Here is the Barack Obama challenge: He says, over and over and over and over and over again, that he is “the candidate of change.”
Yet, neither he nor his more fanatical followers can articulate in a single, English sentence, exactly what Sen. Obama means by this. Rather, his cult-like supplicants of hope keep chanting mantra- like “he’s about change.”
Really?
Let’s see what Obama would have to advocate if he truly was “the candidate of change”–
- Advocate not only universial health care for EVERYONE, but advocate a one payer system such as it is in European countries, with the government picking up the full tab.
- Advocate, European-style unemployment insurance, with out of work employees getting as much as 75 percent of their normal take-home pay for a minimum of three years, or till new employment is found.
- Advocate free, government financed and controlled day-care centers.
- Advocate that military spending, now at its highest level since World War 2, be slashed by at least 40 percent.
- Advocate new legislation that would make any and all forms of lobbying government officials a federal felony, punishable by large fines as well as prison sentences.
- Advocate free education through the university level (as many European nations currently do) to free students of the burden of huge debt by the time they graduate.
- Advocate term limits for Congresspersons and Senators–just as there is a term limit on being able to hold the presidency.
- Advocate that ALL television,radio and cable outlets be required to provide free air time to candidates, eliminating the enormous and growing costs of running for high office in the United States.
- Advocate a freeze of adjustable-rate mortgages for five years and mandate that lending institutions that provided questionable mortgages be held legally liable.
- Advocate a partial ban of automobile traffic into all major city centers, while advocating the building of new mass transit systems aimed at protecting the planet from greenhouse gases.
- Advocate strict water conservation measures for the drought striken southwest and southeast.
- Advocate criminal investigations of all government officials who had any hand in the Bush administration’s commitment of war crimes against innocent Iraqi citizens who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
- Advocate that ALL broadcast stations using the public airways once again be required to provide a certain percentage of their air time to social, community programs.
- Advocate the re-regulation of the airline industry which is falling apart before out eyes.
The list can easily go on. The point,though, is, when people say they plan on voting for Obama because he is the candidate for change, fine…But, for God sakes, at least know what it is he plans on changing and require him to tell us in as much detail as possible.
Oh! And, don’t hold your breath.
7 Responses
jean p. monte
February 14th, 2008 at 3:31 pm
1It’s great that someone is finally starting to tell the truth about Obama, unfortunately, it’s too little, too late! Because the media has refused to do its job, we will have a Democratic failure of a president for the next 4 years, and then just watch the conservatives take over in 2012.
joop breeschoten
February 17th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
21. governments in Europe are not picking up the
full tab of health insurance
2. In most european countries you fall back to minimum wage within 6 months
3.In most European countries there is no free education.
Tom Allen
February 20th, 2008 at 6:58 pm
3Your laundry list is pathetic in that it does not address the main issues of social change Obama will work for: The return of power to the common man and not just the rich and ruling elite. An end to knee jerk military muscle flexing with an emphasis on diplomacy rather than the wholesale killing we have become used to. A return to a more humane and civilized country that was the envy of the world.
I sometimes wonder if journalist want to bash Obama since they are jealous that they are not as gifted in oratory or presentation.
Mary Chamberlain
March 1st, 2008 at 5:31 am
4OBAMA AND CHANGE, CHANGE, CHANGE!
The following looks like BUSINESS AS USUAL TO ME!
On The Rise Of Obama:”He said, ‘Cliff, I’m gonna make me a U.S. Senator.’”
February 27, 2008 4:09 PM
Posted By:Pam
Filed in: Barack Obama, Election ‘08, National News
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Todd Spivak has an interesting piece on the rise of Barack Obama:
Jones had served in the Illinois Legislature for three decades. He represented a district on the Chicago South Side not far from Obama’s. He became Obama’s kingmaker.
Several months before Obama announced his U.S. Senate bid, Jones called his old friend Cliff Kelley, a former Chicago alderman who now hosts the city’s most popular black call-in radio program.
I called Kelley last week and he recollected the private conversation as follows:
“He said, ‘Cliff, I’m gonna make me a U.S. Senator.’”
“Oh, you are? Who might that be?”
“Barack Obama.”
Jones appointed Obama sponsor of virtually every high-profile piece of legislation, angering many rank-and-file state legislators who had more seniority than Obama and had spent years championing the bills.
“I took all the beatings and insults and endured all the racist comments over the years from nasty Republican committee chairmen,” State Senator Rickey Hendon, the original sponsor of landmark racial profiling and videotaped confession legislation yanked away by Jones and given to Obama, complained to me at the time. “Barack didn’t have to endure any of it, yet, in the end, he got all the credit.
“I don’t consider it bill jacking,” Hendon told me. “But no one wants to carry the ball 99 yards all the way to the one-yard line, and then give it to the halfback who gets all the credit and the stats in the record book.”
During his seventh and final year in the state Senate, Obama’s stats soared. He sponsored a whopping 26 bills passed into law — including many he now cites in his presidential campaign when attacked as inexperienced.
It was a stunning achievement that started him on the path of national politics — and he couldn’t have done it without Jones.
Before Obama ran for U.S. Senate in 2004, he was virtually unknown even in his own state. Polls showed fewer than 20 percent of Illinois voters had ever heard of Barack Obama.
Jones further helped raise Obama’s profile by having him craft legislation addressing the day-to-day tragedies that dominated local news headlines.
For instance. Obama sponsored a bill banning the use of the diet supplement ephedra, which killed a Northwestern University football player, and another one preventing the use of pepper spray or pyrotechnics in nightclubs in the wake of the deaths of 21 people during a stampede at a Chicago nightclub. Both stories had received national attention and extensive local coverage.
I spoke to Jones earlier this week and he confirmed his conversation with Kelley, adding that he gave Obama the legislation because he believed in Obama’s ability to negotiate with Democrats and Republicans on divisive issues.
So how has Obama repaid Jones?
Last June, to prove his commitment to government transparency, Obama released a comprehensive list of his earmark requests for fiscal year 2008. It comprised more than $300 million in pet projects for Illinois, including tens of millions for Jones’s Senate district.
Shortly after Jones became Senate president, I remember asking his view on pork-barrel spending.
I’ll never forget what he said:
“Some call it pork; I call it steak.”
Obama is a Joke
March 1st, 2008 at 9:57 am
5Great info Mary! Thanks for sharing it.
Dany
August 17th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
6Obama = change…ha.
Sadly, with that attitude of ’settling’, nothing will change until someone or something breaks the inertia of the present SYSTEM and sets into motion real change (and no i do not think Obama..as ‘appealing’ as he may sound can promise us much). None of the top two candidates for president is capable of making that change. We go through this every four years.
The American SYSTEM of governance (our democracy) is broken, but i don’t want to fault ‘the system’ 100%. However imperfect it is, it does reflect the diversity of America.
Much more dangerous, the PROCESS we call elections and voting–by which we attempt to change the SYSTEM is also fundamentally broken.
Americans have known this for ages…but what do we do? (even i am guilty of this)
We vote for the lesser of the many ‘evils’.
So, with both the SYSTEM and PROCESS broken, at least for most of us, what can we do?
Ive heard a pitch from some for a revolution…but….
We must create a system and process based on something much more important- uh, maybe our earth?
HOWEVER, everyone plays an equal role…we are as much to blame as the government…not either/or. And as much as we fix one side of the cause, the other side will still have it’s effect. It will be a collaborative and parallel effort that will change our ways…
Pepper Spray
February 23rd, 2009 at 6:33 pm
7I voted for McCain. I can’t believe this guy got into office. Hope he doesn’t F*** it up.
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