Progressive Media Advocates
What many viewed as a routine Presidential visit to Australia to finalize an agreement for a new deployment destination of American troops as the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq wind down was anything but. Australian Networks Catherine McGrath reported that “post Iraq…America would have a permanent presence in Australia…in the interest of democracy and trade protection…” Prime Minister Julia Gillard stated [...]
Robert Reich: Occupiers and others have had enough.
Yet paradoxically the presidential race that officially begins a few months from now is likely to be as passionless as they come.
It would seem to me in recent weeks that President Obama’s week-kneed moderation is starting to give way to a bit of moxie. This has been welcome news indeed. This guy needs to engage in some serious political ass whupping.
Robert Reich: By continuing to push and prod we give hope to countless Americans on the verge of giving up. We give back to them the courage of their own convictions, and thereby lay the groundwork for a future progressive agenda
Anthony Samad: I’ll be curious to find out how many people were hired from the CBC job fairs around the country. Or was it another “smoke and mirrors” engagement to make politicians look good?
Randy Shaw: With the President still ignoring cries from his base for confrontational and dramatic action, did anyone really expect those Brooklyn Democrats to be highly motivated to get to the polls?
Brent Budowsky: The Truman metaphor is right for Obama, but it must presage a sustained battle for jobs, and not another brief theatrical scene in an incoherent drama with an inconclusive ending.
Robert Reich: When unemployment is still in the stratosphere, it would be insane to start cutting the deficit by $3 trillion to $4 trillion. That would push unemployment into outer space.
Tina Dupuy: Historians agree the best Republican President was also the first: Abraham Lincoln. Who’s second runner up? Which President has represented Republican values best? Easy. President Barack Obama.
Joseph Palermo: President Obama’s much anticipated speech outlining his jobs agenda for the 2012 election year will sound a lot like a tiny mouse trying to make a loud roar. Instead of clarity, we’ll get hedging; instead of “bold,” we’ll get wishy-washy.
Robert Reich: A bold jobs plan is also good politics. With more than 25 million Americans looking for full-time jobs, the wages of people with jobs falling, and an economy on the verge of a double dip, the President has to come out fighting on the side of average people.
Joseph Palermo: By not speaking about the poor and poverty in America President Obama allows the Reagan era “welfare queen” construct to go unchallenged and, even worse, creates a vacuum that’s already being filled by right-wing pseudo-scholars.
Lucia Brawley: I will fight for you in the upcoming campaign with everything I have, in order to prevent a Republican, or unthinkably, a Tea Party candidate from winning the presidency. But in order to fight for you again, I have to know you’re fighting for Bianca and me. Because if not you, then who?
Anthony Samad: The rise of the Tea Party wouldn’t have taken place had we had a white president. Blink if you want to…but the fact this has not happened to any other President has raised my “Race-dar,” beyond anything ideological battles could muster. Race(ism) has not disappeared in this country. It’s just been codified.
Tom Hall: The mainstream media has had little to say about Obama’s accomplishments. Why would they? The mainstream media is owned by, and serves, a handful of huge corporations in New York.
Carl Bloice: All across the country social services, which largely benefit lower income women, men and children are being cut back and people who made them function are being added to the ranks of the unemployed.
Walter Brasch: After significant compromise with the recalcitrant Republicans who want to continue to give the wealthy tax advantages while cutting significant social programs, President Obama has finally taken a stand on debt ceiling negotiations. However, in labor, wildlife management, and the environment he is still compromising rather than coming out forcefully for the principles he and the working class and environmentalists believe.
Randy Shaw: Obama ran for president preaching hope and rejecting appeals to fear, but now has become exactly what he railed against.
Ivan Eland: The public could be forgiven for missing the real message of Obama’s Afghanistan speech: “We’ve lost the war, but we are declaring victory anyway and getting out.”
Marian Wang: Even supporters of the Libya intervention have complained that the administration is flouting the law.
Robert Reich: Businesses are reluctant to spend more and create more jobs because there aren’t enough consumers out there able and willing to buy what businesses have to sell.
Tom Hayden: The fact is that Democratic constituencies and leaders, responding to overwhelming public sentiment against the war, have been uniting in recent weeks behind a call for “substantial and significant” troops reductions and a transfer of war funds to job creation at home.
Randy Shaw: In hindsight, activists should have taken it upon themselves to become the vessels of hope rather than trusting Barack Obama. But at this political moment, it is Obama who is best positioned to restore the hopes of his core supporters.
Alvaro Huerta: To be a real champ, Obama now needs to end the tax cuts for the rich, withdraw all troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, and get the DREAM Act passed.
Robert Reich: The Republican lie that the nation’s long-term budget deficit is responsible for high unemployment would be laughable if it weren’t so tragically irrelevant to the current situation.
Randy Shaw: Now that cities offer walkable, bicycle-friendly, public transit-available neighborhoods with desirable restaurants and a high quality of life, the poor are being shunted to car-dependent suburban areas in economic decline.
Julie Driscoll: Call me crazy, but I believe firmly that the statutory laws are in place for a reason – to prevent the exploitation of young men and women who don’t have the ability to make informed decisions, who don’t have the ability to “consent.”
Lauren Steiner: Please help us spread the word across Los Angeles! Come with signs that say “Bruce Karsh, please don’t sell the LA Times to the Kochs” and “Bruce Karsh, our democracy is not for sale” We are gathering Thursday, May 23 for a rally and march.
PCL offers monthly Open House Events on the 2nd Saturday at 2pm and 3rd Thursday at 6pm. Click here to learn more.
It’ll Be an All-Cuts Budget “Deal” (Just Like California)
Joseph Palermo: The debt ceiling gambit that Republicans in the House of Representatives have used to tie the U.S. government in knots in recent months is simply the California GOP’s tactic writ large.