Barack Obama was clearly one of the most cerebral and well-spoken presidents that the United States has ever had. But as odd as it may seem, two slips of his tongue may have led to the rise of the two worst dictators so far in the 21^st Century.

In 2011, Obama spoke at the White House Correspondents Dinner. One of the guests was Donald Trump. Obama showed little mercy when while looking at Trump, he said, “No one is happier, no one is prouder to put this birth certificate matter to rest than the Donald. And that’s because he can finally get back to focusing on the issues that matter, like: Did we fake the moon landing? What really happened in Roswell? And where are Biggie and Tupac?” Obama also included a fake video of his birth and an artist’s rendition of what the White House would look like if Trump was president, further embarrassing Trump.

You can see the five-minute video here:

As you might expect, Trump was not pleased by being the butt of the jokes. Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie said Trump was “pissed off like I’d never seen him before.”

Trump had played around with the idea of running fore president before the 2011 Correspondents Dinner. But the events that evening truly crystallized his hate towards Obama as well as any Democrat who held him in low regard. In June of 2015, Trump announced that he was running for president in 2016. He decimated the rest of the Republican field of candidates and then lost to Hillary Clinton by nearly three million popular votes, but won the outdated and undemocratic Electoral College.

The second faux pas by Obama came in 2014. In March of that year, shortly after Vladimir Putin and Russia had invaded Crimea and parts of eastern Ukraine, Obama called Russia a “regional power.” Specifically, he said, “Russia is a regional power that is threatening some of its immediate neighbors, not out of strength but out of weakness.” Obama describes in in more detail in the following 50-second video:

Knowing what we know now about Putin, it is no surprise that he would be humiliated and outraged at the thought of Russia being called a regional power. After all, his dream as president of Russia was to re-establish the old Soviet Union, with all seventeen republics. He felt that Russia and the Soviet Union had a long and proud history of being a global power and he want to reassert what had been lost at the end of the twentieth century when Mikhail Gorbachev orchestrated to collapse of the Soviet Union in order to give more autonomy to each of the republics.

We cannot say that Obama’s demeaning remarks about Russia caused Putin to bully and ultimately further invade Ukraine in 2022, but it certainly did not help. Putin was also irritated by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton who repeatedly criticized Putin and Russia for the lack of fair and democratic elections.

Generally, Barack Obama measures his words as well as anyone. You can see it, particularly in his press conferences, when he often pauses between phrases to make sure that the next thing that he says is precisely what he is thinking and not something that he will later regret.

Life is full of ironies, and the fact that Barack Obama may well have significantly contributed to the rise of dictators Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin can be considered unexpected and certainly unfortunate. It is further evidence that we all make mistakes, even when we try our best to avoid them.

The post How Loose Lips from Obama Hurt America and the World appeared first on Occasional Planet.

It’s been a long and contentious eighteen years since the first Dream Act was introduced in Congress in 2001. The issue of providing a path to legal status for the undocumented youth who were brought to this country as children and grew up here has become one of Washington’s most enduring stalemates. For some of the 1.8 million Dreamers, who have grown up in the shadow of uncertainty and the emotional strain of often over-heated—and sometimes ugly—political sparring, the waiting and hoping has become a burden too heavy to bear.

Many have given up hope. One of the untold stories of this failure to acknowledge the value of these young people and their contribution to American society is that it’s estimated that, since 2005, as many as 500,000 Dreamers between the ages of 18 to 35 have given up, left their families, their homes, and their American dream and returned to Mexico. Remember presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s musings about “self-deportation”? Sadly, those musings seem to be coming true.

To understand the pressures of living with the uncertainties of the vagaries of this political game of now-you-have-it-now-you-don’t, it’s important to take a look back to recall how hopes have been buoyed and then shattered in an unending cycle of dashed dreams. In 2001, even with the support of then-president George W. Bush, the Republican majority in Congress blocked relief for the Dreamers. In 2006, Democrats took back control of the House and Senate. Even with the support of George W. Bush, the Dream Act came up short. In 2010, a version of the Dream Act passed in the House of Representatives but failed in the Senate, with just five votes short of the necessary sixty votes to allow the bill to proceed to a vote.

In 2012, President Obama, his hopes dashed for a bill he could sign to definitively end the burden these young people had been forced to live with, created the DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) program. DACA granted qualifying undocumented youth temporary permission—for renewable two-year periods—to remain legally in the U.S. and to legally be employed. 800,000 young people came out of the shadows and signed on.

