Dear Mr. President,
Since the run up to the last midterm election and up until the recent speech you gave, you've been expressing, to put it mildly, frustration with your base. Prior to the midterm, you told us to "buck up" and "stop whining". You apparently feel that we progressives are a bunch of spoiled children who don't appreciate all the wonderful things you've done. This letter is an attempt to try to explain to you and other leaders in the Democrat party why you're in the situation you're in now.
A sports analogy might be helpful here. To those non-Americans reading this, I know our version of what we call "football" isn't played much outside my country. Hope this doesn't cause you any confusion but our version of football best fits the metaphor.
Imagine, Mr. President, that you are the receiver for a football team. We've been pushed all the way back to our own goal line. Then you are sent in from the bench. You run all the way out to the other side of the field. The team works perfectly up until now. The blocking keeps the Quarterback open, he sees you out there, he throws a perfect pass right into your hands! The crowd is going wild! You're wide open and only 10 yards away from scoring. Your team is so elated at the turn of events. Everyone is cheering.
And then you start running the wrong way.
We're all screaming "What are you doing? Are you crazy? Turn around!"
But you keep running toward the middle of the field. You finally get tackled in the middle at the 50 yard line. You're doing a victory dance, so obviously proud of your accomplishment. After all, you got us 40 yards on the field, right? Sure you didn't score but that's progress. Why is the crowd booing you? Why are your teammates yelling at you? No one seems to appreciate the progress you made for the team. You tell everyone to "buck up" and "stop whining" but that doesn't seem to help.
This analogy should assist in your ability to understand why progressives are so demoralized. It's not because you didn't give us everything we wanted. It's because you have a bizarre political strategy of prematurely compromising before you even get to the negotiating table and then capitulating on nearly everything else.
The health care reform is a good example to use here. Before the process even started, you took single payer off the table. "Medicare for all" should have been a good selling point for the country and kept it simple enough for everyone to understand, but you gave it away before you even got started. Then you were quick to yank the public option off the table, followed by the trigger and the medicare buy in.
What was left was still progress, like the receiver and the 50 yard line in my analogy above, but quite frankly, it's not attributable to any brilliant leadership from your office. It has more to do with the fact that we campaigned for you and got you such overwhelming majorities in Congress that you couldn't lose.
There is also the stimulus package. The best economists told you it was inadequate to the task. After Bush, it was evident that tax cuts to not stimulate the economy. Even still, you tried to placate the Republicans but trimming down the package and loading it up with near-useless tax cuts. At the end of it all, you had an stimulus bill that was too small to bring real recovery to the economy and yet you got no Republican votes to show for it.
Again, what you accomplished was progress. The sluggish unstable recovery we have now is still better than the total meltdown of the last quarter of 2008. However, given the hand you were dealt, you should have done much better.
A person's accomplishments, as with the receiver in my football analogy, are not just measured by the changes he or she brings about but also by the situation he or she faced. Yes, you've made a few accomplishments, some of them even historic, but many president elects could only dream of walking into office with what you had in January of 2008. You had a landslide margin, a mandate from the people, supremacy in the House and a comfortable margin in the Senate, all with an opposition party that was leaderless and all but broken.
The problem, Mr. President, is you won't fight for anything. You give too much away as if the other side would be impressed with your magnanimity and then are quick to capitulate on the rest. Your recent speech to your base has only underscored that you still don't get it. It's not what you didn't accomplish. It's what you chose not to even try to accomplish.
We voted for "yes we can!" What we got was "Aw, c'mon guys!"
What's even worse, is your inability to take a stand has emboldened the radical right wing in America. After all, why should the Republicans ever compromise or be moderate when they can just bully their way into getting 98% of what they want? As in dealing with bullies, "being reasonable" or compromising only encourages them.
Put bluntly, we progressives are forced by your decisions and the decisions of the rest of the Democratic leadership into one of two ugly choices:
1. Hold our nose and vote for you and others like you because the Republicans will be much worse
2. Vote 3rd Party, knowing the Republicans will win but maybe the Democrats will get the message and find some candidates that have spines for the next go-round.
We've been employing the first option since Kerry and things have only gotten worse. Democrats have learned they can take us for granted and they continue to run after the elusive center. Republicans meanwhile continue to fire up their base and run further to the right. As a result, the center keeps moving rightward and there's no reason to think this will change if we keep supporting you.
The second option is also unacceptable but it's looking like the only hope to arrest the rightward swing and regain the two party system (meaning a real opposition party to the Republicans, not a Republican-lite party). The question is whether or not we could bite the bullet and endure the next period of Republican rule, considering what a disaster the last one was.
Both options are ugly but they're not working for you either. Moderates are less likely to vote and independents are just as turned off by spineless appeasement as your base is. So just who are you trying to appeal to?
The outcome will come down to how bad the Republican nominee is. If you are running against Mitt Romney, it may be a good year for 3rd party candidates. Sure, he's a corporate whore but we'll survive and maybe return in four years with a better candidate. Rick Perry, on the other hand, will ensure a lot of nose holding during the voting process. Either way, you have been and are a phenomenal disappointment. I hope now you understand why.
