Happy friggin’ new year

I’d like to say “Happy New Year,” but it’s not looking very good for so many people. “Hope and change” seems to have dissolved into despair and more of the same.

I’ve developed a pretty thick skin, politically speaking, over the years. Idealistic in my youth, as the youth tends to be, I thought our generation (I’m 55) could turn things around. When politician after politician dashed my hopes, I decided it was the system, and things would never change until fundamental changes were made there.

I still believe that. Most of all, we must somehow, as a nation, get the big money out of politics. It is corrupting everything, especially Congress, as the recent health care fiasco so obviously shows. (When over 70% of the nation says it wants a robust public option, for example, you’d think it’d be a slam dunk. But no, the insurance companies that pile on the cash for Lieberman and his ilk get their way, yet again!)

I allowed myself to believe Barack Obama was really going to be different. After all, he wasn’t part of the privileged class, like so many of our presidents have been. He worked hard to make something of himself, then eschewed high-paying lawyer jobs to work for the downtrodden on the streets of Chicago. Surely, I thought, this man could not be so easily corrupted.

But there’s something about holding high office, apparently. Now, he does the bidding of his generals and wages war, as is the American custom. He sits on the sidelines and twiddles his thumbs as the very issue that got him elected gets debated in Congress, seemingly oblivious to the fact that botching it would piss off the majority of people who voted for him. He didn’t even defend the things he campaigned for, like the public option.

He and the super-majority of Democrats we elected compromise before the debate even starts, then compromise some more. Any real bargainer knows you start with something way beyond what you expect to get (in this example, Single Payer), giving you a bargaining tool, in order to end up with something acceptable (like a robust public option). You don’t start with what you really want. Not when you’re negotiating with such a powerful force as Big Money, which is, in the final analysis, the actual opponent.

So, surprise, surprise, we end up with something Big Money (and Big Insurance) is very happy with, but which helps the public very little, if at all. And now we’re set to do it all over again, with bank “reform.” Yeah, right! I can save everyone a lot of time: just ask the banks what they want. They’ll get it anyway.

As I see it, every group fighting for change on any issue ought to all come together and fight for campaign reform. Because until we get the big money out of politics, we’ll keep witnessing the same charade, over and over again.

So, happy friggin’ new year.

Stop the Socialism for the Big Banks

I don’t envy President Obama. While I can take issue with some of his strategies – I believe we should get out of Afghanistan, for example, and he should stop compromising away real health care reform – I can appreciate just how monumental the task of turning this country around is.

Reforming health care? It’s only been nearly a century since Theodore Roosevelt first campaigned in 1912 for it. As Obama told Congress on September 9th of this year, “I may not be the first president to tackle health care reform, but I intend to be the last.” A bold statement, to be sure, something Mr. Obama is very good at. But accomplishing that goal, even with majorities in both houses – as we are seeing – is something else altogether.

Add to that the job of recovering from the greatest financial meltdown since the Great Depression, and you’ve already got a Herculean task. And we haven’t even mentioned all the other sticky issues, like averting a climate crisis, nuclear proliferation, environmental challenges, etc.

One could say that dealing with health care reform just now might have been taking on too much, although it is urgently needed and with Democratic majorities, it seemed like a good time to take it on. But averting financial disaster was not a voluntary task, it was thrust upon the new president. Unfortunately, out of ignorance on the subject, or a blind faith in those in the top echelons of the financial industry, or for whatever reason, Obama chose to trust the wrong team to help him. Now he must recognize his error, and find a new team, and a new strategy. The country’s long term financial health, and even our democracy, depend on it.

In a October 9th interview on PBS’s Bill Moyers Journal with Ohio Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur, she said, “What they’re doing is they’re taking their mistakes and they’re dumping them on the taxpayer... It’s all at risk because of their behavior. We aren’t reigning them in. The laws of Congress passed last year in terms of housing, were hollow... It’s socialism for the big banks.”

Referring to the president, she said, “I think some of the people that he trusted haven’t delivered. I urge him to get new [financial] generals. It’s time.”

I have to agree, and I’m very sorry Obama couldn’t see from the start that you can’t fix a broken system by hiring the people who broke it, and who are invested in bailing it out. But now that it’s completely obvious, it is time to get a new team in there. Don’t be afraid to admit your mistakes, Mr. President, otherwise you’ll be just like the failed president before you.

Unfortunately, the opportunity inherent in the original crisis may have already slipped away. It may, in fact, be a nearly impossible task, but we’ve got to try. The financial sector needs fundamental reform, and it needs it now.