Time to have a little accountability for the actual professional left.

I'm all for pushing Obama left. But cooking up inflammatory headlines based on speculation or gossip from unnamed sources goes on far, far too often. If progressive causes are going to win then we have to stop being gullible about believing every single attack anyone makes against Obama. The following is but one example of what is done by many writers on many issues.

David Swanson: Obama Scraps Iraq Withdrawal
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=8326038&mesg_id=8326038






I suspect I'll be posting another one of these when the deficit commission makes their recommendations.

or questioning the validity of the weak article is was based on.

After posting this I did a search to see if he had written about it lately and he did.

"I'm Sorry I Called Obama a Liar on Iraq Too Soon"
http://www.davidswanson.org/node/2841

That gives him more credibility than someone like Thomas Friedman who never seems to apologize for being wrong on most everything.

David should have stopped there because he goes on to defend his comment by pointing out that some divisions will that may play a support role in limited combat missions will remain.

It's fine to criticize that, but it's inaccurate to claim Obama is breaking his pledge. I'll quote Obama editorial again.

"After this redeployment, a residual force in Iraq would perform limited missions: going after any remnants of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, protecting American service members and, so long as the Iraqis make political progress, training Iraqi security forces. That would not be a precipitous withdrawal."

In other words, Obama is doing EXACTLY what he claimed he would do two years ago during the campaign. He also said during the campaign that he would consult with military advisers about potential adjustments to the plan, which again, is exactly what happened.

If anyone wants to argue that we shouldn't keep non-combat division in Iraq then please make the case. I'll support you. But playing the usual media game of trying to show Obama broke a promise is completely false in this case.

Obama kept his promise on an issue that many of us on the left spent the last 7 1/2 years fighting for. I'm going to take a moment to celebrate.

more would do the same. :applause:

I'm curious who these "many of us" are that were fighting to leave 50,000 troops in Iraq until 2011? Whom ever they were should have been celebrating when Bush signed the SOFA.

And you want to celebrate this?

"And during this period, our forces will have a focused mission -- supporting and training Iraqi forces, partnering with Iraqis in counterterrorism missions, and protecting our civilian and military efforts. These are dangerous tasks. There are still those with bombs and bullets who will try to stop Iraq’s progress. And the hard truth is we have not seen the end of American sacrifice in Iraq."

I don't know what you did, but I protested and organized to stop the invasion from happening and then to make the war end. So I'm feeling good about reaching a very important point in that effort.

As oppose to say 65,000? This is a label change. It's a bit like Toyota changing the name of the Prius and therefor declaring that the Prius accelerator problem doesn't exist any more. Same problem, different name. The troops are still fighting and dying against people inside their own country. What is "this point" that you claim you've been fighting for the last 7.5 years? How is it different from July? Truth is, next December, we'll still have 9000 people there, they'll just wear different uniforms. What is this thing you've been fighting for?

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

It's an honest question.

My question is about "before" what. You said 5 years ago. That's true. It was true last month, and really about a year ago. The activity going on now has been at this level for the better part of a year. We've been watching the casualty numbers decline for some time now. (Removing troops will do that).

The president himself has told you that they will continue to be involved in "counterterrorism missions" as well as supporting the Iraqi troops, which is what they've been doing for the last year or so. All we've done is change the name. They are still going to fight and they are still going to die, the president has said as much.

But it won't be today.

The longer they stay, the more friends that get lost.

Do you really think you're the only one who's smart enough to realize the implication of the troops we're leaving behind? Are you really so arrogant that you think you have to educate everyone about that?
Some of us like to recognize progress once in a while as we keep pushing for more. It's a healthy activity for any peoples' movement. It keeps the momentum going better than constantly shitting all over everything.

That really was my question from the very beginning. I'm not sure what I'm suppose to celebrate this month. A name change? I noticed months ago that whole weeks went by when no one died in Iraq (well they didn't report anyone). I noticed when the death toll fell below double digits, months ago. If you want to talk about significant, THOSE were significant events. Some piece of public relations crap about changing names isn't all that significant to me. The difference between 55K and 50K isn't all that significant. It just reeks of "mission accomplished". I notice the real changes, not some piece of political crap that the pundits get all excited about. And the truth is, until they are all out, there isn't much to be excited about from week to week. I certainly don't want to be celebrating with high 5's until their all back. It's horribly disrespectful to those "left behind" to do so. When all the "Johnny's come marching home" give me a call. Celebrating too early, in our current political climate, is a good way to let those left behind be stuck there for a good long time.

