On this 4th of July weekend: Grow up, America!

June 22 — Governor Dayton makes clear what's at stake for Minnesota in the budget debate: higher education, healthcare, seniors and public safety. Photo from Gov. Dayton’s website.

Let me say at the outset that I continue to have faith in the personal integrity, compassion, and wisdom of Gov. Mark Dayton, someone I’ve had the privilege of meeting personally a couple of times over the years.

At the same time, as a resident of St. Paul, Minn. who will inevitably be affected by the shut down of our state government, I’m not so much angry as I am saddened by watching congressional leaders from both parties behave like opposing teenage gangs.

 

We Minnesotans are getting hit twice, both at the state and the federal level in these unnecessary, so-called budget crises. On this 4^th of July weekend, instead of shooting off fireworks to celebrate our nation’s independence, perhaps we should each stay home, light a candle, and pray that the United States will soon grow up and learn to resolve its problems with intelligence, maturity, and dignity.

But first, take a look at what's going on in Minn.:

Angry Minnesota residents were fuming Friday over the state government shutdown — delaying the issuance of marriage licenses, evicting campers from state parks and furloughing about 23,000 nonessential government employees.

Despite an appointment, Bridget Spaniol of Minneapolis waited 3½ hours at a courthouse for a marriage license Thursday, as the goverment slowed to a crawl. “The whole experience … was terrible,” she told the Minnesota Star Tribune. “I feel sorry for anyone trying to get anything processed through the Minnesota government.”

State parks were also closed, which meant the sudden eviction of the 130 campsites at William O’Brien State Park. Water and electricity was shut off at the camp sites, meaning the campgrounds would be vacated on the eve of the July 4th weekend, typically one of the busiest weekends for state parks.

“This is so unfair,” said 8-year-old camper Ashley Jensen. “We were going to be here for four days and do lots of fun stuff. It’s now all ruined.”

“This is pretty sad, that they’ve ruined so many people’s summer vacations with their families,” said Allen Bjerke, who serves as campground host. “The Legislature is behaving like a bunch of kids.”

One visible sign of the shutdown is that no flags — Minnesota, American, or POW-MIA — were raised over the Capitol on Friday morning as they usually are, reports the AP.

Read more:

 

Clinton urges equality for all, including women, in Arab nations emerging from dictatorships

Hillary in Lithuania, photo courtesy of secretaryclinton.wordpress.com

Leave it to Hillary Clinton to take a stand on behalf of those who might be excluded from the full blossoming of the Arab Spring:

VILNIUS, Lithuania -- U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Friday that the rule of law, political parties and democratic institutions must emerge in the Arab world if it is to emulate Eastern Europe's remarkable transition two decades ago from authoritarianism to truly free societies.

In Lithuania for an international democracy conference, Clinton cited the real risk of Middle East and North African nations slipping back into autocratic old ways. And she lamented the latest accounts of violence in Syria, with security forces and knife-wielding, government-organized thugs reportedly attacking protesters in the city of Aleppo.

"Today there are new democracies fighting for life, there are vicious autocrats clinging to power," Clinton said in a speech at the "Community of Democracies" meeting. "This is an hour or need. And every democracy should stand up and be counted."

Drawing on the experience of Lithuania and other countries that opened up when the Iron Curtain came down 22 years ago, Clinton outlined a series of fundamentals she said were necessary for nations to make the transition to democracy: institutions rooted in law; equality for all, including women; a free press; economic opportunity; legitimate leaders.

Read more:

Good question: are you a ‘feminist’or pro-woman?

Photo courtesy of mniebuhr.com.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Amy Siskind’s post, “Is ‘Feminism’ Going Chapter 11?” reminds me of the sense of betrayal I experienced in 2008 when ‘feminist’ friends and acquaintances first trashed Hillary Clinton in the primary and then Sarah Palin in the general election, seldom pointing to specific areas of disagreement. Instead, the first words out of their mouths were usually, “She’s a bitch.”

I’ve moved on from most of those friends and acquaintances since then, but I’ve continued to refer to myself as a ‘feminist.’ Siskind’s logic is breaking through today, and I’m wondering if it’s time for me to declare myself pro-woman. In her final paragraphs, she directly addresses my category as a former Clinton supporter who left the Democratic Party in June 2008, although I did not head for the Republican tent. Instead, I re-registered as non-affiliated. Now I’m about to give up my card-carrying status as a ‘feminist’ and exchange it for the pro-woman designation. Siskind writes:

And what of Clinton supporters?  The legions of women who felt they no longer had a home in their party.  Among Clinton supporters, there was a rather widely held view that women’s groups (and many feminist) were either ineffectual or complicit in Clinton’s demise, preferring candidate Obama.   The women claiming the mantle of feminism did little to heal these wounds, excoriating Clinton supporters for their criticism of President Obama.  One particularly spiteful Obama supporting feminist coined the term “Clinton dead-enders” for those loyal to Clinton, leading the charge for more Clinton supporter bashing and exclusion.

