The attacks on this President by the so-called base are sickening !

[RBInMaine]

Those in the "base" who are choosing to attack this President for actually GOVERNING as best he can given the Senate numbers and rules, and given oceans of Republican obstructionism, but who still have gotten TONS of pretty damn good progressive legislation over these last two years from Dems and this President should be hanging their heads in shame. They are out of tune, out of touch, and out of reality. The vast laundry list of accomplishment that is pretty damn well PROGRESSIVE could sink a boat. And yet it is bitch bitch bitch about Obama. Where is the FIGHT against the TeaBaggers? Where is the FIGHT again the R's? Where is the ORGANIZING to beat TeaPublicans???? If half the energy was directed at actually attacking Republicans and ORGANIZING and VOTING to beat them, we'd probably have 70 Senate seats and 400 in the House.

No, instead it has to be bitch whine piss and moan about Obama and our own because some things just aren't far enough to the left.

I'm a lifelong active Democrat, and this is shameful.

[4dsc]

1. I refer you to what Keith Olbermann said

Run time: 11:58
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HW3a704cZlc

Worth watching again or for the first time in your case.

[elias49]

9. Olberman getting way too strident for my taste

He needs to walk into the light of day from time to time.
He's going over the top - way too impressed with himself.
Walking in the molasses of Washington is a little different from having your own nightly television program.
Maybe he should run for public office.
Then he could show us all how it's done.:sarcasm:

[dennis4868]

21. Yes...

He can show us how you get your legislation through the senate even though you can't have a vote on it because of the fillubuster.

[remember2000forever]

10. OMG ! Keith Is SPOT ON! Thanks!

[dennis4868]

14. KO is not a realist....

He yells from the hilltops about the horrors of the tax cut deal but he never says how he would get rid of the tax cuts for the rich when the repubs WILL DEFINITELY fillubuster any plan that raises taxes on the wealthy. And if you fight this (whatever that means) and January 1 comes, you are not going to get a decent deal because the repubs will have even more power....so the middle class and the lowest tax bracket people will suffer the most. Easy to bash Obama if you don't see the reality of the situation....Obama has to govern and look out for the little guy....those bashing Obama don't have to.

[elias49]

15. kick

[jeanpalmer]

25. How did they get all this power

standing up for a small number of people who are widely viewed as greedy, the rich, while having only ~41 votes in the Senate and a clear minority in the House? And they don't even have the bully pulpit. They're not strong they're weak. They've been built up into this mythic force by weakling Democrats who don't stand for anything and don't have any fight in them.

[dennis4868]

26. How did they get all this power?

2 answers:

1. Their friends in the media who lie to the people; and

2. The fillubuster which they have used a record number of times in the senate so that nothing obama really wants gets passed (and they keep doing it because they know they will pay no political price for it but instead liberals will blame Obama, which is happening right now).

[polmaven]

30. Right on...

I have admired KO...but that rant was over the top.

[xxqqqzme]

66. You do know the seeds for privatizing

social security are hidden in this deal? You do know the lead deal maker was Biden and lipless mitch?

[Warren Stupidity]

2. How dare they oppose the Bush Tax Cuts for Billionaires!

Capitulationism forever!

[rfranklin]

8. Capitulationism...that's funny!

did you make that up? Better trademark it already!

[Warren Stupidity]

29. I am a fierce advocate for capitulationism.

I have seen the light.

[AzDar]

3. The attacks by the President on the so-called base are sickening !

Fixed that for ya.

:hi:

[Jokerman]

6. +1

[MissDeeds]

27. +1000

Thanks for the fact check.

[bluethruandthru]

36. Thank you! n/t

[Critters2]

74. LOL! Thanks for that! nt

[bluerum]

4. happy to unrec this one

[elias49]

5. I agree. Idealism is great for the soul

but Barack Obama is not some Harry Potter character that can wave a wand and make things happen. He hasn't been in the White House 2 years yet. The screaming left (and I think, though I haven't done a study, are largely the younger members) is pissed off because he didn't 'fight harder' to force the sunset of upper-income tax cuts. Fight 'till when? Until the lame-duck congress disolved and January rolled in? What then?
I consider myself a progressive democrat and it angers me no end that the rich are getting super-rich and the middle class is suffering, but I don't see how he could have gotten a better deal before the end of 2010.
Maybe SALT treaties have some intrinsic value.
Maybe health care improvements have some intrinsic value.
Financial regulation has merit.
Education reform has long-term benefits to the middle class.
There are any numbers of issues that have been addressed over the past 23 months. Should all these havr ben put on a back burner so that he could fight the 'good fight' against greed?
Not so sure.

