Obama Deserves Liberal/Progressive Support!

[I started this post to respond to a wretched article in the Washington Post, but I got carried away. I will follow this with my response to that article.]

As though everyone has joined the tea-party and drank tea mixed with some very odd herbs, it has become popular to characterize Obama’s first year as a failure. As a die-hard liberal, I have three words for other liberals and progressives. “Cut it out!”

As I pointed out in yesterday’s post, President Obama won a four-year (not a one-year) term and has a solid record of accomplishments for which he is being given little credit.

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The Coakley Warning

As I write this, voters in a Massachusetts special election are deciding whether the state’s Democratic Attorney General Martha Coakley, or Republican (You fill in your favorite adjective here.) state Senator Scott Brown. With true Democratic Party grace Coakley, had the election in the bag (a 30 point lead at the start), tripped on her over confidence and let the damned thing get away from her.  Now most polls give Brown the edge and even most favorable polls put the race at dead even. If Coakley wins it will only be because the Democratic Party in Massachusetts does a superior job in turning out the vote.

Despite Republican Party efforts to frame this as a referendum on the Obama administration, this remains a single state race in which the Democratic candidate’s campaign errors are more than sufficient to explain her loss. [Disappointment with Obama, however, may play a role in the outcome, see my next post “Magical Thinking About Barack the Magic _________________ (Fill in the blank as you see fit.)”]

For all of that, Coakley’s problems in this election should serve as a strong warning to all Democratic Politicians facing elections this year.

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The Truth Does Not Matter

Keith Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, and other commentators on the left have had a screaming good time pointing to errors Republican politicians have made in criticizing President Obama’s response to the failed Christmas Day terrorist attack on Northwest flight 253 into Detroit.

True, Senator Jim Demint falsely said Obama has downplayed terrorism and doesn’t use the word terrorism any more. Representative Peter Hoekstra, among other things, falsely said the Obama administration used the term “man made disasters” instead of “terrorism;” and Representative Peter King falsely claimed Obama had banned the use of the word “terrorism” and had even failed to mention terrorism during his address to West Point. All of these assertions can, and have been, easily rebutted with numerous video clips showing Obama and Secretary Clinton talking about the threat of terrorism (as an example, here’s his speech at West Point).

And while it is reassuring for Olbermann, Maddow and their ilk to show us the clips that rebut these Republicans buttholes (doe a butthole really need rebutted?), it has no effect on the right-leaning mass of American voters.

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The Maddow Mistake

Rachel Maddow whose show airs Monday through Friday on MSNBC is without a doubt one of the sharpest liberal/progressive commentators on the scene today, a fearless interviewer and a better reporter than Keith Olbermann. She also might as well be working for the Republican Party.

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The Number One Mission for Liberals and Progressives in 2010: Get Out the Democrat Vote

If you think 2009 sucked politically, imagine starting 2011 without a Democratic Party majority in the house or a minimum filibuster breaking 60 Democratic Senators. Worse, imagine the house and senate seasoned with newly elected teabag patri-nuts.

If you enjoyed watching regular Republicans blocking and delaying legislation then you’ll love teabaggers with no understanding of the legislative process, no respect for others in congress, and no reason to compromise on anything. I suspect congress and the government—not merely the progressive agenda—would grind to a halt. Budget measures, such as defense appropriations, which no party is willing to completely block for long, would be in jeopardy.

Liberals and progressives have ample reason to be disappointed with President Obama.

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