Reply #7: I'm not "bashing." But its my future, and I have a stake in the direction our President takes

[Political Heretic]

It's completely insufficient to say "hey, he's not as bad as the worst president in the history of the United States." And sometimes when people rattle off this litany of Bush failures, it sounds like that's about what they are saying.

If my only interest was providing commentary then yes, maybe I would wait four or more years before making any sort of evaluation of everything once its all said and done. But of course, that's not my interest.

My interest is in seeing that policy is shaped in the direction that I think it should be. Waiting until after all policy is made doesn't help.

Now, I think some people on DU are confused by this, because they recognize that simply posting on DU isn't going to change anything. But those folks make the mistake of assuming that's the only thing some of us that are writing about out criticisms and concerns are doing. It's not, at least not in my case. I'm contacting my representatives, I'm speaking out in my community. I'm partnering with non-profits that are advocating the positions I believe in. Next week my op-ed will appear in my statewide paper. I'm doing what I know to do to advocate for change.

Those same opinions and beliefs I try to put into action in the real world are the ones I bring to DU and express. Thus a "give him time" attitude doesn't work for me. You'll notice that I tend not to speculate about the future Obama, and only tend to focus on concrete examples of policy we already have.

So I don't like Team Obama's policy toward the economic crisis. I don't have to "wait" on that because its not about whether it "works" (where "works" is defined as brings us back to the same status quo where a privileged few reaped massive gains off the backs of the American worker.) It's about we should be moving in a different direction.

I don't have to "wait" to see about our policy in Iraq and Afghanistan, because it isn't about whether it "works" (where "works" is defined as securing our long standing American hegemonic agenda in the region through gentler or harsher means depending on the sitting President). It's about we should bring our troops home from around the world and stop envisioning ourselves as the world's King.

I don't have to "wait" to see about Obama's government making the exact same court argument the Bush administration did. And you can't hide behind the "lawyers doing their job" canard, because the Government certainly didn't have to appeal court rulings against those positions, nor did it have to continue to fight them in court. Waiting doesn't change that those decisions were wrong, and that they are concerning.

At the same time, good things have happened thanks to this administration as well. Many good things. And I wake up in the morning quite happy to not be under the oppression of the last regime's lunacy. But I won't for a second let you or anyone else attempt to use that relief as some sort of argument against conscientious criticism of policy when I feel its deserved.


EDIT - to change "we's" to "I's" because I don't speak for anyone else.