""Less people dying is the point""

about the same numbers are dying, they've just shifted to another country in the M.E.

what's the difference? Still killing civilians at random to "stop" (foment) "terror".

meet the new boss, same as the old boss, owned by the same companies.

so it isn't really like the war is still going on :sarcasm:

If he had gotten 300 recs and everyone applauding there would have been no apology.


He clearly understood that what he was saying was not accurate but was interested in always manipulating facts for the most sensational charge.

anyone Republican or Democrat, it is evidence of lack of confidence in your own point of view. I wouldn't do it to a Republican let alone a Democrat or the President. I wouldn't even do it to you.


When I have a position that I know may well be unpopular here but I consider still worth posting I post it and let the apples fall where they may. Again feel free to cite any circumstance where that is not true.

People can't peddle sensation and controversy fast enough.

We are truly blessed to have DUers who can divine the innermost secret desires and intentions of other DUers.

:grouphug:

They still won't help me pick lottery numbers, though. :evilfrown:

We don't need to be there.

:rofl:

I gotta say, some of these posts and threads today have been pathetic. No other word for for it.

Every bit as pathetic as something one would see on the other side of the aisle.

""Every bit as pathetic as something one would see on the other side of the aisle.""


the GOP and the DNC/DLC are owned by the SAME warmongering corporations

I was reading an article from SUNY Global Studies Prof Michael Schwartz and I'm fully sickened. This is war without end. This isn't some victory, it's the dashing of every hope of what Obama could've been. (Not that I was ever fooled, but it disturbs me to no end to watch people swallow another crock of Obama/DLC rightwing bullshit.) This may be the most cynical move the man has made yet.


INTERVIEW: MICHAEL SCHWARTZ
The withdrawal that isn't
August 17, 2010

Michael Schwartz, the author of War Without End: The Iraq War in Context and a commentator on U.S. wars and occupations for Web sites such as Huffington Post and TomDispatch, talked with Ashley Smith about the Obama administration's announcement that the withdrawal of "combat troops" is on schedule--and what its plans for Iraq really are.


A battalion of U.S. soldiers boards a plane leaving Baghdad (Perry Aston)
PRESIDENT OBAMA recently announced that he was fulfilling his promise to withdraw U.S. combat troops from Iraq. Is the U.S. really bringing the occupation to an end?

ON THE surface, that appears to be case, but it's not in fact true. Obama plans to retain 50,000 soldiers in Iraq after the supposed withdrawal of combat troops. He is merely re-branding these remaining combat troops as advisers and trainers.

These remaining forces will be doing exactly what they have been doing since the occupation began. They will be fighting, attacking various insurgent strongholds and calling in aerial strikes, as well as artillery and tank strikes.

While the level of U.S. military action has dropped in the last couple years, they still do fight and will retain their ability to do so after the so-called withdrawal. Since they have been fighting recently--and will be fighting in the future--alongside Iraqi soldiers, their mission is now defined as "advice and training," even though they're still fighting.

The big mystery is what will happen at the end of next year with the approach of the deadline for complete withdrawal of all U.S. troops, which the U.S. agreed to in its "status of forces agreement" (SOFA) with Iraq.

We have seen a lot of coverage about the amount of materiel, armaments and troops being taken out of Iraq. Obviously in the last year, there has been a reduction of about 70,000 troops, so what's left is approaching 50,000. The question is whether that number will actually go down to zero, and what kind of American presence will remain in Iraq.

The U.S. has three forces that it will use to replace those troops that it has withdrawn. First, the number of contractors in Iraq is very high. Jeremy Scahill, author of the book Blackwater, recently estimated that there are about 150,000 contractors in Iraq. A large number of these are armed mercenaries. So the U.S. has a surrogate armed force different from the military in the country.

Secondly, the State Department actually has a small military force of its own. It has made public pronouncements that it's going to increase that military force to a tremendous size to protect all of the American civilians in Iraq. It made requests to take over the five major military posts that remain in Iraq, each of which is meant to accommodate about 10,000 soldiers.

Third, the U.S. has flooded Iraq with civilian contractors and bureaucrats--what U.S. officials call their "civilian presence." They built the largest embassy in world history, and they plan to expand it quite considerably to accommodate almost twice the 1,000 diplomats it was built to hold. These civilians will constitute a very important presence for the U.S., different from the military, but nevertheless constituting pressure on the Iraqis to conform to U.S. policies.

