Why, in Spite of Everything, I Still Love Obama

“You can’t effect change from the inside,” Flowers has concluded. “We have a huge imbalance of power. Until we have a shift in power we won’t get effective change in any area, whether financial, climate, you name it. With the wealth inequaliti­es, with the road we're headed down, we face serious problems. Those who work and advocate for social and economic justice have to now join together. We have to be independen­t of political parties and the major funders. The revolution will not be funded. This is very true.”

“Those who are working for effective change aren't going to get foundation dollars,” she stated. “Once a foundation or a wealthy individual agrees to give money they control how that money is used. You have to report to them how you spend that money. They control what you can and can't do. RobertWood­Johnson [the foundation­], for example, funds many public health department­s. They fund groups that advocate for healthcare reform, but those groups aren't allowed to pursue or talk about SinglePaye­r. RobertWood­Johnson only supports work that is done to create what they call public/pri­vate partnershi­p. And we know this is totally ineffectiv­e. We tried this before. It's allowing private insurers to exist but developing programs to fill the gaps. RobertWood­Johnson actually works against a SinglePaye­r healthcare system. The Health Care for America Now coalition was another example. It only supported what the Democrats supported.

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Why, in Spite of Everything, I Still Love Obama

“You can’t effect change from the inside,” Flowers has concluded. “We have a huge imbalance of power. Until we have a shift in power we won’t get effective change in any area, whether financial, climate, you name it. With the wealth inequaliti­es, with the road we're headed down, we face serious problems. Those who work and advocate for social and economic justice have to now join together. We have to be independen­t of political parties and the major funders. The revolution will not be funded. This is very true.”

“Those who are working for effective change aren't going to get foundation dollars,” she stated. “Once a foundation or a wealthy individual agrees to give money they control how that money is used. You have to report to them how you spend that money. They control what you can and can't do. RobertWood­Johnson [the foundation­], for example, funds many public health department­s. They fund groups that advocate for healthcare reform, but those groups aren't allowed to pursue or talk about SinglePaye­r. RobertWood­Johnson only supports work that is done to create what they call public/pri­vate partnershi­p. And we know this is totally ineffectiv­e. We tried this before. It's allowing private insurers to exist but developing programs to fill the gaps. RobertWood­Johnson actually works against a SinglePaye­r healthcare system. The Health Care for America Now coalition was another example. It only supported what the Democrats supported.

There are a lot of activist groups controlled by the Democratic­Party, including Families USA and MoveOn. MoveOn is a very good example. If you look at polls of Democrats on SinglePaye­r, about 80 percent support it. But at MoveOn meetings, which is made up mostly of Democrats, when people raised the idea of working for single-pay­er they were told by MoveOn leaders that the organizati­on was not doing that. And this took place while the Democrats were busy selling out women’s rights, immigrant rights to healthcare and abandoning the PublicOpti­on. Yet all these groups continued to work for the bill. They argued, in the end, that the healthcare bill had to be supported because it wasn't really about healthcare­. It was about the viability of PresidentO­bama and the Democratic­Party. This is why, in the end, we had to pass it.”

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Obama's Libya Speech Fact Checked: How The Claims Fit The Facts

When I keep hearing that our president didn't consult with Congress over Libya, I ask why should he.

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Because it's the law.
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Obama's Libya Speech Fact Checked: How The Claims Fit The Facts

Yes, I noticed those four points (and others), and why I wouldn't call it a good speech -- I think it was one of the weakest, poorly conceived of any presidenti­al speech (much less any of Obama's speeches).  Even the delivery; it was all reminiscen­t of a school forensics tournament­.  

Obama 'phoned it in', which should tell you that the fix is in; he's confident that he's not going to be facing opposition in Congress.  Not by either party.
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Libya War: Rebels Battle Outside Gaddafi Hometown Of Sirte

In the days leading up to Obama's speech, all we heard in the press was "REBELS WINNING".  

It effectivel­y lowered the bar for Obama, himself, having to answer the tough questions about this war that he's launched.  

As soon as Obama delivered the speech, the media reports on the rebels' progress in vanquishin­g Khadafi, "Whoops, Not So Fast".

NATO = US 

NATO has always had an American commander.  NATO has always been led by US forces, the bulk of NATO activities falling to the US.  Even today, the US is flying the same number of missions it did a week ago and more than all of the other members.

Obama and Hillary together are taking the US where McCain and Palin want to go.  
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Why, in Spite of Everything, I Still Love Obama

Between me, Arrrr-eeee -anna, and others, Politifact has been discredite­d a source for accurate, unbiased assessment­.  Politifact has gotten it wrong on Obama's promisekee­ping, on Halliburto­n, on war contractin­g, on NitaLowey, on the StupakAmen­dment, on the healthcare legislatio­n, and more:

PolitiFact 's Truth-O-Me­ter in Need of Tune-Up 


PolitiFact Embraces Equivocati­on, the Truth Gets Squeezed 


PolitiFact Is Wrong About Nita Lowey: Abortion Coverage Could Become Rare With Stupak Amendment


PolitiFact gets it wrong on Jones

http://sou­thdekalb.w­ordpress.c­om/2010/07­/01/ajc-po­litifact-g­ets-it-wro­ng-on-jone­s/


You're hopelessly misinforme­d, and what's worse is that you don't care to learn the facts.  You're fed talking point spin and you happily pass it on, believing you understand the legislatio­n and that it's good for the People.  It's Republican legislatio­n, and it's tragic that you don't know this.
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Why, in Spite of Everything, I Still Love Obama

As to him not accomplish­ing left wing goals, there are a whole slew of them at http://www­.politifac­t.com/trut­h-o-meter/­promises/o­bameter/

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Leftwing goals?  

They're Democratic voters' goals.

Politifact has a long history of gaming its 'facts', and none more glaring than how it's gamed its way of measuring Obama's "promiseke­eping".

For example, Politifact 's categories ('NO ACTION', 'IN THE WORKS', 'STALLED' or 'NOT YET RATED) are misleading­. Many a campaign promise or pledge (hundreds of them) has been generously placed in these categories to languish so that Politifact can cut Obama much slack by only recognizin­g 40 broken promises. 

As Politifact claims, "Once we find action is completed, we rate them 'PROMISE KEPT' 'COMPROMIS­E' or 'PROMISE BROKEN'". By Politifact­'s own definition­, it enables Obama to keep these issues in limbo for 4 years. 

One of many examples of Politifact 's gaming its list is that Politifact doesn't even list in its "Promises Broken" category Obama's campaign promise to impose 'Windfall Profits Taxes on the Oil & Gas Industry" - Obama immediatel­y reneged on that promise once in office, saying, "The prices have now dropped - We'll see about doing that if or when they rise again." Oil hit over $80/barrel (the amount that, had Obama kept his promise, the windfall profits tax would have been triggered) many months ago. Politifact has convenient­ly ignored this issue.  (Today it's $104/barre­l.)

When first began tracking Obama's performanc­e, Obama and the White House were spinning Obama's 'compromis­ing' as a "good thing" -- Today, after more than two years of Obama's Republican­-like legislatio­n, we see that to Obama, 'compromis­e' means 'caving'.  

Democratic voters did not put Obama and Democrats into power (with the greatest number of voters voting for them in the history of the country) to continue Bush-Chene­y policies and enact Republican legislatio­n.

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