The liberal class is discovering what happens when you tolerate the intolerant. Let hate speech pollute the airways. Let corporations buy up your courts and state and federal legislative bodies. Let the Christian religion be manipulated by charlatans to demonize Muslims, gays and intellectuals, discredit science and become a source of personal enrichment. Let unions wither under corporate assault. Let social services and public education be stripped of funding. Let Wall Street loot the national treasury with impunity. Let sleazy con artists use lies and deception to carry out unethical sting operations on tottering liberal institutions, and you roll out the welcome mat for fascism. ”

Read the full article by Chris Hedges.

Wisconsin is to union-busting what Arizona is to anti-health care reform, anti-gun control, and anti-immigration policy.

The number of groups targeted by conservatives continues to grow. This should provide progressives, liberals, independents, working/middle-class Americans, moderate conservatives, and rational people of most persuasions the impetus to fight back in a focused, organized, and powerful manner.

Each group fighting for and/or against specific issues will not bring anywhere near the force that a collective, shared coalition will. Given the seemingly bottomless resources and endless venom of the Coke Brothers (as just one example) and a far right-activist Supreme Court, the real battle can only be won by Americans coming together around a common agenda and strategy, beginning now and extending through GOTV efforts for the 2012 elections.

I am initiating a list and am prompting you to extend it. It will be helpful to creating common ground if you were to cite one particular event or (proposed) legislation that illustrates your point. I’ll aggregate these and share them for the purpose of forming an American Coalition against Greed and Ignorance. The goal of our initial exercise will be to create a centerpiece that unites all of those who are experiencing alienation as a result of an agenda built upon a foundation of greed and ignorance.

Send your suggestions and insights to mkyankee – at – gmail.com.

My list is arranged alphabetically for the purpose of giving all constituencies equal footing as we begin to coalesce.

African-Americans
Educators
Environmentalists
Gay Americans
Immigrants
Latino-Americans
Mothers
Muslim Americans
Republican Intellectuals
Senior Citizens
The Underemployed
The Unemployed
Those Who Favor ‘Single-Payer’
Union members
Urban residents
Well-Educated Americans

Consider:

What percent of all voters do these groups represent (without replication)?

How might these groups coalesce to galvanize the potential of Alienated Americans?

What person(s) and/or groups may be best positioned to spearhead such a national movement?

What I had hoped would bring promise as a healing moment has turned into a pissing contest.

It took President Obama to put the events of the past several days into proper perspective.  To my mind, the words that best resonated at the service in Tucson are in his tribute to a little girl.  A very special nine-year-old, mind you.  Nevertheless a person of far greater maturity, character, and purpose than many adults who daily attempt to influence American way.

She saw all this through the eyes of a child, undimmed by the cynicism or vitriol that we adults all too often just take for granted.  I want to live up to her expectations.  I want our democracy to be as good as she imagined it.

President Obama in Tucson: “The Forces that Divide Us are Not as Strong as Those that Unite Us”

Let’s compare that hopeful image with what the “adults” have actually been saying since last Saturday’s event:

Peter King (Congressman and Chairperson of the Homeland Security Committee) announced that he will introduce legislation that would make it illegal to bring a gun within 1,000 feet of a government official,  Give us all a break. How self-serving can a (elected) person be?  That makes it okay to bring a gun to a school board meeting.  How often do we read about a school incident in which an administrator or teacher has been targeted by a gun-wielding nut?  Or to college campuses (after all, think Va Tech massacre).  National parks–of course.  Never know when a visitor might be attacked by Bambi.
Like a law that would have forewarned a violent nut-job not to bring a gun to a public meeting place would certainly have halted Loughner in his tracks (‘Let’s see, perhaps I should not have brought my Glock with me this morning . Instead, what thoughtful and enlightening question might I pose to Cong. Giffords on this beautiful day?’)
Had Cong. King not been a gunrunner, supporting terrorist Noraid (which, in turn, supplied bomb material to the IRA) maybe I’d look at his stupidity from a more admirable perspective.  Nah, not really.