In July 2017, another version of the Dream Act was introduced in the Senate by Senator Lindsay Graham (R-SC) and Richard Durbin (D-IL) and in the House by Representative Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-CA) and Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL). Let’s be clear. The reason the Dream Act and its various versions have been introduced as legislation so many times over the years is because the concept of granting legal status to Dreamers is supported by the overwhelming majority of American voters. Still, in September of 2017, Donald Trump—in yet another gut punch to majority opinion—announced that his administration was ending the DACA program.

Obama speaks out

Former President Obama couldn’t remain silent in the face of this latest in a long line of cruel reversals. Obama issued a stark and passionate rebuke to Trump’s spurious targeting of young people—young people who contribute to their communities, serve in the military, and prove through the lives they’re living that they have earned a path to legal status.

Here was Obama’s plea:

“These Dreamers are Americans in their hearts, in their minds, in every single way but one: on paper. They were brought to this country by their parents, sometimes even as infants. They may not know a country besides ours. They may not even know a language besides English. They often have no idea they’re undocumented until they apply for a job, or college, or a driver’s license.

Over the years, politicians of both parties have worked together to write legislation that would have told these young people—our young people—that if your parents brought you here as a child, if you’ve been here a certain number of years, and if you’re willing to go to college or serve in our military, then you’ll get a chance to stay and earn your citizenship. And for years while I was President, I asked Congress to send me such a bill.

That bill never came. And because it made no sense to expel talented, driven, patriotic young people from the only country they know solely because of the actions of their parents, my administration acted to lift the shadow of deportation from these young people, so that they could continue to contribute to our communities and our country. . . Some 800,000 young people stepped forward, met rigorous requirements, and went through background checks. And America grew stronger as a result.

But today, that shadow has been cast over some of our best and brightest young people once again. To target these young people is wrong — because they have done nothing wrong. It is self-defeating—because they want to start new businesses, staff our labs, serve in our military, and otherwise contribute to the country we love.”

Reflecting the views of the majority of Americans toward the Dreamers, Obama called on Americans to reaffirm their patriotic sense of decency:

“Ultimately, this is about basic decency. This is about whether we are a people who kick hopeful young strivers out of America, or whether we treat them the way we’d want our own kids to be treated. It’s about who we are as a people — and who we want to be.”

What Dreamers say

In the video below, we meet Dreamers who speak honestly about their sense of loss, their frustration, and their deep reluctance to give up on their American dreams. You’ll meet Joshua Casillas, an accomplished student who dreamed of becoming a doctor in his hometown of Houston, Texas, but instead left home to study medicine at a university in Mexico. For Joshua, the constant stress of the threat of deportation had become too much to bear. As he says, “the future I dreamed of was over.”

We also meet Daniel Arenas, who grew up in South Carolina but, at the age of eighteen, returned to Mexico and founded a non-profit to help other Dreamers pursue their education and find job opportunities.

We also meet Paola Morales, an honors student who reluctantly left her friends and family to go to college in Mexico.

When Dreamers like Joshua, Daniel, and Paola—young people with extraordinary talent, intelligence, drive, and ambition—leave America behind, they are not the losers. America is.

The post Going Back: The Untold Story of Dreamers Returning to Mexico appeared first on Occasional Planet.

After Barack Obama was elected, it seemed that America had a new normalcy, one that some described as “post-racial.” For any who took that too seriously, Mitch McConnell popped their balloon when in October, 2010 he said that his main goal was to make Obama a one-term president. Couple that with the rise of the Tea Party which began right after Obama’s election and the new normal included increased levels of racial discord. But despite all the unreasonable criticism that Obama endured, he maintained his level of civility throughout his administration. While his legislative and foreign affairs accomplishments may have been limited, he established a norm of dignity, respect, thoughtfulness and tolerance the likes of which we had not seen since John F. Kennedy and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

And then Trump. No need to list the thousands of lies and the multitude of indignities. Suffice it to say, we have a new normalcy characterized in large part by discord and anger.

In the past few days, we have seen some liberals begin to follow Trump, the pied piper of the low road. First it was the owner of the Red Hen Restaurant in Lexington, VA; then California Congresswoman Maxine Waters who said,

“The American people have put up with this president long enough. What more do we need to see? What more lies do we need to hear?” Waters shouted at a rally in Los Angeles on Saturday. “If you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them!”

Changing the tone and the demeanor of the Trump years will be one challenge, but another will be how to return to normalcy in all areas of policy. The problem is that there is not just one definition of normalcy. One year ago, Trump was saber-rattling against North Korea as no president had ever done before. Now Trump is best buddies with the authoritarian leader of North Korea. We may live in blissful ignorance about the real American-North Korean relationship so long as Trump is in the White House, but eventually there will be someone new and that will lead to a new normalcy.