Since most Clinton supporters were silenced and had no means to act out, they chose instead to act in.  More like a raft afloat.  Each wave washing them further from political ideology.   2010 was the first year since exit polling was taken that women went GOP.  But a closer peek, reveals a truth:  Women, 60 and Over, the largest and most reliable voting block, shifted from +6 D in 2008 to +12 R in 2010.  The second largest voting block, Women, 45-59 went from +10 D in 2008, to tie.   These are Hillary’s women.

There is one place that is making a home for all women, and that is the Pro-Women Movement.  It’s last call for feminism:  go inclusive or go extinct.

Read Siskind’s post in its entirety here.

At the end of Bush’s third term, guess who’s at the top of the economic heap

President Obama and Fed. Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke.

The millions of unemployed in our nation today are lucky that Bill Clinton has their backs. The Clinton Global Initiative is currently focusing on America to create jobs and given the  CGI’s success in helping other countries resolve persistent problems, we’ll soon be seeing movement on the economic front.

As Obama wraps up what amounts to Dubya’s third term, it’s enough to make you want to start a petition asking the One to step down to make room for Hillary Clinton to lead the Dems to victory in 2012. 

 

Surely you’ve heard by now that hard times among the electorate are making Obama’s 0reelection campaign team nervous. The National Journal’s Josh Kraushaar reports:

 

It’s been a rough June for the White House. Instead of being able to run a campaign taking credit for economic improvement, President Obama will - according to the latest forecasts - be trying to win four more years amid a grim economy next year.

In the meantime, the beleaguered president has been courting Wall Street executives to fund his reelection campaign in the same generous manner they did in 2008. I know… you thought his campaign was funded solely by small donations from college students and unpaid interns.

At the Washington Post, Phil Angelides, who served as chairman of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, which conducted the official inquiry into the nation’s financial and economic crisis, begins his coverage of the latest economic developments with this not so surprising news:

They say that winners get to write history. Three years after the meltdown of our financial markets, it’s clear who is winning and who is losing. Wall Street — arms outstretched in triumph — is racing toward the finish-line tape while millions of American families are struggling to stay on their feet. With victory seemingly in hand, the historical rewrite is in full swing.

The contrast in fortunes between those on top of the economic heap and those buried in the rubble couldn’t be starker. The 10 biggest banks now control more than three-quarters of the country’s banking assets. Profits have bounced back, while compensation at publicly traded Wall Street firms hit a record $135 billion in 2010.

Meanwhile, more than 24 million Americans are out of work or can’t find full-time work, and nearly $9 trillion in household wealth has vanished. There seems to be no correlation between who drove the crisis and who is paying the price.

The report of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission detailed the recklessness of the financial industry and the abject failures of policymakers and regulators that brought our economy to its knees in late 2008. The accuracy and facts of the commission’s investigative report have gone unchallenged since its release in January.

Take an anti-nausea pill and read more:

Youthful Obama supporters from 08 “walking around like cattle hit with a stun gun”

Barack Obama Speaks to 75,000 at Portland Oregon Rally, May 19, 2008

 

Newsweek’s Michael Tomasky asks, “How can the president rev up and mobilize his demoralized liberal base?” That would be those folks who supported candidate Obama in 08 from the ranks of “African-Americans, educated white liberals, Latinos, young people, and union members.”

Um, Mr. Tomasky, some of us educated white liberals took a pass on Obama in the 08 primary and voted for Hillary Clinton – for a sampling, click here.

Anyway, Tomasky provides a couple of interesting insights and nuggets of information in his analysis of the hurdles Obama faces in campaign 2012, which, as we are repeatedly hearing, isn’t likely to be a rerun of the media-driven, euphoric stampede the last time around.

Instead, well, Tomasky is suggesting that the Obama camp use fear to get out the vote. Wonder how many of those supporters reeling as if they’ve been hit with a stun gun are going to buy that?  Here’s the scoop:

It was a rare confessional moment for Barack Obama. At a Miami fundraiser in mid-June, the president acknowledged that it’s “not as cool” as it was in 2008 to support him. It isn’t just a matter of fewer hip posters and viral videos. It’s a matter of votes. Rekindling the enthusiasm of African-Americans, educated white liberals, Latinos, young people, and union members—the Democratic Party’s most loyal and progressive members—will be a huge challenge. After all, you can only elect the first African-American president once, and the past two and a half years have deeply disappointed many liberals. “I know a lot of the kids who worked hard in 2008,” says Hodding Carter III, adviser to the last one-term Democratic president (Jimmy Carter) and now a professor at the University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill. “They walk around like cattle who’ve been hit with stun guns between their eyes. This isn’t how it was supposed to be.”

