I feel incredibly sad as I sit down to type.
I am filing Barack Obama's Nobel Prize for peace in with Henry Kissinger's with the news of 35,000 new troops for Pipelinestan and an open-ended withdrawal plan that sounds like a sucker to shut the kids up. Coupled with the wonderful news that Shell Oil has won contracts with the Iraqi government for oil extraction, refinement and export. We have successfully moved most of our occupying forces into our 14 secret super-bases for the long haul, just in case those pesky Iraqis start thinking they own the place again, and the remainder of our prisoners from Guantanamo seem destined to spend their lives, or what's left of them, strapped to the decks of Gulfstream jets, shuttling between one engagement and the next. No word on the prisoners in our remaining black sites. Those for whom the specter of trial looms have already been promised capital sentences when they are found guilty.
Here on the home front, Mr. Obama's back-room deals with the insurance industry have guaranteed that health care reform will be a grim joke, with the primary change being that we all will be required, under penalty of law, to purchase the stuff from private insurers, who have promised to be good, honest. The will of the people, the non-partisan will of the people, has been successfully thwarted once again. By the time this is passed, it will have taken more away from us than it has given us, in any real sense.
No one has mentioned the federal government's domestic spying activities for a while, so I guess now might be a good time to note that nothing has changed, all those programs are still in place and humming along smoothly.
It has become increasingly clear that Mr. Obama's agenda has been to fulfill the Bush agenda. I voted for him, and have come to regret it. At least with republicans in office, there is always the hope of voting up, but if this is the best the democrats are willing to give us after we have put them in power, we don't even have that hope, the hope that Mr. Obama campaigned on so successfully. Maybe we need the republicans back in power for a few more years, and the offer of a greater hope, from a candidate willing to accede power to the electorate. "Public service" has come to be a crude inside joke, and the difference between republicans and democrats has been reduced to...what? We have, once again, been served up to the corporations these marionettes shill for. Punch in red, Judy in blue. I think I'm too tired to watch the rest of the show, but it's a repeat, and will probably run again, anyway. Hey, have fun, keep me posted. Thanks.