The problem with the word ‘normalcy’ is that it implies that there is only one standard. But if you ask leading American politicians, including the many who may run for president in 2020, there is a multitude of normalcies that could characterize our relationship with Kim Jong Un and his compatriots.

If our post-Trump president is someone like George W. Bush, we will have a policy that will be characterized by a combination of intellectual laziness and bullying. If we elect someone like Barack Obama, our policies will be thoughtful, but also tentative.

It would be a different kind of normalcy with someone like Dwight Eisenhower. The country might be reassured by a genuine military “hero” who steers with a steady hand. On the other hand, a Teddy Roosevelt-type figure might be an adventurist who would try to use an intellectual basis for “American exceptionalism.”

The point is that all Americans will need to take a number and get in line to try to define the “normalcy du jour” post Trump. There will be a lot of shoving and jostling in the line. It’s not clear whether taking the high ground of the low road will be preferable in winning the day.

But if progressives have principles that guide them both in policy and behavior, we must keep our eyes on the prize and make wise decisions. The Democratic candidate for president in 2020 will have to be someone with clear vision and the ability to articulate. Our first goal is to find someone we can respect and who can win, and then for us to help him or her raise the bar. It’s been down too low for too long.

The post Hard to tell where the pendulum of normalcy will swing next appeared first on Occasional Planet.

Yesterday, Bernie endorsed Hillary. Body language experts across the Web came to the same conclusion: They don’t like each other. They saw Hillary as uncomfortable, even vulnerable. They observed Bernie as resentful, doing something he didn’t want to do. Hillary and the DNC had to cough up a lot of concessions to get Bernie’s endorsement. And it was equally painful for Bernie to agree to it. While endorsing, he recited his campaign proposals and then declared Hillary was now supporting them. A brilliant move on Bernie’s part. What used to be a meaningless piece of paper—the Democratic Party Platform—is now publicly tied to Hillary. It’s hers to betray and everyone will know when she does.

Tonight, Bernie delegate Jen Ranes reported on a conference call he held with his delegates. She said:

• He has NOT suspended his campaign.
• He is taking this to the convention.
• He needs his delegates there.
• He will call for a role call vote.

Even though Bernie endorsed Hillary, this is not yet a done deal. Chances are quite high she will be the nominee, but Bernie will keep his options open all the way to the convention.

This has not gone down as Hillary had planned. What should have been an easy and short glide to the nomination turned into a long, humiliating trek. While she struggled to fill high school gymnasiums, Bernie filled football stadiums. She was forced to take time off to beg billionaires for money, while Bernie took two minutes to ask for donations at campaign events. Ever loyal to power, the corporate media maintained its blackout on Bernie’s campaign. They refused to cover the massive crowds and the extraordinary, historic nature of his run. They ignored that he had turned modern politics on its head.

Bernie exposes the establishment

What the media didn’t see coming was Bernie outing the Party leadership as not giving a rat’s ass about the rest of us. He was relentless in calling out the “Democratic establishment” and the “media establishment,” as servants of the 1%. Distracted by the incestuous, never-ending DC money game, and used to pretending to be progressive for the rubes back home, party elites were blindsided by Bernie’s spectacular success. People didn’t know they were hungry for Bernie’s message until they heard it, and found themselves overwhelmed and moved by his honesty, his integrity, and his humane proposals. Especially for younger people struggling to get an education and find a job, Bernie’s Democratic socialism seemed sane and sensible. The Party freaked out. It had lost control. A rumpled 74-year-old socialist was the Democratic rock star of 2016, not Hillary Clinton, their handpicked heir to the throne. They regrouped and pulled it off with the help of local party hacks, vote rigging, scheduling as few debates as possible, and a loyal corporate media relentlessly ignoring and/or undermining Bernie. And Yay! It worked! A damaged Clinton limped across the finish line and prematurely claimed victory.

Clinton baggage

Because Wall Street and the Deep State trust her to do their bidding, the DNC put Hillary forward as the Democratic Party candidate. Claiming to be neutral they blatantly tipped the scales in her favor. They ignored her high negatives—knowing both Democrats and Republicans view her as dishonest and unlikable. They ignored Bill’s smarmy past, and his/their terrible economic policies that led to the 2008 meltdown. They ignored their racism—the gutting of welfare programs, the buildup of the for-profit prison system, and, in 2008, Hillary’s 3 AM ads against Obama. They ignored the ravages of NAFTA. The Clinton’s personal and political baggage would fill a semi. The Party picked a familiar but terrible candidate.

