Then:
For me personally, he had me at "Yes, We Can."
Now:
I don't know what we should do, but I know one thing that we shouldn't do: pretend to ourselves that this man is delivering on what he promised when he first won our hearts.
Fearing the wrath of Dear Leader, congressional Republicans are either
refusing to comment on Donald Trump's disgusting pardons of violent Capitol
insurr...
6 hours ago
4 comments:
Obama also said change that wouldn't come from him, but from you. So what are you doing to bring change? You still need 218 to pass the house and 60 to pass the Senate. Obama isn't going to change those electeds and get them to vote right. Only YOU can. So, what are WE DOING?
Also, to be mad that "Obama isn't delivering on his promise for change" is simply ignorant of all that's already been done.... How many calls? How many knocks have been made? You don't get everything you want so we just give up? Say start over? Do we think a Green Party candidate, starting over in 3 years and working their way through the house and senate back to this same place will get us a better more progressive result?
seriously?
Many of us are extremely disappointed with the health care reform bill (among other things). I do not blame Obama for the weakness of the bill. He is willing to work with the congress he has and get what he can. Does he have a choice? Whatever gets passed, if it has any value at all, it's a starting point.
What exactly do people think
the President should have done differently?
As others have said in their comments: Did you do your part?
I will put to bed this derision and presumption as to the blogger’s contributions and commitment to political activism, seeing as how I have had the privilege to work beside him for several months on healthcare reform. Both he and I work full –time hours but elected political activism as our second full-time jobs, and I think for the blogger, his third job. This required countless hours spent phone banking in coffee shops, restaurants, houses, i.e. any place we could get fit a group of people together and provide our data managers with internet; canvasses which ranged from east Nashville to the farthest corners of Williamson county; events and organizational meetings, at which we would attempt to structure our next plan of actions. Both he and I held events on 10/20, a day when our organization along with several coalition partners amassed an effort which led to over 1/3 million people phoning their members of congress. The media dubbed that day the single greatest outpouring of support since Election Day ’08. These are a just a select few of the things I wish to highlight about the blogger and his personal contributions; I hope that for those who have and will comment, this is enough to satiate your queries.
(Hopefully) Moving on: I listened to the speeches when Obama asked that we bring change to Congress, to Washington D.C. The day I mentioned earlier, 10/20, when 1/3 million people demanded healthcare reform, with an overwhelming majority demanding a public option (also single payer) was a Tuesday; the very next day Harry Reid announced that the public option, at that time in peril, was back on the table. I chose to believe this was on the part of overwhelming public support; it worked! – the American people can deliver change to Washington. I then had to watch as that provision, along with several others I had fought so hard for, were stripped from the bill due to the obstruction of a few despite the 70+% of Americans supporting a public option. I questioned why Obama, who DID campaign on a public health plan and also supported a public option at a town hall in July, did not firmly stand for what the majority of the public demanded. I listened to the comments of Lieberman and Howard Dean, both who at one point in time opposed one form or another of the Senate Health Care Bill. I also listened as Robert Gibbs chided not Lieberman but Dean; the White House villainized the person without the vote, the person who has no congressional hand with which to shape the bill (all the while, Lieberman was seemingly enjoying his part in the degradation of the bill). When asked if I believe the President did all he could to salvage meaningful parts of the bill, my answer is simply no. One of the “perks”, if you will, of being POTUS is the political clout you carry within your party. The question: what else did we expect him to do better/what was he (POTUS) supposed to do? I answer: shut down the obstructionists within his majority party, keep the party in line. As to the question of: well what, are you saying that we should scrap the bill, just play do-over when we are so close to the finish line? Maybe. Maybe not. If I was assured that we would be able to better this bill with time, as many use Social Security as an example, I would say, “No. Pass this, we will learn from our lessons and work toward betterment in the future.” But that is precisely the point of this post, can I be assured this? Who can assure this – Obama: our president who came out in an interview to the Washington Post a few weeks ago and claimed never to have campaigned on or for a public option, yet in ’08 before the election, gave an interview to that same news source supporting a public health insurance plan and who also at a town hall meeting in July did campaign for the public option. The White House then took the “splitting hairs” strategy – word play. Maybe asking for assurances that we will come back to this bill and improve it is too much to ask, but what are people pinning their hopes on if not the same assurance they cannot guarantee?
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