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Showing Original Post only (View all)Tired of Malignant Amnesia Anti-Obama Syndrome [View all]
Just months after two massive policy achievements - reopening relations with Cuba after half a century, and bringing the US and Iran close to nuclear agreement that may be the basis for long-term peace - I see (once again, as if the madness ever stopped) his entire Presidency being dismissed as a massive conspiracy intended for the delivery of a single initiative that's disagreed with.
One disagreement is all it takes to make certain people forget (or more likely deliberately ignore) every single fact of this Presidency and retreat into a hysterical anti-Obama rage fugue.
When this hatred - that's been there since Day One - isn't being fed, its key disciples sit there in bitter, simmering fury, apparently more angry when they have no excuse than when they do. But when an excuse does present itself, they spring into action with all their Tea Party-flavored talking points and unconcealed personal hate on display, and for some reason it's tolerated if the single-issue point of disagreement is significant. That is the "Trojan Horse".
This crap is why we can't have nice things on the left. If we ever see Bernie Sanders in the White House - if we can hold back the chaotic impulses of certain people long enough to even get him there - he will be accused of "betraying" us within seconds of taking the Oath of Office. The moment he stepped into the spotlight, you could already almost hear the nervous tension in certain people's commentary, desperately trying to restrain themselves from blowing up the 1 or 2 things they disagree with him about into a full-blown accusation of Manchurian Candidacy.
If you disagree with the President on trade, then disagree with the President on trade while acknowledging you're on the same team. That's how adults shape political agendas. If after all this time you still think Barack Obama's credentials as a great liberal President are in doubt, and your response to every disagreement is to call them into question, you are the problem. You have a selective memory that makes you at very least a burden to your own alleged agenda.
Does anyone remember when Barack Obama was supposedly going to destroy Social Security? See, I remember that Big Lie and all the others these people have told. I see them lie, I see them extrapolate that lie into an attack on Barack Obama's character and motives, and then I see that lie come to exactly fucking NOTHING. Every time, always. Then they forget it ever happened, and we forget how berserk they went over nothing, treating every fresh lie as if it were the first.
But they're not even the real issue, because from where I stand they're transparent. The issue is that we listen to them whenever there is disagreement with the President, or even the vague perception that a disagreement may exist. We give air to voices of malignant amnesia, treating Two Minute Hates as if they were courageously stated moral grievances.
It's like watching the parable of The Scorpion and The Frog in action. Stop falling for this bullshit, and stop letting hateful, dishonest people define progressivism for you. We are the voice of reason in the world, and the minute that turns into something else, we don't amount to much.
Issues come and go, but the strength of everything we stand for is our solidarity with each other and with the truth. Those who attack that need to be treated with strong skepticism, even as we constructively address issue differences.