If she is nominated at the convention, Hillary will go up against Trump in November and the polling doesn’t look good. Bernie has endorsed her and agreed to campaign for her. Thanks to his integrity and tenacity, she has inherited the most progressive Democratic platform in the history of the Party. It’s not everything he or we wanted, but it’s dramatically better than anything she and the Party would have typed up only to forget as soon as the convention ended. By using his considerable leverage, and forcing his progressive platform on the Party, Bernie may have rescued her from defeat. If she is the nominee and genuinely runs on that platform, she may squeak out a win against Trump.

A Democratic Party split?

Bernie could have deliberately blown up the Democratic Party, split it in two. But, even though the Party doesn’t deserve it, he graciously offered to save it from itself. That isn’t to say that the Party won’t split anyway. The installation of Hillary Clinton as the nominee may cause the party to implode—progressives taking off in one direction and corporate shills in the other.

Unlike other “loser” candidates, and it’s not clear that he has officially lost, Bernie will refuse to go quietly into the night. He plans to help elect progressive down ticket candidates, many at odds with the current Democratic establishment. He has announced that, if she is elected, he will organize his supporters to hold her feet to the fire, and to hold all Democrats feet to the fire. She knows that and he knows that. No matter what happens, the future is going to be contentious, because the revolution Bernie started is just beginning. And we should be forever grateful to him for that.

The post Bernie, Hillary, and body language appeared first on Occasional Planet.

Do you think that the country is headed in the right direction? When asked that question in public-opinion polls, Invariably, a majority of  respondents answer “NO.” The question is bad enough in itself, but the transgression is compounded by the fact that it is often presented on the heels of questions like, “Do you think that the President is currently doing a good job?”

When the second question has been asked about President Obama, pundits have been quick to point out that an overwhelming majority of the people think that the country is moving in the wrong direction. This holds true now, even when the president’s popularity and job approval are nudging towards 50%.

In a recent Occasional Planet poll* the overwhelming plurality of respondents said the country is not moving in the right direction.

Figure ‘A’

Comments from respondents included thoughts like:

• “It has recovered from the financial crises but has much work to do to help the middle class and the poor. These two groups are good for the nation because they spend their paychecks in the US.”
• “No – we have anti education, anti-science Reich wing evangelical lunatics taking over this nation”
• “Our country is neither right nor wrong. We are humans, we make mistakes and fail many times. Just because we fail and things may look bad at times doesn’t mean that we are in the wrong direction. We push on and correct ourselves.”

In order to get a better sense of what is a more reliable answer about whether the country is moving in the right direction, we need to drill down on two levels. First, we need learn more from the respondents who said that the country is moving in the wrong direction. Is the country moving too far to the right, or to the left, or someplace else? Second, we need to see the breakdown to the answers by political party. The answers to the questions are revealed, at least in part, in Figures ‘B’ and ‘C’.

Figure ‘B’

The big vertical red bar in the middle is percentage of Republicans (73%) who think that the country is headed in the wrong direction. Next to it is the relatively low (31%) of Democrats who think that we’re headed in the wrong direction. And perhaps predictably, right between the Republicans and Democrats are the Independents who have a more moderate view (57%) of the direction in which we’re moving.

Figure ‘C’

The results here are not surprising. Republicans (the group on the left side of the chart) think that the country is moving too far to the left., Democrats (the group in the middle), predictably think that the country is moving too far to the right. And Independents, the group to the right, tend to think by a margin of 34% to 23% that the country is moving too far to the left.

What conclusions can we draw?

1. It is fairly irresponsible of the media to report that if a plurality or majority of Americans think that the country is moving in the wrong direction that it is an indictment of any sitting president. Republicans, Democrats and Independents all said that the country is not moving in the right direction.
2. Each group wants the country to move in the direction that they favor. Thus, a substantial number of President Obama’s supporters may also say that they do not think that the country is moving in the right direction because they want a more progressive agenda.
3. Where this all plays out in terms of relating public opinion to a policy direction that would be advisable seems to rest in the hands of Independents. As we continue this series, we will focus more on the thoughts of Independents.

*Occasional Planet interviewed 550 Americans on January 14-15, 2016, using the services of the online-site Survey Monkey. The sample size is reliable +/- 4.5%, 95% of the time. It is demographically balanced by gender, ethnicity, age, income and geographic region.

The post Is the country headed in the right direction? appeared first on Occasional Planet.