Representative Louie Gohmert (Texas, of course) is drafting a measure to allow members of Congress to carry guns in the District of Columbia, including in the Capitol and on the House floor.
Gohmert says he and his colleagues need to be able to protect themselves, in light of the mass shooting in Arizona.’  There’s another elected official to revere as a role model for nine-year-olds like Christina Green.  Meanwhile the President spoke to the hearts and minds of Americans, ‘rallying our country to use this moment to reflect on the nation’s behavior’.
Surely Cong. Pete Wilson (Texas, natch) should be enabled to bring a gun to the floor, perhaps finding it a reasonable alternative to screaming, ‘You lie’, during a State of the Nation speech.  And, Cong. Chaffetz (Utah) and Shuler (North carolina) should tote semiautomatics into the Capitol.
That would really resonate with Christina, I’m sure. In a country that makes it easier to get a gun license than a drivers license, who might quibble with a teacher carrying a concealed weapon–just in case?  She would reject the congressmen’s arguments quicker than the would the Supreme Court.

Nothing like an American crisis to bring out the best in our Congress.  This, most certainly, will raise opinion polls consistently showing that Americans view Congress as a dysfunctional body.

Somewhat lower down the list is Sarah Palin–the semi-literate who quit as governor half way through her term so she could make a ton of money, whip the uninformed into frenzies, and place cross hairs on opponents.  Quite the role model.

Here’s where I am going with this rant:

1. The Supreme Court has decided that Americans’ second amendment rights to own a gun is the law of the land and will remain so.  Someone needs to reframe the argument (someone with greater national clout than Carolyn McCarthy) in terms of the 21st century, comparing a musket to a Glock, hunters to police and military.  Now where might we find someone not owned by the ‘slippery slope’ NRA who is risking his/her political career to do the right thing?  May have to begin looking among nine-year-olds who get it.

2.  Writing laws aimed at preventing irrational people from doing irrational things strikes me as irrational.  Is expecting this country’s highest elected officials to serve as role models for little children, hormone-driven teenagers, and mature adults expecting too much?

President Obama calmly and eloquently beseeches us all to ‘talk with one another in a way that heals, not in a way that wounds.’  I respect him greatly as a compassionate person, a devoted father and husband, and the elected leader of our nation. I would want Barack to tell me that I am doing the right thing as a role model, as a friend, as a husband and grandfather, as a caring and grateful American.
I’m trying.  Believe me, I’m really trying.  Easier said than done.  They make it really, really hard.

Your replies, responses, rants, are awaited.

Bottom line, nothing changed. Those true to their liberal/progressive DNA clung to the same values to which they had been long-term committed. After all, a leopard can’t change its spots. We simply exchanged labels.

More recently the unutterable word has become COMPROMISE. Not fashionable. Not ethical. The label serves to further POLARIZE. Now, there’s a useful tag: ‘I’m not a moderate; I’m a polarizer. And proud of it.’

And who does the compromise cloak fit best? President Barack Obama. Yeah, sure. Now he is getting it from both ends of the spectrum. In the short term, the C-label is unfair, counterproductive. Too close to words such as pragmatic, practical, thoughtful. In the long term, “Compromise, like smoking, may be hazardous to your health.”

Recall what Obama’s presidency has managed to accomplish during the past copule of months:

• Most recently, his foreign policy team refortified critical alliances from NATO to East Asia. Following the NOvember (not a typo) election, there were whispers of how American power had eroded and the president had become unfocused and weakened. He now has a stronger, better aligned team. Tom Donilon, the new National Security Adviser, flies below the media radar but is a proven policy guy. Rahm Emauel is busy running for governor and that will make foreign policy goals somewhat easier to accomplish. It already has.
• Obama’s backbone is evident once again. He has strengthened ties with India without upsetting Pakistan! No easy accomplishment, for sure.
• An important free trade agreement–without making key concessions to South Korea. Bi-partisan support at home. Impressive.
• Holbrooke (he will be missed) got NATO to support a timetable for Afghanistan’s transition. Maybe not all we had hoped for, but nonetheless a neat trick.
• The Afghanistan-Pakistan Review avoided a political land mine. Fragile? Sure. Reversible? All too likely. Nevertheless an achievement in the short term.
• Repealing ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’. Anyone think that was not acrobatic?
• Ratification of the New START Treaty with Russia. You have to bow to this one. Almost every conservative politician who recognized that this was a major accomplishment had outwardly condemned it. Amazing. Yet, not surprising.
• Formation of an Iraqi government. This may be a house of cards. But for now, we’ll take it.
• Korea. We were about to prepare to mobilize for war. All it would take would be a tad more provocation by North Korea. Its nuclear capability was a threat to America. Obama got the Chinese to intervene on our behalf. North Korea got the message.

