{"id":33820,"date":"2011-01-29T04:44:58","date_gmt":"2011-01-29T09:44:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/?p=33820"},"modified":"2011-09-24T16:04:28","modified_gmt":"2011-09-24T20:04:28","slug":"move-along-nothing-to-see","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/by-judith-gayle-2\/move-along-nothing-to-see\/","title":{"rendered":"Move Along, Nothing To See"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Judith Gayle | Political Waves<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

They say the State of the Union address is less about the state of the union and more about what’s on the president’s mind. That works for me. Always good to know\u00a0how the\u00a0political leadership\u00a0is thinking about things. When George Bush gave us his yearly offerings, he was usually wrapped in the proverbial flag, carrying the proverbial Bible and speaking very carefully to\u00a0pronounce all\u00a0the words\u00a0correctly.<\/p>\n

\"President<\/a>
President Obama's State of the Union address.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

George was a pretty canny customer but no intellectual, and after the first speech, we didn’t expect him to be. Those on the left found him arrogant and irrational, while those in his fold admired his\u00a0apparent sincerity. Dubya’s hyperbole always seemed to include God’s intention to liberate the whole world to\u00a0a preordained future as\u00a0good Christian capitalists. God was Dubya’s advisor, and he mostly used words\u00a0His followers would\u00a0understand.\u00a0If we were not on the same page, George pretended we didn’t exist.<\/p>\n

Barack Obama, on the other hand, knows how to turn a phrase and\u00a0wouldn’t dream of leaving anyone out. This year the legislators decided, in the interest of civility, not to sit in partisan blocks but rather to mix it up with those across the aisle, making it a little tough for\u00a0viewers\u00a0to know how to react. Even the politicians seemed confused. John Boehner,\u00a0seated behind the president —\u00a0Number 3 in government,\u00a0along with\u00a0Number 2, Joe Biden — clapped regularly, probably breaking faith with some of the more dour leadership. John cried at least one time and clapped\u00a0often; his applause was not encouraging to the left.<\/p>\n

The State of the Union this year was reportedly\u00a0very business-friendly. The reason is simple enough: Obama is on the stump. Whatever progressive things might happen during any Dem term traditionally happen in the first two years; the next two will be more about circling the wagons and getting the\u00a0wranglers well positioned for the coming assault. Ignoring most other accomplishments, the country is calling for jobs, jobs, jobs, but for the most part,\u00a0jobs have gone north, south, east and west, across the big pond and out of sight. None of us want to hear that they aren’t coming back. We don’t want to hear about retraining or growing a new workforce for a new century. We have to feed our families now, pay our rent now —\u00a0find a job to keep body and soul together right this very minute. That’s not something Obama can provide us, but he has a better chance of encouraging job creation if he can move the nation to confidence. That was the gambit on Tuesday night, and we must now wait to see the result.<\/p>\n

Obama’s speech is being called Hope 2.0.\u00a0I take a bit of\u00a0comfort in that. This is an establishment president, after all,\u00a0who closely follows the rules of the game. As much as he wishes to soothe and encourage the nation,\u00a0I don’t think\u00a0he’s\u00a0dishonest in the way that many before him have been. If he’s hopeful, there are\u00a0solid underpinnings to count on and worthwhile possibilities\u00a0to build on.\u00a0In truth, Wall Street is flush again, banks are fat with cash but\u00a0refuse to\u00a0lend,\u00a0so\u00a0business isn’t risking new hires and the public isn’t spending. Obama tried to reassure us with a dose of hope.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Too many people are telling us there isn’t any hope, no balance ahead, no\u00a0future that isn’t\u00a0a downward trajectory. I don’t know\u00a0what tomorrow will bring,\u00a0but if it’s all over\u00a0but the shouting,\u00a0which I doubt,\u00a0Obama’s well-crafted message would have reflected more emergency, not less. If the\u00a0projection is as dismal as that proposed by Paul Ryan, full of dire predictions<\/a> and plans for bone-crunching austerity, or Michelle Bachmann’s fairy tale scenario<\/a> of the Democrats’\u00a0soulless\u00a0socialism,\u00a0then all is, indeed, lost. But if we listen with a practiced ear, we can hear the same kind of red alert warnings\u00a0that gave us\u00a0the jitters\u00a0after 9-11 and spun us up just before the launch of\u00a0Shock and Awe;\u00a0which is to say, Republican Mind-Fuck 101,\u00a0as\u00a0reflected\u00a0through the annals of\u00a0GOP history. They love a good emergency; it gets the juices flowing,\u00a0makes the natives restless and quick on the trigger.<\/p>\n