Now that it’s 2016, it’s time to fact-check some of the end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it predictions that President Obama’s critics made before his 2012 re-election. In an article published today, Think Progress highlights four big things that were supposed to happen by 2016, if Obama were re-elected. [Spoiler alert: They didn’t.]

1. Gas was supposed to cost $6.05 per gallon.

In March 2012, on the floor of the United States Senate, Mike Lee (R-UT) predicted that if Obama was reelected gas would cost $6.05 per gallon by the start 2015. Lee said that gas prices would rise 5 cents for every month Obama was in office, ultimately reaching $6.60 per gallon.

Lee was not alone. Newt Gingrich, running for the GOP nomination, predicted that if Obama was reelected he would push gas to “$10 a gallon.” Gingrich said he would reduce gas prices dramatically by reversing Obama’s energy policies. Gingrich flanked himself with campaign signs promising $2.50 gas if he was elected.

Today, the nationwide average for a gallon of gas is $2.00.

Some of the reasons for the decline in gas prices were beyond Obama’s control — including weak international demand and OPEC’s failure to reduce supply. Also driving prices lower was increased gas production in the U.S., which has doubled over the last 6 years. The policies that Lee, Gingrich and others criticized — the rejection of Keystone XL pipeline, more EPA regulation and limiting drilling on public land — have not gotten in the way of historically low prices.

2. Unemployment was supposed to be stuck at over 8%

In September 2012, Mitt Romney predicted that if Obama is reelected “you’re going to see chronic high unemployment continue four years or longer.” At the time, the unemployment rate was 8.1% and had been between 8.1% and 8.3% for the entire year.

What would breaking out of “chronic high unemployment” look like in a Romney presidency? Romney pledged that, if elected, he could bring the unemployment rate down to 6% by January 2017.

The unemployment rate currently stands at 5.0% and has been under 6% since September 2014. Since January 2013, the economy has created over 7.8 million new jobs.

3. The stock market was supposed to crash

Immediately after Obama won reelection in November 2012, many commenters predicted that the stock market was toast.

Charles Bilderman, the author of the “Intelligent Investing” column at Forbes, wrote that the “market selloff after Obama’s re-election [was] no accident,” predicting “stocks are dropping with no bottom in sight.” Bilderman said that the policies the Obama administration would pursue in his second term would “crash stocks.”

On Bloomberg TV, investor Marc Faber predicted that, because of Obama’s reelection, the stock market would drop at least 20%. According to Faber, “Republicans understand the problem of excessive debt better than Mr. Obama who basically doesn’t care about piling up debt.” Faber joked that investors seeking to protect their assets should “buy themselves a machine gun.”

The Dow Jones Industrial Average currently stands at 17,425.03 and, despite a downturn in 2015, is up over 27% since Obama was reelected.

4. The entire U.S. economy was supposed to collapse

Rush Limbaugh predicted that “the country’s economy is going to collapse if Obama is re-elected.” Limbaugh was confident in his prediction: “There’s no if about this. And it’s gonna be ugly. It’s gonna be gut wrenching, but it will happen.”

The economic free fall would begin, according to Limbaugh, because “California is going to declare bankruptcy” and Obama would force states like Texas to “bail them out.” California currently has a $4 billion budget surplus.

Limbaugh added, “I know mathematics, and I know economics. I know history. I know socialism, statism, Marxism, I know where it goes. I know what happens at the end of it.”

Limbaugh said the economic apocalypse could take “a year and a half, two years, three years.” It’s been three years and two months since Limbaugh’s prediction.

The U.S. economy grew at a respectable 2% in the 3rd quarter of 2014, following 3.9% growth in the second quarter.

Happily, for Americans of all political persuasions, predictions for Obama-geddon didn’t pan out. In fact, we’ve actually had a pretty decent run. I shudder to think how things might have been–especially for people without membership cards for the top 1 percent club–had we elected Mitt Romney in 2012. And with today’s Republican field of presidential candidates, we could be in even deeper doo-doo if one of them makes it all the way. Any Democrat would be better than any of these clowns. As a very smart person [my sister] said here on Occasional Planet yesterday, make it your most important New Year’s resolution to vote in 2016.  And for gawd sake, vote for the Democrat.

The post It’s 2016: What happened to all those dire, Obama-geddon predictions? appeared first on Occasional Planet.

A new CNN / ORC poll just revealed that the majority of Americans want Congress to reject the nuclear deal with Iran that the Obama Administration negotiated. This is a shift from April, 2015 when the majority favored approval of the deal.

