Morning in America (Special Event)

What Happened to that guy? Listening to this depressed me. I miss that guy.

Great idea Jay. When I listened to this podcast for the first time, I was inspired and hopeful. What a difference a year makes. I am especially upset at what this betrayal will do to jaundice all the youngsters who really believed in the grifter from Hawaii.

Somehow I missed this the first time around. This is one of the best things I’ve ever heard. Thanks for reposting this! And although I miss the voice I heard too, that guy is still in there somewhere. He just needs to be reminded who he really is and why we elected him. Can we send this podcast to him?

I think they should lock Obama, his staff and Cabinet in the Oval Office and make them ALL listen to this particular podcast. They believed in these words at one point in time, if they listen again, maybe there will be HOPE for us all yet…

First, I want to thank Jay for all the hard work he puts into this and it shows by how many awards he keeps on winning for his podcast. I want to express my appreciation for all you hard work and keep it up.

As someone who is on the far left, to be more specific like Ralph Nader. I am not disappointed from Obama’s actions and it is quite what I expected. Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer prize winner who’s a senior fellow at the Nation Institute and who’s articles appear on truthdig.org says that he didn’t vote for Obama as someone who voted for Ralph Nader. Before I talk about my disappointments I want to talk about his achievements.

Even though it has been said too many times, it is stunning that a black man can be president with racism as strong as it is today. It is way past due. For him to “talk about” getting rid of “don’t ask, don’t tell” it is monumental. He also appointed the first transgender women. A nobel peace prize winner and of course reforming health care. He also appointed the first hispanic women to the Supreme court.

The disappointments are many. For him to be a peace prize winner yet have 2 wars still actively going on. While carrying out drone attacks in Pakistan. For him to give in to the bankers and not regulate them at all. To call bankers “fat cats” yet do nothing about their billions of bonuses from taxpayer money is a huge betrayal to the millions that voted for you. Obama has also done very little to create jobs and try and solve this 10% unemployment rate. He has not helped Americans to stay in their homes either. Lastly and his core issue healthcare. For him to not push Liberman out of the way or at the very least take his chairmanship away is also a huge give in to the republican party. To take single payer out from the beginning. Obama also has the audacity to say he never campaigned on the public option, though that is true, there are a lot of things in this bill that he did campaign on. For example, no mandate without a public option and taxing the rich to pay for it. There are a lot of things and a progressive could go on all day, but these are just the main issues.

The progressives and liberals need to start protesting. The only way to get real change is to demand it. In order to do that we need to show that we want it so bad that we are willing to take it to the streets if we have to.

In my opinion Jay had it exactly right. “Disappointment is an occupational hazard of being a liberal progressive. We must take all of our victories in stride and focus on our next challenge no matter the present. Things will never be perfect so our challenge is never done.” [I took the liberty of rewording his quote for clarity] Obama is the right man but we progressives must push even our man to be his best. if he fails it does not mean we have failed, just that we must fight another day.

I loved your comments on this show, Jay! I have been spiraling into despair after the events of the last few days: election in MA, Supreme Court decision about campaign finance, stock market going down again…. Your words helped put things into perspective about where we are right now as opposed to the past eight years. BTW, I think the election in MA was more a matter of disappointed progressives who didn’t vote, rather than the state turning to the right. But I guess that’s part of the point!

Of all your fantastic Podcasts, this is the only one that gets a thumbs-down. Excessive use of music over Obama’s speeches created a competition of content.

Additionally, while the message of “Hope” is inspiring, I was looking forward to more emphasis on campaign promises. It’s been a year and now is a good time to gauge if Obama is living up to our expectations.

Quite remarkable how “Yes we can” has become “no we can’t.” We can’t have universal health care, we can’t have peace, we can’t stop torturing people, we can’t stop shipping people overseas to be tortured, we can’t close Gitmo. Whatever it is, we can’t.

Obama is one heck of a great speaker. But, in the end, he’s just another politician.

NOW is the time for that new third party. Let’s call it the Progressive Conservative Party. It really will be conservative – it’ll take us back to the good old days when income tax brackets ranged up to 80%, corporations didn’t have the rights of persons, and our nation had too much honor to torture people and spy on its citizens.

After listening to your comments at the end of this show, I answered the question that roared in my head during the previous hour: “When will these people learn?” The answer: never.

You said with certainty that despite disappointments we had obviously made the right choice. That is too close to claiming our attack on Iraq was justified given the “intelligence” we had at the time. As was pointed out above, this last year was all too predictable….just as knowable and known in advance as the fact there were no WMDs in Iraq.

We had other candidates with proven progressive records and courage to stand up for a cause, and ignored them for rhetoric and “electability.” We saw Obama turn on progressive supporters during his campaign if they stepped out of line and offended the moneyed. Speaking of money, we saw him raise record amounts of it from people and corporations used to investing for a return. We heard early in the campaign from disgusted Illinois progressives who knew Obama’s history all too well….and every step Obama’s supporters made excuses because they wanted so much to believe. Apparently those same people would fall for another “progressive” WMD campaign all over again.

Contrary to punditry, an awful lot of progressives are not disillusioned by Obama….because we never swallowed the wishful thinking in the first place. When will others learn? The sad conclusion from this program is not in the first hour, but in the last 5 minutes.

This podcast made me weep both times I listened to it.
First, because I was so proud and inspired.
Now, because I feel duped and abandoned.

I still support our president, but I wish I could still believe in what he stands for.