Obama and his people have heard this sort of thing so often that they no longer bother to take umbrage. When I asked chief Obama reelection guru David Axelrod about this sense of disillusionment, he patiently ticked off a list of accomplishments: health-care reform, repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell,” financial regulatory reform, the drawdown from Iraq, student-loan reform. “Did we keep faith with the things that the president said he would do when he ran?” asks Axelrod. “There is a long list of things he said he’d do that we in fact did.”

It’s a solid inventory. But it’s countered by the undeniable reality that the country hasn’t noticeably moved in a more liberal direction (quite the opposite), and by the widely held perception among progressives that Obama will never wage fierce battle on behalf of liberal ideals. When I interviewed Justin Ruben, the executive director of MoveOn.org, whose 5 million members (many in swing states) must be revved up and mobilized if the president is to be reelected, he gave me four or five variants of the line “People need to feel like the president and the Democrats are really going to fight for their side.”

Read more:

The fading hoop-shooting image of the once cool Barack Obama

Are you among those stunned to wake up and realize today that nearly four years ago, America, the world’s greatest superpower, at a time of national crisis on several fronts, elected as president an inexperienced young man mainly because he was hip and cool? Does that not have the power to shock you?

Yes, that’s right. It happened after Democratic Party leaders trashed the seasoned, experienced Hillary Clinton, labeling her as too polarizing, to nominate the hip one who was amassing a fortune from Wall Street pockets while claiming his campaign was funded by small donors.

Now completing his first term, Barack Obama is on record as one of the most polarizing presidents in modern U.S. history.

Courtesy of worldgolfreport.blogspot.com

As the youthful Barack’s hoop-shooting image fades, Politico points out it’s being replaced with an image of golfing with John Boehner, and the once electrifying candidate is now mourning his loss of cool while hustling potential donors for a second term.

So the electorate yawns while incumbent Obama tries to rouse his disillusioned followers from 08, and Rep. Michele Bachmann and Mitt Romney take the lead in the Republican field.

But back to the Politico piece chronicling Obama’s lament of his loss of cool:

Barack Obama’s second presidential campaign seems destined to lack 2008’s gleam of insurgency — and nobody knows it better than Obama.

At a series of recent fundraisers, the president lamented his loss of cool, his transformation from fresh to familiar, from edgy to establishment.

“I’m sort of old news,” he told supporters at a New York fundraiser last week.

“I know that it’s not going to be exactly the same as when I was young and vibrant and new,” he mused. “And there was — posters everywhere, hope. The logo was really fresh. And let’s face it, it was cool to support me back then. At cocktail parties, you could sort of say, ‘Yeah, this Obama guy, you haven’t heard of him? Let me tell you about him.’”

Increasingly, Obama is confronting the difference between running as a relative unknown on the popular promise of hope and change and campaigning as a known commodity whose record reflects the inevitable compromises of governing in Washington.

“The old posters are all faded,” Obama told supporters at the opulent Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Washington last week. “People make fun of hope and change.”

 

Read more:

 

As the Obama world turns: Boehner is courted while Pelosi fights for a seat at the table

How quickly the mutual adoration has faded.

 

 

 

 

Interesting how Republican Speaker of the House John  Boehner gets to play golf with President Obama and enjoy a secret meeting with the One; whereas, House minority leader Nancy Pelosi, who fawned over Obama throughout the 08 primary and her tenure as the first woman speaker of the House,  must now make a scene in order to get a seat at the table in debt limit discussions.

Roll Call has the scoop, along with its sorry antecedents:

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will demand a seat in the table for the final talks on the national debt limit, putting a strong liberal voice in the room.

Pelosi and House Democrats were left out of the negotiations between President Obama and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) last year that extended nearly all of the Bush tax rates though 2012.

Pelosi didn’t participate in the final high-level talks over fiscal 2011 spending levels either.

But now she’s demanding her say at a time when many of her House Democratic colleagues are disappointed in Obama’s level of consultation with their caucus.

“If they don’t have the votes, House Democrats have to be at the table,” said a House Democratic leadership aide.

Pelosi stayed out of the talks on crafting a continuing resolution funding the rest of 2011 that included $38.5 billion in spending cuts because House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) expressed confidence they would pass it without Democratic help.

But, in the end of that debate, the Republican votes fell short, and GOP leaders needed help from House Democrats. Democrats went along with a deal they had almost no part in negotiating because they wanted to avert a government shutdown.

The experience left a bitter taste in their mouths, and Pelosi won’t let it happen again.

 Read more: