Obama’s Base Complains About Getting “Absolutely Nothing”

Posting at The Progressive, Matt Rothschild registers a complaint with Barack Obama. Rothschild wants to know:

When is Obama going to appoint someone who reflects the progressive base that brought him to the White House?

A more accurate question would be: When is Obama going to appoint someone who reflects the faux progressive base that brought him to the White House?

Most semi-conscious members of the electorate are aware by this time that Obama’s extreme left base - misogynous to its core - mirrored exactly the fascist tactics of the extreme right in taking down Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary and trashing Sarah Palin in the general election.

Nevertheless, Rothschild details his litany of grievances against President-elect Obama - complete with the usual faux progressive smears against Hillary Clinton and former officials in the Clinton Administration:

“He {Obama} won the crucial Iowa caucuses on the strength of his anti-Iraq War stance, and many progressive peace and justice activists worked hard for him against John McCain.

“So why in the world is he choosing Hillary Clinton to be Secretary of State when she was one of the loudest hawks on Iraq and threatened to obliterate 75 million Iranians?”

I’ll interject a couple of facts here:

Sen. Clinton explained at the time she voted for the Iraq resolution that she did so primarily to give the inspectors time to complete their work. Obama, on the other hand, has repeatedly misled Americans into believing that he actually voted against the resolution when he was not even a member of the US Senate at the time.

Regarding Iran, Sen. Clinton was asked how the U.S. should respond if Iran launched a nuclear attack again Israel, which would conceivably put the entire world at risk. Her tough response would most likely have served as a deterrent.

Alternatively, Clinton could have suggested entering into dialog with the Iranians while Israel perished, and radioactive fallout spread over the Middle East.

One has to wonder how Obama’s base would have responded to that question.

But Rothschild is on a roll here, resentfully listing the Clintonites already recruited by the faithless Obama team:

“And it’s not just Hillary.

“Obama’s OMB pick, Peter Orzag, is a Clintonite disciple of Robert Rubin.

“Obama’s AG pick, Eric Holder, is a Clintonite who represented Chiquita Bananas.

“And Larry Summers’s name is still being bandied about for Treasury, even though Summers, while Clinton’s Treasury Secretary, forced the deregulation of our financial markets and imposed disaster capitalism on Russia.

“Worse still, heading Obama’s transition team on intelligence matters are two former deputies to George Tenet, of all people. (See Amy Goodman’s great story about this on Democracy Now!)

“Look, there are a lot of talented progressives who could be in an Obama cabinet.

“Joseph Stiglitz is a Nobel Prize-winner in economics and a critic of corporate globalization. He should be Treasury Secretary.

“Senator Russ Feingold is a champion of civil liberties. He should be Attorney General.

“Robert Greenstein is head of Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. He would make a much better OMB director.

“Arlene Holt Baker, executive vice president of the AFL-CIO, would be a tremendous Secretary of Labor.

“And if Obama really wanted change, if he really wanted to honor progressives who backed him early on and then did the grunt work against McCain, he’d nominate Dennis Kucinich as Secretary of State.

“That sure would indicate a welcome departure from empire as usual.”

Rothschild concludes:

“But at this point, progressives are getting absolutely nothing from Obama.”

You have to feel sorry for Obama’s base. I mean they were out there 24/7 using every means at their disposal to undermine anyone they perceived as the enemy. While their idol preached enlightenment, his minions spewed venom and look what it’s gotten them – “absolutely nothing.”