But even with these surrogates, the U.S. military leadership has repeatedly said that it expects a modification of the SOFA that will permit a continued American military presence. The fact that it isn't dismantling the five major bases suggests that it expects to get some kind of agreement to retain a significant military force to control the country.

U.S. officials are determined to do so because the Iraqi government has not been compliant with American wishes. When the current political impasse since the election gets resolved, we should not expect the next Iraqi government to be any more compliant. Therefore, the U.S. will need a military force to discipline the Iraqi government.

WHAT IS the character and function of the private contractors hired by the U.S.?

IT'S HARD to get a complete picture of these contractors, because each time the U.S. uses them for various kinds of projects and missions, they meet with frustration and failure. So they keep changing how they are using the contractors. Nevertheless, we can get a partial picture of them. Too often, when we hear about 150,00 private contractors in Iraq, we think they are all mercenary soldiers.

While the U.S. has hired a large number of such private soldiers, it also has employed real civilian contractors. They are administrators, construction personnel and all sorts of officials.

For example, when the U.S. hires a company to construct something, it counts the company as a civilian contractor. It hired such a civilian contractor to build a huge complex just outside of Basra to store machinery and house the various contractors to service the Ramallah oil field. It's the size of a small city, with almost only foreigners inside--a Euro-American island in Iraq.

In other places, the U.S. uses contractors to build roads to facilitate oil extraction or to mobilize troops from one place to another. In other cases, it's establishing commercial sites that contractors can use.

The U.S. often hires civilian contractors to oversee strategic areas of Iraqi life. For example, the Iranians recently built an airport in Karbala to allow pilgrims to visit Iraq. The U.S. hired American contractors to "advise" Iraqis how to run the airport. Or in another example, an American adviser was hired to coach Iraq's oil minister how to negotiate with international oil companies.

You have a checkerboard of many different kinds of activities, but in every one of these situations, the U.S. runs into problems. There is always resistance.

In Basra, there was tremendous resistance from the local government against that huge complex the U.S. built. The local government wanted to use the area, which was an abandoned military base from the Saddam era, for public housing for all the refugees it is trying to re-house. The U.S. and the Maliki government overruled the local government, since the servicing of oil mattered more to them than housing refugees.

In another example of resistance to these civilian contractors, there is a big struggle right now over who will work in the oil industry--Iraqis or international contractors. So far, the Iraqi oil workers have managed to get the manual labor jobs, but not the professional jobs, which have gone to foreign personnel from the international oil companies.

So the use of civilian contractors is complex. But essentially, the U.S. is creating a network of control, segregated from Iraqi society and unaccountable to the Iraqi government and people, to invade Iraq with big multinational corporations and incorporate them and the country as a whole into the global system that the U.S. dominates.

WHAT DOES Obama's partial withdrawal of troops from Iraq mean for U.S. ambitions to dominate the rest of the Middle East and its strategic oil reserves?

THE OBAMA administration has certainly not abandoned the goal of establishing such hegemony, but it has changed some of the tactics.

It has scaled back from the most ambitious hopes for Iraq. It has retreated from Bush's plan to transform Iraq into a ferocious ally of the U.S. and Israel, and use it to attack Iran. But administration officials still want to have 50,000 troops in Iraq as a strike force in the Middle East. They also retain the desire, maybe a desperate one, for Iraq to be a linchpin of American control over oil production.

But they continue to encounter real challenges, even in their attempt to remake the Iraqi oil industry. The goal remains to pump 12 million barrels a day out of Iraq to break OPEC's control of the international oil system. The oil contracts, in particular, reveal the difficulties the U.S. face. While private international oil companies are involved in the negotiations, the big winners have been national oil companies owned or controlled by various governments.

The biggest winners of all have been the Chinese national oil companies--something the U.S. can't be happy about. As a result, the U.S. can't expect the oil companies to be the kind of instrument of American policy it was hoping for. The Chinese companies are not going to be simple allies of the U.S. But the U.S. may be able to salvage the situation. It seems that in the partnership agreements, the international oil companies are the dominant partners.

The U.S. also has to overcome the pledges of Iraq's Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani to honor OPEC agreements. But he isn't really in control--he may be ousted when a new Iraqi government finally emerges, and the oil contracts may be ripped up. The contracts have never been approved by parliament, and they violate all sorts of laws.