23 months...each of us should maybe ask "What have I accomplished over the past 2 years?"

[Bluerthanblue]

37. well said!

wish more people would listen and think about what you've said-

:grouphug:

[SkyDaddy7]

7. THANK-YOU!!!!!!!!!!! [phone]

[impik]

11. It's not the base. They just want to think they're the base.

[watrwefitinfor]

44. +1

[Cassandra]

12. We could have gotten better legislation...

or at least a more forcefully made case for it if the President had bothered to make the case publicly for the public option, or for letting the tax cut bill expire, but he says those things weakly, I suppose because he doesn't believe in them himself. If he thinks we got 90% of what we wanted in the healthcare legislation, he is deluded.
What progressives want is not "lefty" legislation but EFFECTIVE legislation. Obama said he wanted to do what works, but what he's doing either won't work or won't work as well as what we want. And on top of that, he insults me for wanting what would be good for the economy while being ever so solicitous of what the repukes want, which will destroy the country.
I've been an active, voting Democrat for almost 40 years.

[dennis4868]

17. Obama made the case against tax cuts for the wealthy...

During the campaign...polls show this is the case....but just because the people want something does not mean the fillubustering repubs give a shit....that's what Obama means when he says they are hostage takers.

[olegramps]

52. That is when you take your case directly to the citizens.

Rather than making backroom deals with the enemy he should at least have been consulting with his own party. Yeah, that party that elected him president. This is not a fabrication. The Democratic Party leadership is in open revolt over this latest fiasco. He not only backed down of the tax cuts for the wealthy, he threw in a reduction of the inheritance tax and continued the ridiculous 15% capital gains tax. You know,the tax that allows the wealthy to pay a paltry tax on a major source of their income while the Middle Class pays twice as much on their meager earning.

They are going to come after Social Security and he is signaling a capitulation on this issue just as he did in regard the HCF and Financial Reform. His only achievements were in areas where he didn't have any significant opposition other wise he caves in like some wimp against the playground bully and hands over his lunch money. Only in his case it is the future of the working class that is being sacrificed. Get used to the idea of extended families that were the norm of the early last century before FDR's Fair Deal. Not only your kids will be living in the basement, but you grand kids and great grand kids if you manage to live that long on cat food. Sorry,but he is a total disappointment.

[bowens43]

13. what is shameful

is life long democrats defending the actions and inactions of this president.

this man has caved on every major issue. he has not fought for anything. republicans say jump and he asks how high.

[Supersedeas]

23. blind affiliation to celebrity and personality can be just as sickening, no?

[Bluerthanblue]

38. you either have limited vision, haven't been paying attention or

aren't an honest person.

"he has not fought for anything"

"caved on every major issue"

be careful how you use your words.

:thumbsdown:

[political_Dem]

16. Exactly. Our side does not know who represents our true enemies.

We're going to lose election after election because people won't develop a coordinated plan of attack against the GOP. :(

The fight for more seats in Congress should be our biggest priority.

[Botany]

18. I did not get up @ 4:30 AM and work until 10:00 PM on election day 2008 ...

... to give extended tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires, keep up a never ending and un-winnable in
Afghanistan, let all the crimes of bush/Cheney/Rove go unpunished, keep Gitmo open, and/or to be called a
fucking retard. Barack Obama seems to think that that just because his body has warmth that he can sleep
w/ rattlesnakes, aka republicans, and they will not bite him because he is keeping them comfy. Every time you
give in to a bully he will just come back for more.

[watrwefitinfor]

42. My son,

who is not young anymore, gets up at 3 p.m. every afternoon, six days a week, sometimes seven, puts in a 12 hour night shift doing physical labor until 5 a.m., plus has a 1 hour commute each way. He has one of the few well-paying factory jobs left in a 100 mile radius. He cannot feed his family on it and buy gas to get to work and provide heat (15 degrees here the other night) and he makes too much for food stamps or any other kind of assistance. I buy green vegies and fruit for them and vitamins for my great grands out of my SS pittance.

His wife lost her job over a year ago and has been unable to find work. His two adult children cannot find work and are drifting into the bad habits of many of the youth in our area who are chronically and maybe forever jobless. They are on a downward slide and we haven't found a way to stop it. He is supporting them, plus his two grandchildren.