It might be farcical that the American people are asked their views on the deal; it’s very complicated and hardly anyone has read it. On the other hand, we’re all entitled to engage in “gut politics” in which we intuitively make judgments about whether or not we can trust an individual or a policy.

The problem with the second approach, the “gut approach,” is that we are more susceptible to emotional appeals, particularly when they are blasted upon us by the electronic media. No sooner had Secretary of State John Kerry concluded the arduous negotiations with the Iranians and five allies than right-wing organizations began saturating the American airwaves with fear-mongering ads that as always, present only partial information and a lot of disinformation.

We have previously written about how the nuclear deal is somewhat similar to the fast-track consideration of the Trans-Pacific Partnership that President Obama narrowly shepherded through Congress. It’s complicated and does not lend itself to easy consideration. However, a fundamental difference between the two is who the opponents of each is.

In the case of the TPP, those who opposed the President’s stance were primarily his traditional supporters, workers, labor unions, environmental groups, consumer groups, and progressives in general. In the case of the Iran nuclear deal, those opposed are mostly Republicans, most vehemently those who have sworn to do whatever they can to undermine virtually anything that he supports. These people are bankrolled to the hilt and can roll out one ad after another to scare Americans about the Iran deal. Those who opposed the TPP were of limited means and also somewhat reluctant to dumb down the conversation with 30-second fear pieces.

While I am not a nuclear scientist and cannot personally vouch for the scientific veracity of the agreement, I am pleased that one of the top American negotiators was Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz, former professor of Physics and Engineering Systems at MIT. He and most other scientists who understand nuclear physics support the deal. This is somewhat like climate change; those with the knowledge support reform; those who are largely ill-informed resist taking reasonable action to address a true threat.

It’s not just the United States that entered the deal with Iran, it’s also countries as disparate as Russia and China, Germany, France and the United Kingdom. All but Germany are permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. On July 20, 2015, the ten non-permanent members of the Council joined the permanent members to give unanimous endorsement of the agreement. Those countries are Angola, Chad, Chile, Jordan, Lithuania, Malaysia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Spain and Venezuela.

The fact that the agreement is supported by so many scientists and so many countries is reason, though not assurance, that it is a good deal. One of the problems that President Obama has had in trying to sell the deal is that neither he nor anyone else can guarantee or assure that Iran will not develop nuclear weapons sometime in the future. What’s unfortunate is that opponents of the deal cannot accept the simple truth that there is no way to prove a negative; that something won’t happen. That leaves you with relying on the best information available. This is certainly a far shot better than Congress disapproving the deal and overriding his veto. Then whatever guarantee exists now will be destroyed and the likely outcome will be war with Iran and further isolation of the United States from other countries in the world.

Maybe supporters of the deal will have to take to the air waves, but as we all know, it’s difficult to overcome Republicans pandering to fear.

The post Iran Nuclear Deal too complicated for TV commercials appeared first on Occasional Planet.

Like the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, the nuclear deal between Iran and five other countries including the United States is complicated, and the devil is in the details. When we’re talking about centrifuges, yellow cake, and a host of other components, it is very difficult for the layman to assess the trustworthiness of the agreement.

In situations where the facts, particularly about variables, are overwhelming, it is important to have one or several individuals who are knowledgeable about the issue to offer their opinions to lay persons.

For much of his administration, President Barack Obama was one of those “go-to” figures for me. I largely trusted his goals and intentions. In the first large legislative hurdle that he faced, the Affordable Care Act, I was supportive, even though I thought that he could have pushed the edge of the envelope more with Medicare-for-all, or at least the public option. The key item was that it was clear that he wanted to expand affordable health care, with limited contingencies, to as many Americans as possible.

During years two through six of his Administration, he did enough to give me reason to have confidence in his judgment and decision-making. I was somewhat baffled, perhaps even concerned, with his hard lines on Iraq and Afghanistan, but was willing to give him a benefit because he was more familiar with the details than I would ever be.

2015 has been a transformational year. The President has stepped up his advocacy for meaningful gun control (this actually began following the Newtown shooting in late 2012). His response to the shooting of nine unarmed African-American citizens in a South Carolina church has been thoughtful and forceful, while appealing to our best emotions. Issues of race and violence are ones in which the layman can offer thoughts without need for experts or “go-to” figures.

But 2015 has also been the year of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. Weighing how new international economic relationships will impact on American workers and consumers is difficult to do. Such an issue would normally lend itself to relying on the opinions of a trustworthy person in office.

However, President Obama lost me on the issue for several reasons. None of these reasons have anything to do with an expert analysis of what’s in the treaty. They have to do with the “packaging” of the agreement and all the missed-steps in providing citizens with a recommendation with which they could be confident.