Those who do not not believe that each of these achievements involved COMPROMISE are mistaken.

Those unwilling to accept that COMPROMISE will be a recurring path as we move ahead (in terms of time and in terms of PROGRESS) can’t get past the perfect.

At the start of Obama’s presidency the phrase, “Don’t let the prerfect be the enemy of the good” was fashionable. It remained the mantra. Until it didn’t. It didn’t because COMPROMISE became a dirty word.

It seems the L-word is back as an acceptable adjective. I am noticing that progressives are more often referring to themselves as liberals once again. It took a bit of time to get there. Too long in my opinion. But it is happening, as in ‘I’m a LIBERAL’.

Repeat after me. ‘I’m a LIBERAL and I’m proud to say it.”

Good. Now say it again with conviction.

Great. Three more times.–loud.

Even greater: Go say it where someone can hear you.

Best: Say it straight to a conservative who spends his/her days bitching about Obama-Care or saving the auto companies and hundreds of thousands of jobs or financial reform or . . . (see above).

Soon, the C-word will regain acceptance as a verb, an action word, that can be said in public without having to run for cover. ‘COMPROMISE’ will once again be permissible for use in mixed company–liberals and conservatives working toward some areasonable goal. It will be like the ’90s. In hindsight, Bob Dole does not appear to have been so bad.

Most important, if we are to declaw Issa, Palin, Kantor, and their ill ilk, we must return to being a culture of reasonableness. Might that then become the R-word? People will only converse across political lines in the shadows, in locked rooms, after checking for transimtters?

Compromise is too often viewed as the enemy of reason, rather than being somewhat synonymous.

I just returned from a stay in Florida. So, believe me, I know.

After the Democratic “shellacking” in the midterm elections, everyone wondered how President Obama would respond. Would he show what he was made of? Would he stand firm for the values he believes in, even in the face of political adversity?
[....]
Whatever is going on inside the White House, from the outside it looks like moral collapse — a complete failure of purpose and loss of direction.
[...]
So what are Democrats to do? The answer, increasingly, seems to be that they’ll have to strike out on their own. In particular, Democrats in Congress still have the ability to put their opponents on the spot — as they did on Thursday when they forced a vote on extending middle-class tax cuts, putting Republicans in the awkward position of voting against the middle class to safeguard tax cuts for the rich.

It would be much easier, of course, for Democrats to draw a line if Mr. Obama would do his part. But all indications are that the party will have to look elsewhere for the leadership it needs.

Read the full column @ NYTimes.com.
Some Yes We Can! Long Island Board Members expressed their opinions on this column.

Marvin had the following comment:

Agreed. I made this point over and over at yesterday’s meetings. I am at
my most conflicted level since the 2008 election. Hopefully, backbone will
persist and the State of the Nation speech will bring honor and conviction
back to where it had been no so long ago.

Susan said:

I’m really sad to say that I agree with Krugman

Phil said:

I think Mr. Krugman badly misses the mark with today’s column ” Freezing Out Hope”. To begin, the freeze on Federal pay, although small in the overall picture, is important symbolically. The public’s perception is to a certain degree correct, government employees have not suffered nearly as much as the general public who have experienced near depression level unemployment, many out of work for years or otherwise underemployed just to keep food on the table. Seniors didn’t get a COLA this year, rightly so because the cost of living has not gone up. Why should Federal employees get cost of living increase? Furthermore “a freeze” is somewhat the equivalent of the unilateral ban on “ear marks” by Republicans. The “ban” was also symbolic, welcomed by not only tea party type but also by independents. I think both the “freeze” and the ‘ban” are good unilateral politics.