Obama just made a last ditch effort to help them and others like them. My son and his family and I truly appreciate all the efforts of the "left" to try to keep this president from doing what he can for the working class.

And it is fixing to get a whole lot worse, when millions of people wake up on January 1st and find that the Dems and "the left" have cost them their tax breaks and their unemployment extensions. These are real, voting people. My son and his family have always voted straight Democratic ticket. They are not old rads like me. They are too busy trying to survive to engage in much analysis. But they are plenty smart enough to see what "the left" is doing to them now.

Wat

[smiley]

53. What the left is doing to them...?

You "appreciate the efforts of the left" but yet you feel your son is "plenty smart enough to see what the left is doing to them now".

I think you may be contradicting yourself. Wait and see where your son's financial situation is in a few years because of these tax cuts. Hopefully he'll still have that factory job. But I guess we just have to wait and see now because the deal has already been brokered.

:)

[Name removed]

63. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

65. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[watrwefitinfor]

75. To have my retort

upon being misquoted singled out as rude from someone who tells me to "piss off" and calls me an "a-whole" - well on DU today it is all somehow beyond my ability to assimilate.

I suspect that we are both capable of better bahavior and that we would be exchanging pleasant greetings on another subject on a different day. I've gone for six years on DU without making very many enemies, and don't want you to be among them.

It is a difficult day in trying times.
Smilies are woefully inadequate, but :hi:

Wat

[JustAnotherGen]

58. Thank you

I was working long hours (though a resident of NJ) in PA that day, driving elderly Dems to the polls, canvassing, helping another voter out who got turned away . . .


And you left one thing off your list: Continuing the failed Economic Policy of the Bush Administration - i.e. growing the deficit. This is not a new issue for me. It's a seven year old issue - because I put the same level of effort to get Clinton into office in 92 and 96 - and it was about the economy then too!

[watrwefitinfor]

19. The American people are seeing this as the Dems finally taking a stand,

AGAINST the working class and the unemployed, and against the president who tried to do something for them. And the media is going to make sure they understand that by driving it home all day, every day.

The same Dems who could never find their spine in order to take a stand FOR working people, or AGAINST Bush and his lockstep Republican Congress, finds its collective balls just in time to keep the president from saving unemployment insurance and tax breaks for the working class. Oh, yeah. This is going over great among the masses.

And what is the media telling them this morning? That it's the Democratic Congress who is opposed to working people keeping their Bush tax break and their unemployment insurance. That's the takeaway. Whine and bash all you want. That's the message that is being heard in the land.

What fucking good is an idealistic "base" that doesn't organize? that doesn't lead the masses to understand they're here to save them? What fucking good is a "Democratic" congress that bends over for the Republicans every time, and finds its collective spine just in time to block the president's efforts for the working class?

Do you think the poor slob slaving away at two jobs and not making enough to buy groceries for her family, but too much to qualify for food stamps is gonna appreciate all that you and the congressional Dems are standing up for when they take even more out of her paycheck?

And, oh, yeah, your anti-Obama screeds at the top of your lungs is racist to the core.

Funny and sad shit coming from the "left" these days.

Wat

[GOTV]

55. We'll have to wait and see how the American people are seeing this

It's too early to know that. Since the tax cut expiration was expected for years we do know how they feel about extending taxes for the wealthy and they are largely against it.

[dennis4868]

20. I agree 100%

The problem is most progressives think that a fight is an option here when it's not....no matter how much Obama "fights" they will not take the fillubuster off the table in connection with tax increases for the wealthy....there was nothing to fight here!

[Davis_X_Machina]

22. The problem is that a good-sized slice of our political spectrum...

...has no interest in compromise. It has no interest in producing any legislation because it has a profound mistrust that anything good can come from a legislature. Because power corrupts, and the more you exercise it, the more corrupt you become. The only legitimate, uncorrupt stand is to not exercise it.

But it's not on the right -- it's on the left.

The ‘professional left’ doesn’t trust government, maybe doesn’t even support their own participation in government — a predilection with the teabag right, interestingly enough.

This leads to adulation of the powerless (Bernie Sanders, Alan Grayson), dreams of politics-without-politicians, and reductionist, 'Kill-the-Bill' politics. In progressive circles, powerlessness is considered proof of good will. Anybody with efficacy is corrupt, because they have efficacy.

We’re fighting Marx/Kautsky v. Bernstein/Jaurés, ministerialism over non-participation, all over again.

The Second International was a hundred years ago -- and we're still fighting their battles.

[David__77]

32. Well if the "second" can't do it, then we need a new "third."

As an aside, FDR never would have, nor could have implemented the New Deal reforms he did without a mass, militant left demanding much, much more far reaching policy changes and fundamental social transformation. I am a Democrat, but I have no interest in being a seeing the ballot box as the main forum of politics.

[Davis_X_Machina]

33. We've got people who won't even make it to the ballot box...

...because it's too far away from the keyboard, and, just now, someone on the internet is wrong!

I don't mind people rejecting left-ministerialism for principled reasons, but when it's just a fashionable pose, or an expression of inertia, you get what you see today, here, on DU.

[JamesA1102]

73. Very well said nt

[TreasonousBastard]

24. It's a cryin' shame that a post backing the President is unrecced like this, but...

I don't think it's the "base" doing all this whining. Or the unreccing.

I had dinner with 150 of the "base" last weekend, and we weren't happy with much of what's going on down there but we were ecstatic that in this Republican district we got Tim Bishop a fifth term. We were thrilled that our party is on the upswing out here and we see great things happening. Out here, the glass is half full.

Any bloviator with a blog, microphone, or better yet a TV show, can talk about shoulda-woulda-coulda but actually trying to govern with a unified and powerful opposition is something else.

[watrwefitinfor]

28. You're so right.

Can't Rec it again, so kicking...

Wat

[Mosaic]

31. You said

"damn well PROGRESSIVE"

Why do you fools have to use the word *damn* WITH progressive. Some progressive!

[Bluerthanblue]

anger and outrage is out of control- everywhere. I'm ashamed

of my own over reaction and loss of control lately too.

It is really troubling to see this being played out so boldly here and in the national media.

I think we could all do well to look around and understand that while our own personal lives may be really difficult, we, as Americans living quite by accident here vs. in Port au Prince, Cotonnou, Gaza Strip, Mogidishu, Al-Mazraq, Gazoura ...countless other places around the globe, have SO much more than most of the world. Not because we deserve it- no one chooses what situation they are born into.

We need a reality check- a serious one.

We get angry when Cheney told Sen.Leahy to "go fuck yourself", when Joe Wilson called out "you lie" at the SOTU, yet the garbage that has flown around here lately makes me wonder who the fuck WE think WE are.

I am a Democrat by CHOICE. One of the best qualities of our party I believe is that WE- far more than the Republicans truly CARE about people- not just the elites, not only those who look like us, live like us, think like us, believe or talk like us- But ALL people. We aren't the party of "love it or leave it"- at least not in my mind.

I'm having a hard time finding that quality much lately. People are pissed that that Pres.Obama hasn't morphed into a Democratic version of G.W.Bush and seem to be adopting (proudly) the pugnacious 'screw anyone who doesn't believe like me' mentality.

I'm not about to stop being a Democrat, but I'll admit, I'm ashamed of the attitudes and actions that I'm witnessing lately.

fwiw-

I've rec'd your OP, and I share your discouragement.

[Bluerthanblue]

34. dupe

[whosinpower]

35. Borrowing money from the Chinese

To give tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires is offensive.

And I will suggest something else. The republicans will use this as a blunt object to pound away at Obama next year - fiscally irresponsible. Social security has already been attacked - by Obama himself, and this corrosion of fundamental social safety net programs will continue next year. And those tax cuts will not buy a single vote for him, and it will not help elect a single democrat. The erosion of democratic values continues AT OBAMA'S HAND, and we apparently are supposed to just shut the fuck up.

When your team has the public behind it and supported the end of bush tax cuts for the wealthy - in good margins - you are foolish, ignorant and arrogent to erode the very things you believe in. We all heard the same song with the public option on health care. And if you think for one second, that this did not reveal itself with the midterm elections, you are blind.

[bluethruandthru]

39. [phone]

I'm tired of being chastised by my own party and my president for standing up for what have always been, Democratic values!

Half of those on this board are more than willing to throw away what the party has stood for for decades in order to continue worshipping Obama! I don't idolize Sanders or Grayson - as some here suggest. I support the principles of the party. When I hear a politician stand up for those principles - I applaud them. When they denigrate those principles, I boo.

[Supersedeas]

54. Lot's of the same disparaging remarks were used to silence criticism of the President's policy

decision then too.

[bvar22]

40. The attacks on the base...

..by the "so called" "Democrats" is sickening.

THIS is a "Democrat":

"In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all—regardless of station, race, or creed.

Among these are:

The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;

The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;

The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;

The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;

The right of every family to a decent home;

The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;

The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;

The right to a good education.