First, the treaty was not designed to be taken up by Congress like most other pieces of legislation. It was offered as a “fast-track” item, in which Congress would agree to its consideration if no amendments were allowed, and there would simply be an up or down vote in each chamber. Initially, a sufficient number of Democrats objected to this process, but somehow the Administration twisted enough arms to gain acceptance of fast track consideration. That process did not sit right with me.

Second, none of us as citizens have been able to see the text of the treaty. Terms of the treaty say that only a very narrow group of “involved participants” could actually see the text. This included members of Congress. However, they would have to read it in an isolated room, take no notes, make no copies, and leave their digital devices outside the room. The other large group of readers were the “captains of industry” and Wall Street Bankers. Left out were representatives of labor unions, consumer groups, health and safety organizations, academics, and just plain interested citizens exercising their civic duty to be informed on the issues.

Third, other people in whom I have confidence have repeatedly explained how the TPP will undermine the economic well-being of American workers, particularly those in labor unions. Furthermore, worker safety can be compromised, and citizens may receive new products for which it would be extremely difficult to hold manufacturers accountable in court for defects. Among those speaking out against the TPP have been Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, as well as former Labor Secretary Robert Reich.

President Obama never offered a comprehensive explanation of the treaty to the American people. It was not a frequent topic of questions in press conferences. He even refused to take questions from members of his own party when he met with their caucus on Capitol Hill.

The fact that this agreement was shrouded in secrecy and was being advocated by wealthy entrenched interests in the United States and in other countries gave me sufficient cause to somewhat reluctantly refuse to accept the President’s position on this.

And now we have the nuclear agreement with Iran. In many respects, the President has already presented it in a much more palatable way than he did with TPP. In his July 15 press conference, he not only eagerly accepted questions on the agreement; he actually solicited more queries on concerns about the treaty when questions seemed to dry up. The full text of the agreement is on-line. Congress will have up to 60 days to have robust debate and dialogue on the issues. Nuclear experts from both government and private sectors are available to share their thoughts on the understanding. Perhaps most importantly, the rationale for the agreement is clear: to diminish the likelihood of Iran developing nuclear weapons in the near future and thereby promote more world peace. As the President said, there are no guarantees, even with stringent inspection protocols, but it is about as good a deal as could be negotiated under the circumstances.

However, my inclination to support the President on a complicated issue like this is somewhat diminished because of what I considered his extremely shoddy and disingenuous defense of the TPP. I’m going to try to learn as much about the Iran agreement from different sources as I can.

I doubt that I am the only person whose confidence in the President has been somewhat diminished because of TPP. Like anyone, he can earn it back. But to quote him from his news conference, he has “some ‘splainin’” to do.

The post After TPP, Obama may have a tough time convincing some on Iran deal appeared first on Occasional Planet.

I’ve spoken with several people who just could not watch President Obama’s State of the Union speech. These are Obama supporters, but for various reasons, they shied away because of anticipated pain, or at least a disappointment, in listening to him once again plead his case to Congress and the American people. I tried to watch the speech but gave up quickly to resume my marathon viewing of HBO’s “The Wire.”

I was watching “The Wire” because it is gritty and the characters frequently use few words to say a lot. In “The Wire,” you get zero points for B.S.-ing anyone. If you have something to say, say it bluntly and live with the consequences of your chosen words. Not exactly a State of the Union speech.

In the State of the Union address, the currency of the realm is platitudes. Whereas in “The Wire,” someone speaks to a single audience, in the SOTU (State of the Union), words are chosen to placate the needs and desires of specific interest groups. You don’t hear characters in “The Wire” pander to the middle class. They don’t speak in code to Wall Street.

This year, President Obama’s theme was strengthening the middle class. Who would disagree with that? No one publicly. The Republicans say much the same thing; the only difference is that when it comes to action, they don’t even pretend to make good on their promises. For all intents and purposes, when a politician is speaking to the middle class, he or she is essentially speaking to everyone. Virtually all Americans, except perhaps those in the bottom 2% and top 2%, believe they’re in the middle class. They also consider themselves in the catch-all group of “hard-working Americans.”

Even if most of us are pandered to as members of the middle class, we need more in the way of direct hits. The President reminds union members that he wants high wages; he tells teachers and parents that education is important; he tells environmentalists that while in office he will be our shepherd of the earth.

His platitudes in 2015 could have been spoken by virtually any other president in any other year:

• “But tonight, we turn the page.”

