Agrajag:
And I suppose that you wouldn't be moved if I pointed out that the DNA of chimps and us is 95% identical and yet we're not chimps.... Small differences can make for huge distinctions. That the dems share some attributes with Communism does not make them Communists, would-be Communists or soon-to-be Communists. Today it's all too easy to rip ANY SINGLE element of Communism, Marxism, Fascism and then say the entire entity that exhibits it is that thing. Bull.
I take the view that, because the two platforms are so similar, either the Communist Party has moved to the Right a good bit, OR, the Democrat Party has moved to the Left a good bit. Evidence points strongly to the latter.
The CPUSA has pretty much always been a fringe party in the United States. That being the case, their more dedicated members began, in the 1940s, to look for a 'mainstream' party whose platform had at least some similarities to theirs. They figured that it was a start and that, over time, they could push/pull the 'mainstream' party further to the Left until they got what they wanted. It's taken them about 60 years but they made it.
A parallel can been seen in the modern environmental movement. A huge preponderence of those leading this movement are nothing more than socialists and communists who found their political theories discredited and looked for another mechanism by which to spread their beliefs. They've latched on to the radical environmental movement now- another thing they have in common with Obama.
Where'd that one come from? For a publicly traded company their stock sure as heck didn't reflect this view. Their stock was at 19 when Bush came in. It slightly improved until the war and then jumped to a high of 53 and then Obama started looking like the eventual winner and it plummeted in anticipation of a total withdrawal. Now that we're not leaving it's recovering rather nicely. It dropped as low as 15 and is back to 31.
I'll have to find the primary source when time permits (it's in a book I have around here somewhere). But, until I can locate that source, consider this one:
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2005/04/18/8257012/index.htmThis is a very different story, though it's also not a pretty one. The truth is that the conspiracy theories about the Vice President's involvement in Halliburton's Iraq contracts are either unproven or flat-out wrong. And while the company's Middle East operation is the subject of scathing audits and investigations, it's hardly raking in scandalous profits. Indeed, Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR), the part of Halliburton's business that America learned to hate because it was making far too much, is the part of the business Wall Street hates because it is making far too little.
That's from CNN- not exactly Cheney's bosom buddies.
The piece goes on to explain that wild fluctuation in stock price. It had more to do with Halliburton's exposure in an asbestos suit than it does with Iraq. KBR, a Halliburton subsidiary, was constantly dinged by Wall Street for, as the story says "not making enough [money]." It also chronicles the rise of Halliburton from a "second tier" company in the energy field to the world's largest- done by Cheney before he became VEEP. This growth is the primary reason why Halliborton was uniquely qualified to do the sort of work that needed to be done in Iraq (the piece also points out that Halliburton had won a bid-contract back in 1992 [LOGCAP I] which involved work that was almost identical, save for the larger scale, of the work in Iraq. they had proven capable and so were hired to do the LOGCAP II work in Iraq).
Kudos to CNN for telling the truth about Halliburton. It's only too bad that the rest of the media didn;t report this story with the fervor they reported the mis- and dis-information negative to Halliburton, for the purpose of damaging Cheney and, through him, George W. Bush.
Sorry, but as someone who was treated exceptionally well by my union reps earlier in life (I worked at a supermarket and made a great living at it while today you can't make a living from it even though that union has been nearly eradicated). This idea that unions have ultimate power and that company reps are powerless to stop them is ludicrous. Unions tend to crop up in places where people have been mis-treated the most (trucking, assembly lines, etc.) There are countless examples of companies that don't have unions but treat their people decently and have no threat of their people unionizing.
I'm glad that you had a good experience with unions, but I have to wonder how the higher wages you earned compared to those made by non-union workers doing the same job affected the consumer. You've got to know that the price of your inflated wages was passed on by the company to its vendors and consumers.
We had a supermarket chain here in Alabama go into bankruptcy, in large part due to its being a union organization. It never found a buyer and the reason cited by every potential buyer was that they were not interested in the company unless the union contracts were declared null and void and the unions disbanded. The unions refused to even consider this and, as a result, every single one of those jobs are gone.
I find that to be very cynical. I believe he thinks it could be "better" and his view of better differs from many just like the view of "better" from virtually everyone to hold that office. I also believe that MOST of the past Presidents would gladly re-write the constitution to "fix" it if they could get away with it. They all pretty much knew they couldn't.
Certainly the Progressive Presidents thought that way.
Many of TR's actions were of dubious Constitutionality. Virtually all of FDR's were. Ditto for LBJ.
But Nixon (and I consider him to be a Progressive)? Reagan? Eisenhower?
No, it seems that the urge to re-write the Constitution exists almost soley on the Left (and in the courts).
We're going to be sitting here in 2012 or 2016 and things are going to be much the same as they are now. Some things will be better. Some things will be worse. The degree of change one way or the other is going to dictate his success or failure and his legacy.
Let's hope that you are right.
The Dems were sure that Bush was going to ruin everything. It didn't happen. The Republicans were sure Clinton was going to ruin everything. It didn't happen. The power of our system is that it's pretty amazingly resilient.
It does seem that divided government works best.
But again, Obama is no Clinton. Clinton had a pragmatic streak in him. He wanted to get all of his agenda enacted- every President does- but he knew when he reached too far and the best course of action was to compromise. Hell, he vetoed welfare reform twice, then the polls convinced him that it was politically the right thing to do to sign it, signed it and then tried to take credit for it as being his idea all along.
Absolutely nothing Obama has done gives me the slightest hint that he has that sort of pragmatism. He is the single most committed ideolog we have ever- EVER- had as President. It is not in his nature to compromise. It's not even in his nature to debate- not with those in or outside his party. Largely due to mistakes made by the GOP, he has the working majorities to enact his radical agenda. The leaders in Congress are at the very least as radically Left as he is (Pelosi might be even more radical).
2010 cannot come quickly enough.
My main problem with your viewpoint regarding nibbling is that I feel that's just what corporate American has done with regard to lobbyists. Every generation is dramatically worse than the one before and I feel we're no better as a result. That worries me more than one guy who has the same sort of viewpoint as many Presidents before him.
Setting aside for the moment my disagreement that Obama's viewpoint is even remotely similar to any, much less "many" Presidents before him....
...I agree with your point re: lobbyists. I don't think a great deal better of them than I do unions...and you might have guessed that I'm no fan of unions.
Personally, if you were to put me in charge of campaign finance reform- scary thought, I know, but work with me here- I would immediately ban lobbyists from having any form of contact with politicians that the common folks do not have. If I can only write, email or fax my representatives, then that should be the limit for lobbyists as well. Sound fair?