All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.

Americas own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for all our citizens.

For unless there is security here at home there cannot be lasting peace in the world."---FDR

"There are forces within the Democratic Party who want us to sound like kinder, gentler Republicans. I want us to compete for that great mass of voters that want a party that will stand up for working Americans, family farmers, and people who haven't felt the benefits of the economic upturn."---Paul Wellstone



"By their works, you will know them."

[Clio the Leo]

41. the teabaggers are OWNING us on this issue. nt

[Imajika]

43. The attacks from Olbermann and Ed have been so over the top...

..that is very difficult to even watch either right now.

I am almost embarrassed for both of them because neither apparently know how ridiculous they sound to all but the most fanatical partisans.

[Pisces]

45. Couldn't agree with you more. People don't know what governing looks like. They watch to many

movies. They think Obama can act like a king and dictate with the wave of his wand. It is disturbing to say the lease what gets said on a progressive board.

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

46. The betrayal of the Presidency cast upon the so-called base is sickening!

[Bodhi BloodWave]

48. so defending oneself against repeated attacks is betrayal?

[Phx_Dem]

47. [phone]. Sickening and disgusting! n/t

[DirkGently]

49. How can liberals fight with the President when his solution is surrender to the GOP?

[Nancy Waterman]

50. Totally agree +10000

From Stephen Pearlstein today:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/09/AR2010120906436.html

Like it or hate it, one thing you can say about the tax deal that President Obama struck with Republicans is that it sure beats the one hammered out by Democratic leaders in Congress. That's because Democratic leaders never actually produced one that had a chance of being enacted.

For that, of course, Democratic leaders blame Republicans. They blame the Senate rules. They blame the president. They blame uncooperative colleagues. They blame everyone but themselves - not just for this, but for Congress's overall inability to tackle pressing problems.

So it should be no surprise that when the new Congress takes office next month, the lineup of Democratic leaders in both chambers will be pretty much the same. Why shake things up when everything is going so well?

[watrwefitinfor]

64. +1 (or 1000000000) n/t

[La Lioness Priyanka]

51. awww. poor little powerless president.

:eyes:

[polichick]

56. As a lifelong Dem activist, I think the bait-and-switch we got is beyond shameful. nt

[donco6]

57. Thankfully, people are finally focusing on the actions, not the personality.

And they are not liking what they see. Which is a good thing.

[bushisanidiot]

59. [phone]

The President has accomplished a hell of a lot even though he has had to fight the party of NO every step of the way, as well as the MSM who has been out to get him since he was inaugarated.

the republicans are blocking everything, and would have the country completely destroyed rather than to work with the dems. but if the dems try to work to acomplish a compromise to move forward, we're selling out?? WTF?!!!!!

cut the baby in half, King Solomon! damn the consequences!! really, dems? REALLY?

[niceypoo]

60. Obama abandoned his own party

Obama has embraced Supply side economics

[avaistheone1]

61. The attacks on his base, and the President's lack of support for the working and middle class

sicken me.

:kick:

[CakeGrrl]

62. Some of us DO get it and understand what the President faces.

Those who are crying in their cups that they've been had and are tearfully ripping bumperstickers off cars weren't paying attention to everything he said when he campaigned.

And more and more as things unfold in Washington with the Johnny-Come-Lately Congressional Dems and the consistently assholish Republicans, he's looking like the only real adult in the fray.

Never mind the handsomely paid Professional Left, who at the end of the day get their paychecks from the same corporations who love Repubs. They're token rabble-rousers.

[Skittles]

67. they're calling out the man behind the curtain

it's about fucking time

[Aramchek]

68. they aren't his base. and most of the loudest screamers never supported him to begin with.

[Name removed]

69. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[otohara]

70. Hugely Disappointed in Obama

I was like you two weeks ago, then he did what he did behind closed doors with the GOP.

FAIL!

[willswisher]

71. Even 2 weeks ago

for the past few months I went from pro obama to neutral Obama.. saying he'd have to do something to earn my vote... well let's just say he went the other way...

[yurbud]

72. it's tough to organize when you have to spend time protecting yourself from a Democratic president

As someone in a teacher's union, even if they wanted to throw 100% of their weight behind Obama, our assets are tied up fighting the standardized testing, union busting, and privatization of public agenda of his secretary of education.

To get out in front of someone and fight for them, you have to believe that they have your back, and won't put a knife in it or surrender when you are in the middle of a charge.