A new government could easily renege on the contracts. We will see if the U.S. is able to establish new ones on its terms and in its interests. But international oil companies are very worried about Iraq's instability, and are consequently hesitant to invest money in Iraqi oil right now.

Nevertheless, U.S. government policy has been consistent. U.S. officials want an oil industry, administered by private, not Iraqi government, oil companies, that will have the ability to make the decision about how much oil will be pumped out of Iraq. They want the decisions removed from the Iraqi government.

With the U.S. effectively opening up Iraq's immense oil resources in this manner, they would terminally wound OPEC. OPEC would not be able to set prices and wield any kind of power. That's always been the U.S. goal.

More of the interview @ http://socialistworker.org/2010/08/17/the-withdrawal-that-isnt

People's sources and interpretations should always be considered. Unfortunately, some people just don't want to bother. Personally, I hesitate to click on links when the source is not identifiable; heaven only knows where I'll end up.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x8973345

Who is Chris Floyd? ;-)

Who's Chris Floyd? A Tea Party style nutjob.

Frederick Kagan?

a warmongering nutjob that Obama supports?

Do Tea Party people generally attack warmongering neo-cons?

not that I've seen

on this? I'm not familiar with the story.

of blog links. :rofl:

Apparently he is associated with

http://www.counterpunch.org/floyd1101.html

The link that he posted to the L.A. Times took me to a blog on which people posted news articles--with no links (that I could find) to the articles themselves. You can start here:

http://www.chris-floyd.com/articles/1-latest-news/2007-release-the-kagan-arch-neocon-nabob-hired-by-team-obama.html#comments

Frederick Kagan? Why did Obama pick him?

Why are we in Afghanistan?

CIA Heroin?

Oil/Gas Pipelines?

Defense industry profits?

Why are you feigning unfamiliarity with this story?

It's the exact same one that was going on in Iraq. Same death and destruction of innocent civilians, same warmongering companies profiting $Billions at the expense of the workers while things like healthcare and education continue their downward spiral.

:thumbsup:

This had five recs soon after I posted it. Four people have written "K & R" since then. Yet I'm back down to zero reccs. I guess no one wants to explain why they support inaccurate hyperbole.

One which you defended at the time.
I didn't put words in anyone's mouth.

""I guess no one wants to explain why they support inaccurate hyperbole.""

uhhh, no, no one wants to explain why they don't support your inaccurate hyperbole

since holding war criminals accountable is off the table. Did you hear halliburton got their oil well deals yesterday...mission accomplished.

How much was it again halliburton ripped off the american taxpayer for? Not to mention the deadly showers that electrocuted our service people.

How many troops and private mercenaries are we leaving on our dime to protect halliburton's newly acquired assets?

Well, water under the table so to speak, let's go get the professional left and hold them accountable.

Nothing to be shy about.

I don't believe the problems we have yet to deal with negate the importance of progress that's happening.

We have a president who won't hold war criminals accountable. Unless he is the problem yet to be dealt with your claim is bogus.

Pardon me if I don't start waving the flag because some troops have been withdrawn per schedule. We occupied, tortured, maimed and destroyed a nation of innocent people, now we will continue that occupation in order to guarantee the rights of multi national corporations to divvy up the spoils i.e. resources.

Same old, same old.

I'm glad some of the soldiers are coming home on schedule, I hope they are ready for the massive, near depression level, real unemployment that will greet them. Another on of those problems "yet to be dealt with".

It's not like they're not an international band of thugs with no accountability to the US. Welcome to the beginning of a new onslaught of privatization of war. Excuse me, have to wash the vomit off my keyboard.

Oh and the kicker? Obama has done more to stop the antiwar movement than Bush ever could. Just rebrand it, make up a bunch of bullshit, have the news declare victory. The antiwar movement was crushed during 2008 because everyone stopped believing in themselves and starting pinning their hopes on this guy. Now we have the next step in pacifying the American people while expanding empire abroad.

It's grotesque. It's an occupation. And now it's permanent. (Of course until the Iraqis rise up and blow the shit out of us and we have to send troops back--after the midterms of course...)

to be held accountable for all the toxic red meat they throw out to fatten their coffers.

Troops still there and more mercenaries incoming = mission not accomplished, status unacceptable.

