In my view it is also an act of
moral cowardice (not unusual for Presidents but still appalling) over
Afghanistan, where many Americans and Afghans will die so that Hamid Karzai, a
hideously corrupt ‘president,’   can still hold power in that
country.   In the last
election 1.3 million votes were tossed as fraudulent.  Out of 5 million total. 
The odds are that we are helping impose a corrupt government militarily on a
population that voted against it. 
Americans dying for dictators. 
Wonderful. 

Men in power find it so easy to
preside over the deaths of others who did them no harm in order to look
“strong.” Bob Herbert clearly describes this aspect of America’s and Obama’s
weakness pretending to be strength.    Only the conservatives and
neo-cons who cheered us on to attacking Iraq seem to really support escalation.  Thugs like Karl Rove. 
Outside that camp of losers there is decidedly less support. Even many foreign
policy  “realists” who often criticize
the supposed naivete of people who want moral values to count in our
policies  oppose this escalation. 
Glenn Greenwald, as usual, exposes the nonsense of those Democratic lovers of war as being as
intellectually and morally vacuous as that of the Republican right.  We’ve been down this road before.

But Obama is better than Bush,
someone might say.

But being better than the
opposition isn’t a sign of competence when the opposition is depraved, and the
mistakes have been as big, and the opportunities to lead as strong and
neglected as has been the case with President Obama. We are nearly a year into
his first term, which is traditionally a President’s strongest (see FDR and the
New Deal, LBJ and the Great Society, and RWR and the Reagan Revolution as
examples).  So far we have
admittedly significant but not very visible changes done at the Executive
Branch level, not so much accomplished in Congress, and on the big issues, STILL
no clear vision of what health reform should look like in Obama’s eyes, no
administration bill over global warming to help focus debate, and kissing up to
Goldman Sachs and other banksters and national tapeworms.

For me, tonight us strike three. 

I am through giving Barack Obama
the benefit of the doubt.  In my
eyes he has proven to be a fully owned instrument of the military-industrial-financial
complex until he proves otherwise. 
He does not care that a majority of Americans oppose escalation.  He figures we’ll fall in line.  This one won’t.

I know, I know – Obamaists will
say he has to deal with a corrupt Democratic Party and a depraved Rethuglican
Party and both a corrupt and depraved Washington DC and media culture.  All of this is depressingly true.  But he was elected to lead, not to be a
clerk.  He was elected to focus
energy for change, not for a corrupt ‘bipartisanship.”  He was elected to offer an alternative
to the architects of our national disasters, not to learn to sleep with them.  He was elected to act based on his
words, not just continually spout more pretty words.  Instead of “Yes We Can,” in power Obama is “No We Can’t.” 

I see nothing in this man that
stands out as a leader except fine words, and without actions when you have the
chance to act, fine words are cheap. 
Worse, fine words without action spread cynicism and despair.  Remember all the promises about
transparency after years of Bush’s secrecy? They were rendered meaningless
within months.  These were issues
where he did not depend on Congress, and his frequently pledged word was
without value.  I cannot believe
him now except by an act of irrational will akin to those conservatives who
made little George their savior.

I sure would like to be proven
wrong.  I really would.  Like many of us I’d like, for once, a president I could truly respect.  It;s been a long time.  But I doubt that I will.

That Obama is a failure as a
leader or as a moral force is no reason to vote for a Republican, for a Sauron
rather than a Smeagal, but his presidency is certainly nothing to get excited
about.  If this country has much
hope of remaining a society with some semblance of decency, I think it will
arrive either from hitting rock bottom so the establishment, right and extreme
right alike, can’t avoid being discredited (and as with drunks, the outcome of
hitting the bottom  isn’t always
good) or if good citizens vote ONLY for Democrats who actually serve their
constituents more than Goldman Sachs or the insurance industry or the
military-industrial-congressional complex.  There are a few and primaries could select more if we vote
against “centrist” and “conservative” incumbents.

Otherwise thank the Gods we have
our spirituality, one that puts the pathetic  incompetence of so many “leaders” in a fitting
perspective.  But still it’s
sad.  This could be a so much more
decent world.

And Barack Obama could have been
a great man.