Obama’s effort on the signature issue of healthcare has been truly pathetic. More generally, he seems to have no problem with US citizens paying tithes and bailouts directly to US corporations as government policy, despite what he says publicly.
Populist Rhetoric and Symbolic Actions
Barack Obama is so mad at Wall Street! Here, just look at what he told 60 Minutes last night:
BARACK OBAMA: I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of fat cat bankers on Wall Street…Nothing has been more frustrating to me this year than having to salvage a financial system at great expense to taxpayers that was precipitated, that was caused, in part by completely irresponsible actions on Wall Street…the people on Wall Street still don’t get it. They don’t get it…you guys are drawing down $10, $20 million bonuses after America went through the worst economic year that’s it’s gone through in decades, and you guys caused the problem.
But he’s not just all talk. He’s also taking action! He’s so furious he’s going to have an hour-long meeting with Wall Street executives. Dear god in heaven!
Meanwhile, the banksters continue pissing on Barack Obama’s shoes, even after he put on a public show to berate them for their financial malpractice.
… Said one CEO who attended: “I expected to be taken to the woodshed, but the tone was quite the opposite.”Said another senior exec with knowledge of the meeting: “The whole thing was so telegraphed that not much was accomplished, other than giving Obama a PR stunt … He might have sounded mean on ’60 Minutes,’ but during the meeting he was a hell of a lot nicer.”
So far, the dude’s been painfully, strikingly ineffectual, with resulting outcomes always favoring corporations and screwing the public, even though health care and job prospects suggest a fucking blowout for Democrats in 2010. Worst, his actions, as distinct from his “word-itude,” suggest he is a total corporate sell-out willing to alter the Constitutional fabric of our nation. Never mind the ineptitude and ineffectualness of Mr. Constitutional Law. And never mind 2010. What a total fuck-face.