Belly ache all you like.

commission makes its report. Or, are you willing to commit now to fighting the recommendation if they include cuts to SS benefits (which includes raising the benefit age)? And can you commit to fighting elected officials who support the recommendations if they include cuts to SS benefits?

other than wild speculation based on who was appointed. But there's plenty of evidence that they won't, such as Alan Simpson flatly saying so and the presence of liberal members on the commission. I don't deal in wild speculation.

would start an oil war in iraq.

Funny how that works. Past actions count. Accountability and all.

While Obama has never said he support SS cuts. He has been consistent about protecting it and supports lifting the cap on payments into the system. So there's a pretty big difference in those examples.

does not included putting social security on the table in front of a presidential deficet commission (the people's representatives in congress had already voted down the idea), in a way that allowed it to be staffed by right wing anti social security nazi's.


That's not anywhere close to being a fierce advocate of social security. It's more along the lines of say quail hunting with social security playing the role of a wing clipped quail.

I've been watching this kind of horseshit since reagan. Same slick and sleazy excuses to rob the people's wealth.

Alan Simpson has not said they won't cut benefits. And there are only 2 members of the commission who have ever offered any defense of SS and one of those was rather tepid.

I'll happily eat crow if they don't propose benefit cut to SS. Will you do the same if they do?

you'll tell us which cuts you support as soon as you find out.

Wow and he is calling him a member of the "professional left".

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/davidswanson

Though why on earth he'd want to maintain a journal at a site that allows some of its members to break the published rules in their quest to personally attack him is beyond me.

:shrug:

It's a real shame, as he's been an asset to DU for years.

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

If not, this is a call-out.

So by definition, he is the professional left. I intentionally picked someone who's published rather than the many random DUers who expressed the same sentiment.

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

and bloggers who consistently stretch the truth to attack Obama and whether they should be held accountable when the hyperbole is proven wrong? Ok then.

If you're unable to do so, please provide independently verifiable evidence of your telepathy.

Thanks.

-- http://www.democraticunderground.com/forums/rules_detailed.html

That's only the published DU rules, though. Perhaps other factors are in play? :shrug:

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

:shrug:

Otherwise, what would people have to piss and moan about?

Yeah, right. That's what I keep reading.

I've posted threads applauding the President when I've seen him moving in a good direction on an issue. Here's a couple:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=8552815

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=8572062

I posted in support of him fighting for the UI extension. I've posted in support of him telling Congress it is the wrong time to cut spending.

OTOH, I've never seen you criticize any policy of the President or hold him accountable for any of the failures we've seen. For you, anything that may be going wrong is always somebody else's fault and you seem to believe the President bears no responsibility for any of it. Kind of one-dimensional, IMO.

4-6 people who tend to follow me from thread to thread with essentially the same line of argument every time. So it's pretty easy to lump you in with those making the same arguments, although I appreciate that you don't appear to have the same level of irrational hatred as the others.

Most of my criticisms lately have been about Afghanistan. Most of my posts about Obama on DU have been corrections directed at the exaggerations and ugly chicken little predictions. I criticize Obama much more often in my own life when I'm talking with rational people who don't make a hobby out of repeating ridiculous polemic against him. My reaction is the very predictable result of the most polarizing anti-Obama campaigners.

That's what I was getting at here but your reply suggests you missed my point.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=433&topic_id=415636&mesg_id=416514

Everyone has to decide if they're going to approach issues in a productive way of if they're just here to take shots at Obama every chance they get. For some people, it's pretty obvious what they've chosen.

My top concerns right now are SS, jobs, and the economy. I'm assuming other people show up in threads that are about issues they are interested in. It may well be the same people showing up in threads over and over because the threads are about issues that interest them.

You'll rarely see me in a thread about the war. Not that I am not concerned about the war but my energy is being spent on domestic issues, right now.

As for being a chicken little, I plead guilty. My husband and I have gone from pretty solid middle class people with FICO scores in the high 700's (him) and over 800 (me) and a very comfortable income in 3 years. We've both put in long hours working our asses off for over 30 years. He started apprenticing in his trade 47 years ago and has been working ever since (with some time off serving as a paratrooper in Viet Nam). He ran a successful business from 1982 until business started dying up with the bust of the housing market. I lost my job. We've run through our savings, we've lost our health insurance because we could no longer afford a $1200 a month premium. I'm 55. He's 63. We both have chronic health issues which were well controlled when we had health care but are now going unaddressed. We have slim hope of ever finding jobs. Our savings, as I said, are gone. We have managed, so far, to get enough work into our shop to feed ourselves and put fuel in the vehicles to get to the shop or the job site. There's no extras and all we need is one bad month (and our slow season is approaching) and we'll be down to hoping someone will feed us. You're damned right, I'm a chicken little right now. SS is the only hope we have of not sleeping outdoors and starving to death.

