Even before President Obama delivers his State of the Union message, the rumblings of partisans can be heard rattling the media timbers. Democrats are putting the finishing touches on their heartfelt endorsements of the raw honesty of the speech and the bold agenda it laid out for America’s future. Republicans are polishing their spontaneous reactions to the flaccid presentation and counting every occurrence of keywords like “terror” or “deficit” as if the number of times you say them has an impact on their destiny. The post-game on these events is so thoroughly predictable it hardly requires a spoiler alert.
These ceremonies never really describe the state in which we find our union. It is more like a confessional wherein our shortcomings are enumerated and our commitment to dispatch them is renewed On both of those measures the President has much for which to answer. A little more than a year ago, just days before the election, he told a cheering audience of supporters that…
“We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.”
That was 453 days ago. I’m not sure that he can make a case that the U.S. has been fundamentally transformed yet. It was a stirring promise that was received with overwhelming enthusiasm at the time. But after a year of Town Howlers, Tea Baggers, and pusillanimous pundits praying for failure and openly weeping, that moment of inspiration has been twisted into an ominous threat. Glenn Beck repeatedly plays video of the sound bite with a sneering implication that the transformation Obama had in mind was one from an American fable of perpetual prosperity and freedom, to a hellish realm of impoverishment and tyranny. Never mind that many politicians invoke the vision of transformational change. Even Beck himself in his announcement for his contrived and disingenuous 9/12 Project:
Beck, 3/17/2009: We’ve got to fundamentally change. We’ve got to be involved.
Dick Cheney, 3/20/2008: There has been a huge fundamental change and transformation for the better.
Mitt Romney, 9/21/2007: [W]e’re going to have to take fundamental change in Washington.
Newt Gingrich, 2/7/2008: [A]nything less than fundamental change will lead ultimately to a weaker and more vulnerable America.
See? Everybody wants change. It’s a universal trait of humanity. Except for those who fear change. Which, ironically, is just as universal. Nonetheless, the hope and change that many were led to believe was just a new president away still eludes us. There is a laundry list of aspirations that remain unfulfilled. In fact, much of the current landscape looks eerily like the one we thought we had escaped.
- Iraq
- Afghanistan
- Gitmo
- Don’t Ask Don’t Tell
- Rendition and Enhanced Interrogation
- Patriot Act
- Wall Street Bailouts
- Massive Deficits
- Record Foreclosures
- Crippling Unemployment
- Global Warming
- Health Care
Even worse, the appetite for change, and for the agenda articulated in the campaign, has seemed to wither. It appears that all of the momentum today is for regression to the last decade’s legacy of war, greed, and the bliss that so famously accompanies ignorance. How else can you explain the once unimaginable yearning for a return to the shallow austerity of George W. Bush’s America? Could anyone have ever seriously predicted this:
No, I do not miss him. I do not miss the smirking arrogance, the corruption, the cronies, the incompetence, or the bull-headed insistence on selling our nation out to corporations and masters of war. But I do miss the hope that I held for a resurrection from the morbid state in which Bush left the union. I miss having faith that the goals to which our nation aspired were closer than ever to our grasp. I miss believing that we, as a country, were coming to our senses.
Many of the President’s defenders make the legitimate point that a year is not nearly long enough to erase the fiasco of the previous eight. But it would be nice to have the sense that we were a little farther down that road. With the disheartening compromise and collapse of the health care legislation, and the recent electoral debacles, and the enduring economic and job slump, and the persistent rise of right-wing media, it is getting harder to remain optimistic.
None of these issues will be resolved this evening when the President gives his speech. I don’t expect him to leave the podium with legislative victories in hand. Nor do I expect unemployment to decline tomorrow morning. And it appears unlikely that our troops will be returning from the Middle East any time soon. The only thing I would ask of the President from this address is that he return to the message that got him elected in the first place. I ask that he rediscover in himself the ambition to serve the poor and working-class Americans who worked their hearts out so that he could assume this high office and be their representative.
That’s all I ask. Just a simple request for a return to genuine compassion, fairness, and justice. Is that too much to hope for?
We would like to thank our partners in mongering. Glenn Beck of Fox News has been an invaluable ally as he promotes myths that elevate our status and increase the fear quotient upon which we rely to be successful. We are also appreciative of him and his colleagues at Fox for minimizing reporting on this Supreme Court decision, as too much publicity could result in attempts to legislatively supersede the Court. And we would not be where we are today without the help of conservative pundits and think tanks who put in long hours justifying decisions like the one just handed down. We expect the media in general will continue to ignore this decision because they stand to make billions in advertising from the newly unleashed corporations.
And the coaching staff at Fox is already preparing the field. Fox Nation took the occasion of Brown’s victory to promote a video that portrays Democrats as despondent Nazis being berated by their leader, Adolf Hitler.
Honestly? Supposed lack of diversity? Even one of the black “leaders” profiled in the article describes the Tea Parties as “mostly white.” And now, after nearly a year of overtly racist rhetoric and symbolism Fox News is going to portray Tea Baggers as a bastion of tolerance and diversity? The same Tea Baggers who call President Obama a Lyin African; who accuse Obama and Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor of being racists; who carry signs that depict the President as Hitler or a witch doctor? Those Tea Baggers?
Without bothering to support their assertions, the article describes the “enthusiastic involvement of black conservatives in the tea party rallies and trips,” That lie is exposed by pretty much any photograph of an actual Bagger event. And when you see the real leaders of the Tea Party nation, it is unmistakable who this movement is really working for. Like Dale Robertson, the head of TeaParty.org, at left.