As far as the bigger issue of the Bush tax cuts we have to ask ourselves who will be hurt more if the cuts expire for everyone including the middle class taxes? Who will be blamed when a family earning on $60,000 per year has to pay almost $3000 more in taxes or almost $6,000 for a family earning $120,000. Who will be blamed the President or the Republicans? Is it a bigger risk for politicians or the middle class?

To a large degree this problem of communication and symbolism was almost two years in the making. As President Obama has admitted they did a poor job of explaining successful legislation. For example: one third the “stimulus” was a tax cut but almost no one realizes it? The Health reform debate dragged on for a year and showed the worst part of making the legislative “sausage”.

Much of it to placate democrats and independents such as Senators Nelson and Lieberman, not republicans. Finally the bail-out of Wall Street was done without caps on bonuses. As a result Wall Street will give out a record $20 billion in 2010 in bonuses, while the middle class is suffering.

The President can’t make the same symbolic mistakes again. I fear he will be blamed for gridlock if he loses this “game of chicken” but the tax cuts expire and the middle class ends up paying thousands of dollars per year in additional taxes. Since the president won election partially on the basis of post-partisanship, and if he loses the battle of chicken, I think the President should instead extend the tax cuts temporarily (for all) but not for more than 2 years and live to fight in 2012 for his re-election? But certainly I don’t think it an easy answer.

Ben Brodsky posted a comment on the comment section of the column:

Hope is more than just a pay raise.

While I agree with your premise – freezing federal workers salaries will do very little to effect the deficit – and these actions will not help President Obama in finding support from the Republicans, it should not be looked at as an attack on liberal values. A two year pay freeze, while inflation is very low, at a time of such economic upheaval and uncertainty isn’t the end of the world.

A temporary freeze, while possibly misguided, can have some positive benefits, such as giving these agencies more money to hire new employees or improve the efficiency of their department. At least the employees know they have a job that isn’t going anywhere, and right now, that is probably has more value than a pay raise. Stability.

As for your assertion that President Obama is in some way attacking his liberal supporters with this and other policies, I can’t help but question the basis for this assessment. President Obama was not the liberal/progressive candidate some labeled him. Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel were the only two true liberal Democratic candidates in 2008. Though he had many liberal values and views, many assumed he was far more consistently progressive then he ever claimed to be.

President Obama spoke of admiration for Ronal Reagan, of his opposition to legalization of cannabis, of his support of the Afghanistan War – clear examples of his not-so-liberal tendencies. He spoke more of pragmatism and compromise — remember his Red State/Blue State speech?

His focus since his inauguration appears to be a longterm plan to gain support amongst a wide cross-section of America, not based on traditional dividing points in American society, but a better tomorrow achieved through common sense.

In 2 years time, will a Tea Party activist who sees better Health Care for a dying parent realize that President Obama might have done some good with health care reform? Will the Wall Street banker appreciate the booming economy that is based on real small business growth, putting the days of financial wizardry behind them? Will the middle-class family be better off when their child, who was able to get reasonable student loans from the government, can stay on the family health care until 26? Will the soldier appreciate not being sent to war in a nation that we had no business fighting in? When the soldier can also discuss his sexual orientation without fear of reprimand? Will the bloggers appreciate the trove of government information now in the public domain?

Those expecting a liberal, progressive dawning of America with the election of Barack Obama were only fooling themselves with their own hopes. The fact is President Obama has been doing great things for the future of America while focusing very little on the short-term political benefits of his actions. I wonder how many of his supporters actually check out the White House website and blog on a regular basis or if the majority of them just find out about his presidency through watching MSNBC and reading liberal blogs?

We are a fickle people in America, not because we change our minds, but because we refuse to evolve our thinking and reconsider our actions. So many supported President Obama so vehemently during the campaign in 2008, yet today are so often disappointed because they found out he wasn’t exactly what they hoped he would be.

Well, it is time to wise up and support our President and country at this time of great challenge. We should not be looking for “hope” and “change” in our personal hopes and dreams, but we must have hope in a better future for ourselves, our nation, and our planet, even if it ends up being more than two years away.

These times might not be as dire as the times that try men’s souls in 1776, but a great deal of similarities exhaust between then and now. I suppose we shall see if we as a nation are better or worse at being patriots than we were at the founding of the nation.

“I see no real cause for fear. I know our situation well, and can see the way out of it.”