And I am angry at President Obama. I'm angry so much has been given to prop up the financial sector and so little for the rest of us. And I'm angry about the deficit commission. With SS being our last hope, I am angry anyone would be considering taking even this away from us. The Senate defeated the bill to create this commission and President Obama chose to do it be executive order. People whose situation is not as dire have the luxury of sitting back with a wait and see attitude towards the commission's work. But their recommendations and Congress' action on them really do constitute a life and death situation for some of us out here and I'm not willing to wait until it's too late to start raising hell about it. If they don't decide to cut benefits, what have we lost but some time? This really is about people's lives. And I am irritated at the increased tendency of many to treat politics as if it's some sort of sporting event and any win for 'our team' is good regardless of the effect on people.

This was my response to the post you linked to: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=433&topic_id=415636&mesg_id=416558

Like most people in my age group, I've never experienced the financial security you once had. I finished college with student loans the size of a mortgage and a job market where the idea of working at one place for more than 10 years sounds as realistic as a Disney cartoon. I've gone long periods without insurance when I didn't have the asthma medication I should be taking daily. So I can sympathize with your loss of financial security.

Your anger and fear are understandable. Yet, there's still no evidence of Obama "leading the assault on social security" as pundits have hysterically claimed. It seems to me that it's a case of someone exploiting your anger and fear for their own political purposes. That's what demagogues do. It's what the tea party is doing, and the left has its own demagogues as well.

I saw the response you just linked before, and I'll repeat that you seem to have missed my point since you didn't address it. Whether you contacted Congress has nothing to do with it. I was illustrating the difference between dealing with an issue in a productive way that's meant to accomplish something in contrast to sensationalist demagoguery that alienates and divides people. I'm also tired of people who treat politics as a sporting event, especially where the goal is to take as many shots against Obama no matter how much they have to exaggerate and stretch the truth to do it. That sport doesn't help social security or any other issue.

I lived on $200 per month during nursing school and it was some sort of minor miracle I didn't starve to death. Many days, I was hungry. The day I graduated, I owned my nursing school uniform, 2 pairs of frayed and worn blue jeans (not a fashion statement in those days), 2 pull over sweaters and 2 tee shirts, no winter coat. I had never had a car and I walked and took the bus to get to school. I had a fair amount of student loan debt, also. Not as much as some due to living on nothing and a scholarship I managed to get for my last year 2nd to having the highest GPA in my class.

I had to declare bankruptcy in my 30's over medical expenses. I lost everything in a flood in my early 40's. Once the for profit corps took over our industry, I worked longer hours every year for wages that were not keeping up. I, generally, had a side job on my days off (meaning I really never had any days off). I've never taken a trip out of town that was more than 5 days and I think that's only happened twice. As I said, I lost everything in a flood in my early 40's. I had to relocate to a state where I had some friends I could stay with until I could regroup. My car and my home were destroyed in the flood (along with most of my belongings). The insurance paid the value of my car and left me owing money on it. I had to pull my meager savings at that time to relocate and take care of expenses until I had my nursing license in the new state and found a job.

My life has always been more or less a paycheck to paycheck existence. I went without many things and was putting what I could into savings (which wasn't much) in hopes of retiring some day. I met my husband shortly after the flood and he had just lost everything in a divorce. We picked ourselves up, buckled down, put in grueling hours, and started saving and paying down our debt. In 2005, we had paid off all our debt and managed to save a down payment for a small home we could afford on a couple of acres of land. I was putting back everything I could in a 401k. We were making it and could, for the first time, breathe a little. A year and a half after we bought the house, the housing market tanked and his business slowed to a crawl. We were struggling but reworked our finances as best we could to try to weather it. At the end of 2007, he was diagnosed with cancer and I lost my job. By pulling our savings and tapping ever LOC we had, we managed to keep my COBRA premiums paid long enough to finish his cancer treatments. Other than keeping the insurance paid, it's been subsistence living ever since. I don't know what you call 'financial security' but any security we ever had was dependent on us being able to keep dragging ourselves out there for long days doing grueling work and we were never secure enough to weather any big storms. Having enough to feed ourselves and pay our health insurance for six months is not 'security' for a couple in their 50's.