Which isn’t to say we aren’t in trouble, of course. We surely haven’t come far enough to curtail big banks, defeat lobbyists, close corporate loopholes, or regulate a thousand errant rules that wound us. We’ve only just begun to\u00a0notice\u00a0all that ails us. And I can testify that if I had my druthers,\u00a0I, like Robert Reich,<\/a> would have the president\u00a0be more candid\u00a0about\u00a0 class disparity, about the stranglehold of big business, about irrational rhetoric.\u00a0I’d love to see him lower the hammer on corporations, on banksters, on obstructers. I’d love to see a little whoop-ass now and then.<\/p>\n

But I ask you — do you think it would be wise to poke the vipers with a sharp stick\u00a0right now, when they have the very old, the very white and the very paranoid up in arms? Are you ready for another fire-storm like the one\u00a0that burned brightly when Obama\u00a0mentioned\u00a0bitter country folk clinging to guns and religion? Can you image John Edwards’ “Two Americas” speech coming out of Obama’s mouth without causing blowback from\u00a0a terrified demographic\u00a0locked and loaded over\u00a0the angry Black man who rode into the White House on the ACORN Express? You think Tucson was bad?<\/p>\n

This president walks carefully for a whole litany of complicated reasons. Still,\u00a0regardless of what Obama\u00a0did or didn’t include in this speech, we’ve got to admit he looked like the only calm, level-headed adult in the room, the one who\u00a0could work with anyone.\u00a0Given the kind of hysteria we hear daily, that’s an attractive and welcome\u00a0attribute. As well, the points\u00a0he presented seemed suddenly quite progressive,\u00a0compared to what the opposition proposed.<\/p>\n

The GOP offered their usual rebuttal, and this year we were treated to another by the Baggers, broadcast on CNN. The take-away from these competing speeches was a pretty clear choice for the American public: either the small, radically pruned\u00a0government proposed by the traditional GOP, the\u00a0Christian purist version advanced by the Tea Party, or the revamped, reformed government proposed by the Democrats. None of them move\u00a0too far off the establishment ley lines, of course, but they do exist on what passes for the far ends of them these days, opposing one another. While that may rankle with\u00a0a far left\u00a0that feels it has no representative here, despite the hype, Obama did not back up on foundations he’d already laid nor retreat on\u00a0projects\u00a0like green energy, education\u00a0and infrastructure.<\/p>\n

We’re in something of a cosmic holding pattern, but the changes that are ahead for this nation have, I believe, less to do with politicians than we suppose. Some people think Obama has dropped the ball in this left\/right conflict, been too cozy with the other side, needs to remember his progressive roots. I think Obama is a bit of an exotic, like someone with a rare blood type: he runs a little cooler, responds a tad differently\u00a0from the majority of us. He\u00a0drops a little behind, moves a little ahead, but seldom trots along with the herd. He’s configured not to confront, even as the rest of us are begging for such an opportunity. He will\u00a0head-butt\u00a0if he has to, but he does not consider that productive, and in these times, he may be right.<\/p>\n

Perhaps this is\u00a0a moment when\u00a0we might consider that what has always worked before is no longer how best to proceed. Perhaps there’s a new way we haven’t tried yet. I think that\u00a0events most politicians did not foresee, that the public did not imagine, that bubble up, seemingly\u00a0from out of nowhere — those are usually the things that shake us awake. Meanwhile, the political persona of this nation is being jolted into awareness about what is valuable to humanity and important to sustaining life.<\/p>\n

So we can\u00a0move along,\u00a0not much to see this week. We gained little ground, but lost little, either. It was, by virtue of Obama’s oratory skills, an enjoyable State of the Union speech, with a minimum of political preening and no stuttering whatsoever.\u00a0The choices about our future are still in our own hands, as is the responsibility to act in our own best interests. The option to wake up and see things differently is still available.\u00a0There are roses waiting to smell, children to hug, friends to encourage, kindnesses to extend. And, at least for a few days, a renewed sense of hope to ease the way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Judith Gayle | Political Waves They say the State of the Union address is less about the state of the union and more about what’s on the president’s mind. That works for me. Always good to know\u00a0how the\u00a0political leadership\u00a0is thinking about things. When George Bush gave us his yearly offerings, he was usually wrapped … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":""},"categories":[1744],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33820"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33820"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33820\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}