Cracking Obama Nation
Sean Scallon
May 27, 2009
Good for Glenn Greenwald!
Unlike other leftists who wish pledge allegiance to Obama Nation, the Salon.com writer still remembers all that Obama said on the campaign trail last year, and is holding him accountable to it.
Whether it´s military tribunals for prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, whether its court briefs in support of warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens by the government and telecom companies, whether its covering up photos of torture or in other areas whether the current Administration´s policies are no different than the one it replaced, Greenwald has been there to point out the flip-flops and the inconsistencies between the campaign rhetoric and the realities of policies put forward and enacted upon.
But more so than just questions of civil liberties, on a whole range of topics from the war to the government bailout of the banking and financial sectors of the economy, the Obama Administration is on the same path as liberal administrations before it, as Andrew Bacevich so well put it:
THE HISTORY of American liberalism is one of promoting substantively modest if superficially radical reforms in order to refurbish and sustain the status quo. From Franklin Roosevelt´s New Deal to Bill Clinton´s New Covenant, liberals have specialized in jettisoning the redundant to preserve what they see as essential. In this sense, modern liberalism´s great achievement has been to deflect or neutralize calls for more fundamental change - a judgment that applies to President Obama, especially on national security."
Thus the only "change" is who governs the system itself, who runs the show, not whether the show itself needs to be re-written.
The question then becomes whether the inhabitants of Obama Nation, especially the young and the idealistic, acquiesce in the way American liberalism works and meekly accept it or will they become disillusioned.
Will they feel betrayed?
And then will they become angry enough to do something about it?
If they do, then such a crack within Obama Nation will be an important political development for the future.
The facts have to be faced that for right now, Obama Nation is the majority of the country and for right now, outside of a few precincts, there is no effective opposition to it.
Thus, any opposition to Obama in the future, whether in 2012 or to his designated successor in 2016, must depend upon splits within the majority.
After all, it was such splits within the GOP and the conservative establishment that did much to bring Obama to power.
And those splits could grow to bigger ones than just complaints over civil liberties.
Obama was elected in large part with his promise to bring the current war in Iraq and Afghanistan to end or least on pathways to ending.
But lets say by 2012 neither has successfully concluded. Let us also say that by 2012 large amounts of U.S. troops are still in Central Asia and are still dying. And let us say the economy, which has been greatly affected by such wars, still is stuck in neutral.
Thus Obama faces, like Richard Nixon, the prospect of trying to end a war with all sincerity but without a clear idea of how to do so without it appearing as if the U.S. somehow "lost."
So did Nixon engage in the secret bombing of Cambodia, so too does the bombing of a sovereign state by U.S. forces to which we are not at war with continue under Obama.
But there was one thing Nixon did not have to worry as far as his own party was concerned, a large and vocal anti-war wing. Republicans by and large allowed Nixon to conduct foreign policy without much complaint or very muttered complaints at best.
Obama, on the other hand, does have to worry about such a constituency within the Democratic Party and does have to worry whether by 2012 such a rupture could take place that could split his base of support.
If such a crack does take place in Obama Nation, then opposition to him has a better chance of succeeding than it does now. But it will take smart opponents to know how to take advantage of it. Hopefully someone will have learned something by then.
Sean Scallon is a freelance writer and newspaper reporter who lives in Arkansaw, Wisconsin. His work has appeared in Chronicles: A magazine of American Culture and The American His first-ever book: Beating the Powers that Be: Independent Political Movements and Parties of the Upper Midwest and their Relevance in Third-party Politics of Today is now out on sale from Publish America. Go to the their website at www.publishamerica.com to order a copy.
Unlike other leftists who wish pledge allegiance to Obama Nation, the Salon.com writer still remembers all that Obama said on the campaign trail last year, and is holding him accountable to it.
Whether it´s military tribunals for prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, whether its court briefs in support of warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens by the government and telecom companies, whether its covering up photos of torture or in other areas whether the current Administration´s policies are no different than the one it replaced, Greenwald has been there to point out the flip-flops and the inconsistencies between the campaign rhetoric and the realities of policies put forward and enacted upon.
But more so than just questions of civil liberties, on a whole range of topics from the war to the government bailout of the banking and financial sectors of the economy, the Obama Administration is on the same path as liberal administrations before it, as Andrew Bacevich so well put it:
THE HISTORY of American liberalism is one of promoting substantively modest if superficially radical reforms in order to refurbish and sustain the status quo. From Franklin Roosevelt´s New Deal to Bill Clinton´s New Covenant, liberals have specialized in jettisoning the redundant to preserve what they see as essential. In this sense, modern liberalism´s great achievement has been to deflect or neutralize calls for more fundamental change - a judgment that applies to President Obama, especially on national security."
Thus the only "change" is who governs the system itself, who runs the show, not whether the show itself needs to be re-written.
The question then becomes whether the inhabitants of Obama Nation, especially the young and the idealistic, acquiesce in the way American liberalism works and meekly accept it or will they become disillusioned.
Will they feel betrayed?
And then will they become angry enough to do something about it?
If they do, then such a crack within Obama Nation will be an important political development for the future.
The facts have to be faced that for right now, Obama Nation is the majority of the country and for right now, outside of a few precincts, there is no effective opposition to it.
Thus, any opposition to Obama in the future, whether in 2012 or to his designated successor in 2016, must depend upon splits within the majority.
After all, it was such splits within the GOP and the conservative establishment that did much to bring Obama to power.
And those splits could grow to bigger ones than just complaints over civil liberties.
Obama was elected in large part with his promise to bring the current war in Iraq and Afghanistan to end or least on pathways to ending.
But lets say by 2012 neither has successfully concluded. Let us also say that by 2012 large amounts of U.S. troops are still in Central Asia and are still dying. And let us say the economy, which has been greatly affected by such wars, still is stuck in neutral.
Thus Obama faces, like Richard Nixon, the prospect of trying to end a war with all sincerity but without a clear idea of how to do so without it appearing as if the U.S. somehow "lost."
So did Nixon engage in the secret bombing of Cambodia, so too does the bombing of a sovereign state by U.S. forces to which we are not at war with continue under Obama.
But there was one thing Nixon did not have to worry as far as his own party was concerned, a large and vocal anti-war wing. Republicans by and large allowed Nixon to conduct foreign policy without much complaint or very muttered complaints at best.
Obama, on the other hand, does have to worry about such a constituency within the Democratic Party and does have to worry whether by 2012 such a rupture could take place that could split his base of support.
If such a crack does take place in Obama Nation, then opposition to him has a better chance of succeeding than it does now. But it will take smart opponents to know how to take advantage of it. Hopefully someone will have learned something by then.
Sean Scallon is a freelance writer and newspaper reporter who lives in Arkansaw, Wisconsin. His work has appeared in Chronicles: A magazine of American Culture and The American His first-ever book: Beating the Powers that Be: Independent Political Movements and Parties of the Upper Midwest and their Relevance in Third-party Politics of Today is now out on sale from Publish America. Go to the their website at www.publishamerica.com to order a copy.
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