Sincerely,
Since the run up to the last midterm election and up until the recent speech you gave, you've been expressing, to put it mildly, frustration with your base. Prior to the midterm, you told us to "buck up" and "stop whining". You apparently feel that we progressives are a bunch of spoiled children who don't appreciate all the wonderful things you've done. This letter is an attempt to try to explain to you and other leaders in the Democrat party why you're in the situation you're in now.
A sports analogy might be helpful here. To those non-Americans reading this, I know our version of what we call "football" isn't played much outside my country. Hope this doesn't cause you any confusion but our version of football best fits the metaphor.
Imagine, Mr. President, that you are the receiver for a football team. We've been pushed all the way back to our own goal line. Then you are sent in from the bench. You run all the way out to the other side of the field. The team works perfectly up until now. The blocking keeps the Quarterback open, he sees you out there, he throws a perfect pass right into your hands! The crowd is going wild! You're wide open and only 10 yards away from scoring. Your team is so elated at the turn of events. Everyone is cheering.
And then you start running the wrong way.
We're all screaming "What are you doing? Are you crazy? Turn around!"
But you keep running toward the middle of the field. You finally get tackled in the middle at the 50 yard line. You're doing a victory dance, so obviously proud of your accomplishment. After all, you got us 40 yards on the field, right? Sure you didn't score but that's progress. Why is the crowd booing you? Why are your teammates yelling at you? No one seems to appreciate the progress you made for the team. You tell everyone to "buck up" and "stop whining" but that doesn't seem to help.
This analogy should assist in your ability to understand why progressives are so demoralized. It's not because you didn't give us everything we wanted. It's because you have a bizarre political strategy of prematurely compromising before you even get to the negotiating table and then capitulating on nearly everything else.
The health care reform is a good example to use here. Before the process even started, you took single payer off the table. "Medicare for all" should have been a good selling point for the country and kept it simple enough for everyone to understand, but you gave it away before you even got started. Then you were quick to yank the public option off the table, followed by the trigger and the medicare buy in.
What was left was still progress, like the receiver and the 50 yard line in my analogy above, but quite frankly, it's not attributable to any brilliant leadership from your office. It has more to do with the fact that we campaigned for you and got you such overwhelming majorities in Congress that you couldn't lose.
There is also the stimulus package. The best economists told you it was inadequate to the task. After Bush, it was evident that tax cuts to not stimulate the economy. Even still, you tried to placate the Republicans but trimming down the package and loading it up with near-useless tax cuts. At the end of it all, you had an stimulus bill that was too small to bring real recovery to the economy and yet you got no Republican votes to show for it.
Again, what you accomplished was progress. The sluggish unstable recovery we have now is still better than the total meltdown of the last quarter of 2008. However, given the hand you were dealt, you should have done much better.
A person's accomplishments, as with the receiver in my football analogy, are not just measured by the changes he or she brings about but also by the situation he or she faced. Yes, you've made a few accomplishments, some of them even historic, but many president elects could only dream of walking into office with what you had in January of 2008. You had a landslide margin, a mandate from the people, supremacy in the House and a comfortable margin in the Senate, all with an opposition party that was leaderless and all but broken.
The problem, Mr. President, is you won't fight for anything. You give too much away as if the other side would be impressed with your magnanimity and then are quick to capitulate on the rest. Your recent speech to your base has only underscored that you still don't get it. It's not what you didn't accomplish. It's what you chose not to even try to accomplish.
We voted for "yes we can!" What we got was "Aw, c'mon guys!"
What's even worse, is your inability to take a stand has emboldened the radical right wing in America. After all, why should the Republicans ever compromise or be moderate when they can just bully their way into getting 98% of what they want? As in dealing with bullies, "being reasonable" or compromising only encourages them.
Put bluntly, we progressives are forced by your decisions and the decisions of the rest of the Democratic leadership into one of two ugly choices:
1. Hold our nose and vote for you and others like you because the Republicans will be much worse
2. Vote 3rd Party, knowing the Republicans will win but maybe the Democrats will get the message and find some candidates that have spines for the next go-round.
We've been employing the first option since Kerry and things have only gotten worse. Democrats have learned they can take us for granted and they continue to run after the elusive center. Republicans meanwhile continue to fire up their base and run further to the right. As a result, the center keeps moving rightward and there's no reason to think this will change if we keep supporting you.
The second option is also unacceptable but it's looking like the only hope to arrest the rightward swing and regain the two party system (meaning a real opposition party to the Republicans, not a Republican-lite party). The question is whether or not we could bite the bullet and endure the next period of Republican rule, considering what a disaster the last one was.
Both options are ugly but they're not working for you either. Moderates are less likely to vote and independents are just as turned off by spineless appeasement as your base is. So just who are you trying to appeal to?
The outcome will come down to how bad the Republican nominee is. If you are running against Mitt Romney, it may be a good year for 3rd party candidates. Sure, he's a corporate whore but we'll survive and maybe return in four years with a better candidate. Rick Perry, on the other hand, will ensure a lot of nose holding during the voting process. Either way, you have been and are a phenomenal disappointment. I hope now you understand why.
Sincerely,
Atheist Forums Hall of Shame:
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist
