Politics « The Restless Chronicles

Who Speaks for America?

If one thing is for sure this November, the loser or winner of the 2010 midterm Elections will not be the politicians on the ballots; rather, the American citizenry casting these ballots.

In an election year that has produced the highest campaign spending in the history of the republic (almost $2 billion), the battle has continued to rage on who best speaks on behalf of the American people.

In late September, at a news conference in a small hardware store in Virginia, about 20 miles from the U.S. Capitol, a group of 12 incumbent House Republicans presented a document titled “A Pledge to America.” In announcing the agenda, the Republican House Minority Leader John Boehner said after listening to the American people for the past 20 months, “we get it, we get it.”

Meanwhile, with polls showing Democrats are about to be beset by Armageddon, President Obama and the rest of his party are claiming they best empathize with the groaning of an electorate in pain.

Unemployment is at 9.5%. With the exception of the super-rich, who barely felt the Great Recession, the proletariat is sitting, standing, and walking around all-day on economic pins and needles. We have the greatest income disparity since the creation of the union, with the top 20% accounting for 85% of the national wealth. The bottom 40% of Americans has zilch (no wealth that is)!

Now, with Democrats controlling the executive and legislative branches of government for the past 20 months, it’s hard to convince an electorate feeling such great pains that the pains they feel could have been worse. How do one convince a man who stared down the barrel of a loaded gun things could have been worse had he been actually shot, when he’s so visibly shaken and traumatized—so much, that understandably, his reasoning is still being processed through the uneasiness he feels.

This is the quandary in which Democrats find themselves: A quandary compounded by their lousiness in communication.

Economists did not call the recession of 2008 the Great Recession for nothing; global financial markets teetered at a precipice for months. And nowhere else were conditions direr than the United States, which accounted for the greatest share of market volatility.

As we all know, Obama inherited a mess, putting it mildly. The previous Republican administration inherited a budget surplus and left with a record deficit.

It is no secret that the failed economic policies of the Bush administration almost sent us into a “second” Great Depression. Be it the irresponsible and reckless deregulation of the financial markets; the massive tax cuts for the rich and powerful; the two unpaid and mismanaged wars; and a host of other ill-fated decisions—the nation was on its knees.

By admission of most objective historians, President Obama has been more substantive than any of the past administrations of the last 20 years. There were the stimulus and recovery bills, credit card reform, student loan reform, Wall Street reform, and even the biggest of the past 60 years—healthcare reform. All these less than two years into a four-year job.

But for reasons best known to Democrats, they’ve not only been numb in enunciating their accomplishments, some have even tried to distance themselves from them. For instance, the passage of healthcare reform, which, by 2014 would insure 32 million more Americans and drastically cut into the federal deficit.

So in place of general awareness of facts on the ground, we have an electorate that is confused and angry because the party in power will not state in intelligible terms what it has done to better livelihoods, and the party before, is the devil they already know.

Yet, both clamor they speak for the people.

One thing is for sure, the failed Republican policies of yesteryear will not get us out of this ditch—we are here because of them. Republicans aggressively still tout more of the same by promising to permanently engrain the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy; further deregulate financial markets; cut into social assistance when millions of unemployed Americans need it most, etc.

Whatever happens at the ballot this November, Americans are poised to either improve their lot or dampen it by reversing to the failed and selfish policies of the past.

At times, when I’m sitting in a very uncomfortable chair and my behind hurts, I shift from cheek to cheek; not because the other cheek is less painful, but just because I’ll rather try the other cheek already.

If Republicans take control of either or both Houses this fall, it will not be because they are the butt cheek that hurt less or not at all, it would be because they are just the other cheek on an equally painful butt—beneficiaries of the increased restlessness of a groaning population.

