THE CHUMP CYCLE
Progressives and Netroots Feeling
Abandoned as Obama Tacks Rightward

AlterNet runs a couple Huffington Post essays on Obama's post primary rightward shift. Here's an excerpt from one by a disgruntled Obama Democrat:

But two can play at Obama's game.

To me, Obama's methods are obvious. He is selling out a constituency without leverage (progressives) to burnish his centrist image, which he believes will bring him more votes in November. Obama is practicing, as BooMan puts it, "raw political calculation." Well, guess what; I can do that, too!

I will work to elect Obama because, a la "Crashing The Gate," he is the candidate who will most likely bring about the change I want. But I realize that this raw political calculation is only a marriage of convenience. As soon as Obama is elected, I become his critic, looking to move him left.

Click here for the rest of this one, as well as a more general article over the brouhaha.

Right. Well, all these left-wing Obama supporters have good reason to be angry. Just check out these links:

What Does Obama's 'Love of Markets' Mean for Our Economic Future?

Obama Backs Bill Giving Immunity To Telecoms

Obama's Draconian New Death Penalty Stance

Obama endorses pro-war Barrow

While I haven't specifically been saying all along that Obama is no liberal, I have been saying all along that his rhetoric hasn't given me any reason to make me think he is. I've also been saying that "post-partisan" is completely incompatible with the "change" that has been the centerpiece of his campaign. Well, now that he's got the left side of the Democratic Party in his pocket, his rhetoric and actions have given me the certainty I need: Barack Obama is no liberal.

Or maybe he is!

Maybe his newfound love of the death penalty, his support for federal mass surveillance of US citizens, his self-proclaimed support of neoliberalism, and his support for Iraq war supporters is all just a ruse! Maybe he's only pretending to be a conservative so he can get more conservative votes! Maybe Obama is as liberal as a Kennedy!

I suppose that's possible.

But what's the difference? How is pretending to be a conservative any different from being a conservative? We got the same kind of shit from Bill Clinton, who knew how to emit good vibes to liberals, while, as has been observed by countless writers and pundits, governing to the right of Richard Nixon--I think it was Michael Moore who called old Bill "the best Republican President we've ever had." I've always wanted to believe that Clinton was secretly a liberal, but was simply unable to advance liberal ideas under the withering attacks of Newt Gingrich's GOP. But who really knows? He signed away welfare. He brokered trade deals that enriched his campaign contributers, while offshoring damned good manufacturing jobs, eroding the middle class. He presided over deregulating a financial sector that is now in the midst of collapsing on itself. In short, Clinton, liberal or not, was a warrior in the continuing Reagan revolution that's turned America into a shit hole.

America really does need the "change" so loftily offered by Obama, but it's all just words with him. Whether he's liberal or not doesn't really matter: he's running as a center-right conservative, who loves guns, deregulation, the death penalty, and the Iraq occupation. And that's what he's going to give us if elected.

What's particularly funny about this is the cognitive dissonance progressive Obama supporters are now going through as the awful truth slowly dawns on them. I mean, the writer of the above linked essay is nothing short of pathetic. He wants to get Obama elected in order to mercilessly attack him?!? That's fucking nuts. Why not attack him right now? I mean, if these people really hate Obama's rightward shift, if it's fair to actually call it a "shift," they're crazy to vote for him.

The bottom line is that bigtime electoral politics has absolutely nothing to offer the left. We've been squeezed out, useful for votes in the primaries, but that's about it. And as long as progressives dutifully play their role as springtime dupes every four years, that's all they're ever going to be. A bunch of fucking chumps.

I know my vote for Nader won't count for much in terms of getting a candidate I like elected, but it is a nice little "fuck you" to the Democrats, a nice little personal break from the cycle of chump. And if all progressives, liberals, leftists, whatever you want to call them, took a personal break from the chump cycle, the Donkey Party would be facing a grave crisis: they'd have to reevaluate their role as conservative-enabling, corporate-loving assholes.

Some day.

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