I am not being manipulated by people 'exploiting my anger and fear.' I thought the deficit commission was a horrible idea and was relieved when the Senate defeated the amendment to create it. I was appalled that President Obama then created it by executive order. Whether that constitutes, 'leading the attack on SS,' or not, I can say, I can't think of a valid reason to have created this commission if he is committed to keeping our benefits intact. And I certainly can't see someone who is against cuts to SS appointing Bruce Reed as Executive Director of the commission and Alans Simpson as co-chair. The timeline he established (giving them a deadline of December) is suspect, also. It is conveniently after the election so we will the vote will be made within weeks of the election by a group of lawmakers who have all either just been elected and are, therefore, safe for a couple of years or who will be polishing their resume for a job in the private sector. I am not happy that all I have heard him say, lately, is that he will oppose privatization. That is a good thing. But it worries me he has not said he'll oppose cuts to benefits. I've seen some here say he has said some 'modest changes' are all that would be needed. But who knows if he considers raising the retirement age to 70 'modest?'

I can't speak for others but I don't have a goal of 'taking shots' at President Obama. I do have a goal of seeing him change the way he's been doing a lot of things. I don't like the attacks on 'the left' I've seen come out of his administration. The regularity with which I see them engage in these attacks do lead me to believe they don't have much use for us or our ideas.

I would like to see a little more indication that they are aware of the struggles of people like me (and you, for that matter) and that they have some ideas of how to turn this around for us.

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One would think. :shrug:

Hekate

Unless Mr. Swanson is an avowed member of the group the OP is claiming, it's both a call-out and a personal attack.

See here for the rules in question (bolded for convenience):
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=8974366&mesg_id=8977469

This is a call-out!

Especially when one reviews this portion of the rules:

-- http://www.democraticunderground.com/forums/rules_detailed.html

My point above was that unless/until Mr. Swanson says, "I'm a member of the Professional Left," it's both a personal attack and a call-out. But the rule I've quoted above might even call that dodge into question.

Either way, it's incredibly disappointing to see this behavior implicitly condoned at DU.

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I guess not.

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meant was "PUMA's". And there are plenty of PUMA websites.

that he may have been a bit premature in his criticism.

.... from a well-known author, blogger, and activist. As someone who publishes extensively elsewhere under his own name, I trust that using his name in the citation does not violate any DU rules regarding call-outs.

Aside from that, last night's MSNBC broadcast was the best news I've had in a long long time.

Hekate

I'm very happy to hear calling people for their crystal ball exercises doesn't count against the rules.

But, of course, some are always more equal.

Good catch

:rofl:

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/19/iraq-last-combat-troops-leave



Ahh, rebranded combat troops to remain and rebrand the military operations. And, to meet the talking point details of the 'exit strategy' from Iraq as concocted by W.

Maybe, after these "trainers" are rotated out of Iraq, Obama should let Arne Duncan 're-define' their mission to 'public education', and they can be ordered into the Mobile, AL elementary school system to 'train' the 3rd-6th graders how to read and do arithmetic? Then they can be "rebranded" as Teachers For America (no one would dare to question the qualifications of a soldier to teach anything he or she damn well pleases in a place like Alabama, right?)

Oh yeah, and ketchup is a vegetable...

Do you really believe that?

Here's yesterday's New York Times article about it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/19/world/middleeast/19withdrawal.html?_r=1

Now here are the 361 comments on it, overwhelmingly angry and dismayed that 1) ANY American troops are still there and 2) that the U.S. is using mercenaries, i.e. the same "civilian contractors" that the Iraqis hate.

http://community.nytimes.com/comments/www.nytimes.com/2010/08/19/world/middleeast/19withdrawal.html

On other boards, I have dared right-wingers to go read the platform of the Socialist Party U.S.A. online and then tell me that Barack Obama is a socialist.

Now I'm daring some of the people on this thread to go read the comments I have linked to and tell me that it's still just "the professional left" who are angry, dismayed, even heartbroken at what this country has come to.

It's no secret that they believe it will be another year before the rest of the troops are gone. That's no reason not to recognize this as a turning point.

"...tell me that it's still just "the professional left" who are angry, dismayed, even heartbroken at what this country has come to."

True. I know some teabaggers who feel that way too.

and read those 362 angry, thoughtful comments in the New York Times.