asterism
Congress != Progress
This is an interesting read, the left wing Rolling Stone got three Progressives to discuss the Republican victory this month. Peter Hart and David Gergen have some very good points, but Matt Taibbi is just so simply out there it's downright comical. Some snips:
Roundtable: The GOP Victory, the Tea Party Ascendancy ? and Obama?s Next Steps | Rolling Stone Politics
This demonstrates the problem Progressives have, they think the solution is even more government and when the voters say otherwise they lash out. Taibbi obviously has contempt for businesses and look at what he says when told that's what the business community feels from Washington. Taibbi seems to not understand that if the contempt the White House has for business is a problem, even more contempt from the likes of him is worse, not better. Obama didn't get shellacked because he compromised too much, it was because he compromised too little.
Hart: I agree with David. When two out of five people who voted last night say they consider themselves supporters of the Tea Party, we make a huge mistake to suggest that they are some sort of small fringe group and do not represent anybody else.
Taibbi: I'm not saying that they're small or a fringe group.
Gergen: You just think they're all crazy.
Taibbi: I do.
Gergen: So you're arguing, Matt, that 40 percent of those who voted last night are crazy?
Taibbi: I interview these people. They're not basing their positions on the facts they're completely uninterested in the facts. They're voting completely on what they see and hear on Fox News and afternoon talk radio, and that's enough for them.
Gergen: If you talk to many CEOs, you'll find that they're very hostile toward Obama.
Taibbi: Who cares what these CEOs think? I don't care they're 1/1,000th of a percent of the electorate. They're the problem. Obama needs to get other people's votes, not their votes.
Gergen: It's not their votes he needs to get it's their investments and jobs.
Taibbi: I'm sorry, but Bob Rubin is exactly what I'm talking about. Under Clinton, he pushed this enormous remaking of the rules for Wall Street specifically so the Citigroup merger could go through, then he went to work for Citigroup and made $120 million over the next 10 years. He helped push through the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, which deregulated the derivatives market and created the mortgage bubble. Then Obama brings him back into the government during the transition and surrounds himself with people who are close to Bob Rubin. That's exactly the wrong message to be sending to ordinary voters: that we're bringing back this same crew of Wall Street-friendly guys who screwed up and got us in this mess in the first place.
Gergen: That sentiment is exactly what the business community objects to.
Taibbi: Fuck the business community!
Roundtable: The GOP Victory, the Tea Party Ascendancy ? and Obama?s Next Steps | Rolling Stone Politics
This demonstrates the problem Progressives have, they think the solution is even more government and when the voters say otherwise they lash out. Taibbi obviously has contempt for businesses and look at what he says when told that's what the business community feels from Washington. Taibbi seems to not understand that if the contempt the White House has for business is a problem, even more contempt from the likes of him is worse, not better. Obama didn't get shellacked because he compromised too much, it was because he compromised too little.