize that they’re going to necessarily lose some intensity of support. It’s not all upside. And for me, that is reflected in a lack of interest in making that contribution.

That’s it. No need to freak out. It is what it is. Others will happily pick up the slack. We’re headed toward a massive Democratic wave, and what I decide to do with my money means next to nothing, no matter how much hyperventilating may happen on this site’s comments and diaries about it all.

And if for some crazy hard-to-see reason my money actually is important to the Obama campaign, then they can adjust their behavior to get it.