October 27, 2010 Posted by 'Pelumi Olatinpo | Domestic/U.S., Election, Politics | 1 Comment

No Fox In The White House

This past week, Fox News executive Michael Clemente met with President Obama’s press secretary Robert Gibbs at the White House. While no footage of a meeting that supposedly lasted twenty minutes was provided, it wouldn’t be ridiculous if you said two grown men in suits exchanged a series of hot and vicious slaps before taking their seats at the table.

It’s been such a wonderful love affair between Fox News and the Obama administration.

This latest saga began a couple of weeks ago, when White House communications director Anita Dunn, appearing on CNN, took the opening shots at the network.

“Let’s not pretend they’re a news network,” she said. “Fox News often operates almost as either the research arm or the communication arm of the Republican Party.”

And this was soon followed by other aides in the administration joining the assault front. White House chief-of-staff for instance, Rahm Emanuel, appearing on CNN, said the President considers Fox News “not a news organization so much as it has a perspective.”

And Mr. Clemente for his part vehemently defended his network: “Surprisingly, the White House continues to declare war on a news organization instead of focusing on the critical issues that Americans are concerned about like jobs, health care and two wars.”

It is no secret that there’s been a feud between the Democratic Party and the Fox network. Feelings that are now only brought back to daylight with the presence of a Democratic administration in the White House.

Sure, it’s hard but not impossible to find a news channel or network in the nation without any ideological or political leaning.

Inasmuch as the White House attacks Fox on being insanely partisan, the Obama administration also has an insanely partisan ally in MSNBC.

Both networks boast stars that shamelessly advocate their ideologies, distorting and polluting news analysis in the process.

But the White House, in trying to rationalize its assault on Fox does make a valid point. And that is, in spite of the love or scrutiny the administration can expect from other channels, Fox News not so subtly seem to be on a war path. It seems employees and affiliates of the organization live for one single purpose – seek and destroy all Democratic initiatives.

So in a sense, I can’t blame the president and his aides for eschewing the network in their rounds of interviews promoting the administration’s agenda. I know when I watch Fox News, it’s Democrat-bashing all the way and it will be stupid for a Democratic president to expect a fair shake from openly antagonistic interviewers.

Fox, up until the meeting this past week, had not shown any incline to relent. The president had a prime time news conference in July and a Healthcare Reform address before Congress in September; Fox alone failed to televise both on its staple channel. Instead, it showed “So You Think You Can Dance” on both occasions.

If this is not an affront to a sitting president, what is?

And of course, the White House has received so much flak for its stance on Fox. Rogue Fox contributor, Karl Rove, who was at the center of virtually every indecency during the Bush years chastised the president. Speaking on “Fox News Sunday” — “This is a White House engaging in its own version of the media enemies list. It is unhelpful for the country and undignified for the president of the United States.”

And right there, I believe, is another tragedy of this whole melodrama. Where were Mr. Rove and like-minded folks when George W. Bush made it official state policy to not engage the press? At least, Mr. Obama has reversed such course and is now only seeking “fair-shake” journalism from those who seek to engage.

I do not remember Fox News or Mr. Rove for that matter, lambasting Mr. Bush when for almost six years he repeatedly turned down the invitations of the NAACP to speak at its convention. He finally did in 2006, when it became clear it was a repudiating eyesore.

What about his meeting with the Congressional Black Caucus only once during his eight years in office? It seems clear that for a network that has “fair and balanced” as its slogan, its only care for foul cry is when its cheeks are not being pampered.

I cannot stand to watch Keith Olbermann on MSNBC, just as I do not blow kisses at Sean Hannity on Fox. But the saving grace for MSNBC is that it does have less radical points of view on its network who have a discernible voice. One will be hard-pressed to say the same about Fox, where the motto ought to be “United We Stand.”

I cannot forecast how this shakes out in coming days and weeks. But this much can be said, the Obama administration has exercised its right and has done due diligence in bringing Fox to task. Until Fox can show it not only thrives on Democratic flesh and blood, it deserves the boycott it continues to get from this administration.

November 2, 2009 Posted by 'Pelumi Olatinpo | Domestic/U.S., Politics | Leave a Comment