• “America, for all that we’ve endured; for all the grit and hard work required to come back; for all the tasks that lie ahead, know this: The shadow of crisis has passed, and the State of the Union is strong.”

• “So tonight, I want to focus less on a checklist of proposals, and focus more on the values at stake in the choices before us.”

Decades ago President Jimmy Carter learned that the American people don’t like to be asked to sacrifice. The French philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau wrote that democracy involved a social contract between the people and the government. Many in the American body politic seem to have forgotten that a fair contract is a two-way street. Obama is no Carter when it comes to currying the favor of the American people, and he knows that the way to please the people is to offer rather than ask.

So what would it take for the president to deliver a State of the Union speech in which real progressives would tune in with anticipation? It wouldn’t have to be as coarse as “The Wire,” but it could be as direct. He might raise points such as:

1. We are not a united country; indeed we are divided between blue and red and many other persuasions as well.

2. As progressives, we’re having difficulty getting our message across to conservatives. If we want to move away from gridlock, we need to convince more Americans to buy into the idea of a social contract, which involves give and take.

3. How can we work to have a more humane and empathetic society without conservatives undermining our efforts?

4. The answers to these questions and many more are not simple, but we need to look more carefully at what frightens conservatives about compassion and work for ways to allay their fears.

It would not necessarily be a speech with a lot of answers, but it might rival “The Wire” in engaging the mind. That would be a good start.

The post What if the President spoke to us as if he was on “The Wire?” appeared first on Occasional Planet.

I was in eleventh grade when the shots were fired, the announcement was made, and the LBJ years began. Up until JFK, my father had been a Republican, but after the “I Like Ike” years, both my father and I graduated to the Democratic Party. JFK had influenced me already; I decided to go to American University in DC because the President had given a brave and optimistic speech there about ending the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

How could you not admire JFK, he was thoughtful, funny, caring, athletic and eloquent? Does that remind you of anyone? Of course it does, President Barack Obama. We should be so fortunate as to have the two of them as presidents in the same half-century. But the violence that struck down JFK, and the prejudicial venom directed to President Obama is what is so disturbing. Equally a downer is much of the list of presidents we’ve had in between.

The accomplishments of JFK were remarkable, and they were accelerating at the time of his death. While it’s true that much of the Great Society legislation of Lyndon Johnson was made easier because of the sympathy towards Kennedy following his slaying, the specifics of the Great Society were items that were on JFK’s checklist. Also on JFK’s “to-do” list was to thoroughly re-examine the commitment that the United States had to South Vietnam. But his accomplishments were brutally ended by the strange loner who had as few reasons to feel good about himself as JFK had reasons to regard himself with pride.

As things are now, Barack Obama, a man with as many assets or more as John Kennedy, has fallen into a rut in which he is mercilessly battered by the right, a right that is far fiercer than what JFK faced. For the most part, the media is stone cold to what Barack Obama could do if he was given a few breaks. But perhaps most distressing for the President is how his base seems to abandon him when he needs them most. The hope that JFK gave us is only equaled by that which Barack Obama has given us. It’s quite possible that if we don’t help him when skies are grey, we will have to wait another half-century to get a similar opportunity.

As inelegant as LBJ was, he was skillful in getting legislation passed. If he had chosen to withdraw from Vietnam, he might have put in place a long-lasting progressive era. But that didn’t happen.

Jimmy Carter was our next hope and he was to be loved for his professed sense of ethics, his attention to detail, and his connection with “ordinary people.” But like Obama, he was fiercely opposed by the right; undermined by the media; and somewhat forgotten by the left. Was it his fault that the hostages were taken in Iran? Probably not. Was it his fault that a helicopter crashed in a rescue mission? No. He became a one-term president.

Bill Clinton gave us a big boost. He tried to reform health care he didn’t have the magic touch. His one major foreign intervention was so successful that the U.S. did not lose a single person in the Balkans conflict. Clinton knew how to maintain a semi-progressive agenda and still bring us a balanced budget. But his dalliance with Monica limited the esteem with which the public held him. A progressive period was abruptly stopped when a conservative and cynical Supreme Court selected George W. Bush to be president rather than Al Gore.

For someone who has had high hopes that the government can help promote more income equality, expand human rights, acknowledge its mistakes, intervene in foreign affairs with great caution, it’s been a very rough fifty years, from beginning to end. As part of the Kennedy legacy, we need to garner as much support as we can for Barack Obama and pave the way for a continuing line of Democratic presidents, each one daring to get a little more progressive than the last.

The post From Kennedy to Obama – what might have been appeared first on Occasional Planet.