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"He had first aroused and then frustrated their craving for
freedom, as he had aroused and deceived [their] hunger for land."
These words were written by Isaac Deutscher
about Tsar Alexander II ("The Prophet Armed: Leon Trotsky
1879-1921," page 2). But in ways that seem eerily prescient,
they might also be applied to President Barack
Obama’s record during his first few months in
the White House.
In order to understand the moods of dismay that are already well
advanced in some sectors, it’s essential to look to the period prior to
the November elections. Even the most cursory examination of that
campaign reveals that, just like the Russian masses who saw Tsar
Alexander II as a "liberator," those who saw then Senator Obama as a "left" candidate were engaging
in self-deception.
Obama’s candidacy galvanized huge numbers of
people of color, in particular African Americans, and this increased
exponentially once his campaign was seen as viable. The Obama campaign also grasped the mood of millions of
Americans worn down by the bludgeoning effects of eight years of George
W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and their minions. Obama
repeated his themes of "hope" and "change" so often
they became almost mantra-like.
These elements, as well as others, combined to act as a catalyst for an
ad-hoc movement in support of Obama’s
candidacy that included large numbers of people who could not be
considered Democratic Party "regulars." It was from this
corner that hopes were expressed that an Obama
victory would represent a defeat to the pro-corporate policies of the
Bush administration and bring an end to U.S. military involvement in Iraq.
Once elected, however, the tune began to … well … change. This is
not surprising since Obama had sought to
dampen expectations even before he was sworn in by noting that things
would not change overnight. And indeed, the new administration’s
orientation continued to be pro-corporate. Its "economic
stimulus" to the average person remained a mere pittance, in the
form of a tax reduction designed to be welcomed only by those who
adhere to the "it’s better than nothing" school of thought.
Joel Bleifuss, editor of the “left”
Democratic Party-oriented In These Times magazine, complains in the May
2009 issue, "What are Obama’s
progressive supporters to make of the fact that Lawrence Summers (who
crafted banking deregulation during the Clinton administration) is Obama’s chief economic vizier? Or the fact that
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, a
Summers protégé, seems determined to address the economic crisis by protecting
the banking industry executives with whom he was cosseted for the past
five years as head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York?"
The Obama administration’s pro-corporate
stance has also extended to environmental issues. In his article that
appeared in The New York Times on April 11, John M. Broder
notes that addressing climate change appears to be slipping down the
president's list of priorities for the year." Broder
reports that "business lobbyists welcome the White House's go-slow
approach, saying the issue is too complicated and too costly to be
rushed, especially in a recession."
The coup de grace to any hope that Obama’s
election represented genuine change, if one were needed, is that his
administration has asked for $83.4 billion to fund continued U.S.
military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan for fiscal year 2009,
increasing to $130 billion for fiscal year 2010.
Revolutionary socialists and genuine progressives who cautioned that Obama was a power operator committed to corporate America and uninterested in
fundamental change should take little satisfaction that they were
right—much like the chorus in a Greek tragedy. Millions are losing
their jobs, homes—and lives, in an increasing number of suicides and in
military adventures in the Middle East. And yet the hope for
change, real change, will continue to flicker. It is that flame that
will need to be tended.
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