Sorry, gang; can’t help it. Sometimes a portrayal of a situation defies all subtlety and poetry, and forces me to “go Herblock” on it.

If you’ve been paying any attention to the news lately, you’ve probably heard all about the big CEO get-together up at Obummer’s Place, with all the attendant worried blather from the boss media chatterers about whether or not El Presidente is being seen as “pro-business” enough. Well, let’s see… there’s the bank bailouts, the health-insurance industry bailout (aka “Healthcare Reform”), the latest round of bailouts of the banking industry (aka “Financial Reform”) and, of course, the latest sellout to the rich in the form of the extension of tax cuts for the rich under the thin disguise of “tax cuts for all”. After all this, how could there be any doubt about how “pro-business” our Glorious Boy Emperor is? Seriously, the guy’s been pro-corporate since day one, and even before. What the hell are all these big shots on CNBC bitching about? He’s pretty much given them everything they want.

What I’ve enjoyed, though, is the defensive, pushed-button reactions of the White House and Democratic Party “leadership” every time any Progressives or Lefties call bullshit and point out how he’s sold out to corporations on every major issue; they go into the pre-programmed “compromise” rap and brand anyone who objects to “compromise” as an unreasonable zealot or “purist”. What Obummer fails to point out, however, is how all of his “historic reforms” are weak, watered-down half-measures at the very best, and how his “spirit of compromise” involves caving in to corporate interests at every opportunity, appeasing right-wing neofascists and wannabe theocrats, and colluding with the very same class of people who are responsible for the trouble this country’s in now. Y’know, if our side actually got something out of all this compromising, it might not be so bad, but we’ve gotten absolute zero.

So, if being appalled at crass opportunism, cowardice and hypocrisy makes me a “purist”, then, hell yeah, I’m a purist. If wanting an end to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the closure of Guantanamo and Bagram makes me a “purist”, then, hell, yeah. If wanting the control of the healthcare system taken away from corporations makes me a “purist”, then, hell, yeah. If wanting an end to warrantless spying and intimidation and the restoration of the Bill Of Rights makes me a “purist”, then, hell, yeah… just like Frederick Douglass was a “purist”, and Eugene Debs was a “purist”, and Emma Goldman, and Nelson Mandela, and Abbie Hoffman, and Bobby Seale.

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“You’re obsolete, my baby–my poor, unfaithful baby,
I said, baby, baby, baby, you’re out of time!”
–Rolling Stones

A couple of weeks or so ago, Vice Emperor Joe Biden went on TV and called the American Left “whiners” for daring to complain about the abject failure of the Democratic Party to enact any truly progressive reforms while at about the same time, Boy Emperor Barack Martin Luther Gandhi Aquinas Timberlake Obama The One gave a bitchy interview to Rolling Stone in which he slags the Left six ways from Sunday for complaining about the Democrats sucking so badly, pretty much doing everything but pissing on us and giving us the finger in what was the first round of “hippie bashing” by the Democrats — followed by his remarks at a posh fundraising dinner in Connecticut attended by a buttload of rich people, in which he spits on the Left yet again while bowing and scraping to “the people who write the checks”. That’s sure a helluva way to convince your progressive “base” to support you, isn’t it? You go back on every promise you ever made during the ‘08 campaign, you retain and expand on Bush’s policies on imperialist war and the national security state, you enrich the banks and Wall Street while leaving the unemployed and homeowners facing foreclosure to twist in the wind, you sit by while economies and ecosystems are destroyed on the Gulf Coast, you legislate sweetheart deals with the health-insurance and pharmaceutical industries under the guise of “reform”, you exhibit the most craven behavior possible in the face of rightists and fascists — and when the people who helped elect you dare to complain about it and threaten to withhold their support in the midterm “elections”, you go on TV and insult them to their faces? There’s some real out-of-the-box thinking for you. Is your party and its leadership an abysmal failure? No problem, just blame those fucking hippies for complaining, and announce that the beatings will continue until morale improves.

