{Cross-posted on Broadsides.org}
Wait a second. I’m starting to think I saw this movie. You know, the one where the president at a time of crisis rushes around in a hyperkinetic fit telling us to follow his plan or face death to nearly everything and everyone we care about. And, by now, we all know how those movies end.
In the days after 9/11, President George W. Bush grabbed the bullhorn at the site of the former-Twin Towers and went rushing into what can only honestly be called a maniacal, ill-informed, ill-targeted, tragically executed and otherwise disastrous grand plan to topple Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. Why? Weapons of mass destruction, of course.
But the overly-hyped Bush, jacked up by the tales of macho-triumph being spun by Cheney, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, put logic on hold and, instead, exported his fear and loathing to whip the nation into a malleable mob that would join the great suspension of logic and support any and all rash military acts as “the only thing” we could do. Well, that or face lung lesions and death from the onslaught of chemical and biological weapons that were “just about” to rain down upon us.
They even added color to their great cartoon caper: The ridiculous color-coding of the nation’s risk alert status. That, my friends, was nothing but an elaborate psy-ops orchestrated upon each of us who drank from the chalice of American Culture enough to watch, see or read about the dangling lights of fear, fear and more fear. And they knew that when they needed something – say, a new bomber, bomb target or tax cut – all they had to do was up the fear meter and, as a result, scare/shock us into submission.
But now Obama’s got his hands on the fear joystick. And, sadly, he didn’t seem to learn much from the grand misadventures of Bush.
Obama, of course, was the unfortunate recipient of a nation spinning out of control economically. Thanks, George, indeed. So he certainly deserves a moment or two worth of understanding. But those moments are up for me.
Obama’s now rushing around with a metaphorical bullhorn of his own, yelling to anyone who will listen that we must throw one trillion dollars more to corporate criminals. That, or face a hideous economic death to anything and everyone we love.
Hmmm, smells like weapons of economic destruction to me.
And please, don’t misconstrue any of this to think I’m belittling the economic crisis this nation (and world) is facing. Sorry, but you don’t need an economist to know which the money winds are blowing today. Besides, I think those of us swimming at or near the bottom understand this economic crisis a whole hell of a lot better than the stuff-shirts who keep gallivanting before Congress with their hat in hand and their crocodile tears announcing that they’re now willing to forgo their bonuses for the year. Oh, the sacrifices!
Sorry, but that’s like letting a bank robber go free because they’ve promised not to rob again for a year.
Like Bush in his post-9/11 coronation of our new state-of-fear, Obama is flying the fear flag in the face of the economic catastrophe that has landed in his lap. According to Obama, we have no time. We have no options. And we must act now. Or else.
As much as I keep hoping for the director of this movie to step in and yell, “cut, cut, cut,” realizing it’s feeling all too familiar to last year’s movie, it’s not happening. Worse, it’s working – Obama is convincing that malleable mob to rush to action once again. Silly America, when will we ever learn?
Make no mistake, today’s economic crisis is Obama’s 9/11. It’s the defining crisis of his presidency. And, unfortunately for the believers in real change, it’s a crisis that Obama is already mishandling.
In his rush to act, Obama has entered the shark pool of big money and big influence and made nice with them all, resulting in a “solution” that can only honestly be called a maniacal, ill-informed, ill-targeted, tragically executed and otherwise disastrous grand plan to save a nation’s economy.
I know we’re in the Twitter and Blackberry age, whereby everything has to happen fast, fast and faster, and where everything that has to be said better fit in a “subject line,” but, my goodness, can’t we take a breath as a nation once in a while? We Twittered our way to war, yellow-ribboned ourselves in deeper, and now seem ready to instant message ourselves to economic oblivion.
In other words, shallow fucking haste. Or paper mache principles. Or both.
The economic crisis is now Obama’s – no matter what he inherited. He’s made it the first act in his very own presidential drama. And, sadly for us all, it will be the defining act that will ultimately pop the remaining hope balloons and send a nation back to reality: We got fooled again.
Obama had his moment served to him before Chief Justice Roberts had time to flub up his oath of office. Dangling there on the key chain handed over by the oh-so-happy to get out of there Bushies was a neon light that certainly flashed: Economic Disaster.
But Obama has failed in his response so far. He has cow-towed to the economic elite. He has bent over for only one consitutuency: The Right. And he has wielded his fear stick and told us all that we must do as his administration says or face … or face… or face… (oh yeah) the same old shit that got us into this mess: Corrupt power from the top.
Oh well, at least we all forgot about the war, the lack of health care, the lack of an adequate safety net, and the continued mockery of our dreams and ideals.
Go Obama, Go!