In the meantime, Democratic Party mouthpieces in the blogozone are going into full-tilt pants-crapping panic mode, with Robert Parry at consortiumnews.com spewing a page full of the most weak-assed, warmed-over, shopworn scaremongering and excuse-making possible, complete with that good old Nader Hate. Trouble is, in the course of trying to make a case of supporting the Democrats no matter what, he makes a case for staying home — or even voting Republican, seeing as how even with the Democrats in power, we’re still being saddled with Republican policies which, more often than not, are being enabled by the Democrats. Parry might as well have cut’n'pasted an old column from 2000, begging and pleading with us not to vote Green in response to the cowardice and hypocrisy of the Clinton Regime, threatening us with calamity and disaster, guilt-tripping us with that tired old bullshit about how “a vote for Nader is a vote for Bush”. Hell, even the Communist Party USA is getting in on the action, with Comrade Chairman Sam Webb posting a whiny-assed screed pleading with us to not sit this one out. Jeezus, who’d have thought that even the geezing old cranks at the CPUSA were fronting for the Democrats these days?

Eight or ten years ago, this kind of behavior by the Democrats and their mouthpieces would’ve made me livid, but nowadays it just fills me with delight; I can’t begin to tell you how liberating it was to finally quit giving a shit about what happens to the Democrats. Sure, on the one hand its really piss-poor the way Biden and the Boy Emperor are dissing us, but what do you expect? These are Democrats we’re talking about here, y’know. I become flat-out ecstatic every time I hear either of these two — not to mention the likes of Rachel Maddow, Keith Olbermann and Ed “I Know No-THING!” Schultz blustering and kvetching and pleading for us to come out and vote for their miserable-assed party, because I know that every time they do this, they’re showing us just how truly weak, ineffectual and entirely unworthy of our support they are. “Pleee-eeease vote for us! Pretty please? We only suck ass a little less than the GOP! C’monnnn, pleeee-eeaase?” P’wahh ha ha ha ha ha hahhh. Take a goddamn’ hike, assholes. It’s popcorn time. You want to pander to me, exploit me, guilt-trip me, lie to me, insult me to my face on TV? Kiss my ass goodbye.

I plan on staying home on “Election” Day, withholding my support for a bunch of cowardly corporate tools, refusing my consent for a system that doesn’t work in my interests — and doing it without shame, regret or apology. Seriously, folks — there’s no shame in staying home on “Election” Day if none of the walking wastes of DNA seeking your vote are representing your values or standing up for what you believe in. C’mon, take a chance. Stay home. Don’t participate in the cheap-assed kabuki theater that passes for “democracy” in this country. See how liberating it is.

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“Bipartisanship…” “On the table…” Y’know, gang, I’m actually from DC, and all this Capitol Hill Sunday Morning doubletalking bullshit still makes my brain hurt. Still, a well-informed citizen is a well-armed citizen; so, after many, many Sunday mornings of slogging through hours of Meet The Press and Hardball and Face The Nation so you don’t have to, I’ve put together this quick guide to the phrases and words you hear the most in Washington.

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Continue reading "The Language of Washington" »

So, here we are hardly a week into this Shiny New Hope™ and Change™ Era, and we’ve already pretty much seen what The One and his Donkeycratic cohorts are all about: The Future. They want to move forward, move ahead, don’t look back, don’t stop thinking about tomorrow (MoveOn just wants to take another swig of Kool-Aid and – move on). They’re so much about The Future, in fact, that they want to totally ditch the past – including their enabling of war crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo, their role as accomplices in the destruction of the Constitution via USA PATRIOT, their endorsement of US-backed Israeli atrocities in Palestine.

Do you people – those of you who know who you are – honestly think the Donkeycrats will so much as lift a finger to bring the Bush mob to justice? Arrest Bush? In your goddamn’ dreams. President Timberlake has kept Robert Friggin’ Gates on as Secretary Of War, f’cripesake – not to mention that The One has also already gotten his hands bloody in Afghanistan and Pakistan this week. Does this look like the kind of guy who’s going to raise so much as a murmur of objection to the crimes of the Bush Regime, anymore than he’s spoken barely a whisper about US-financed Israeli war crimes in Gaza? Wake the hell up, US Left.

To bring Bush and the Gang to justice would require the Donkeycrats to admit to their own extensive complicity in crimes against the Constitution, international law, and humanity in general, crimes the Bush Regime could not have carried out without help from the Donkeycrats – kinda like the spot they found themselves in about ten years ago this month. To have impeached Bubba Clinton for his complete “rap sheet”, aside from all that blowjob nonsense – murderous sanctions against Iraq, the continuous bombing of Iraq, the “Lewinsky Bombing” of Afghanistan and the Sudan, the two and a half months’ continuous saturation bombing of civilians and civilian infrastructure in Yugoslavia – would have required the Donkeycrats to ‘fess up to their having allowed it with barely a peep of protest.

In other words, don’t hold your breath.

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