Some interesting articles with positive news for Democrats and progressive leaning Independents:
Washington Monthly – The Incomplete Greatness of Barack Obama
The Hill – New Wisconsin Senate candidate adds chaos to GOP Field (Hovde)
The White House – New Data: The Affordable Care Act in Your State (links to Excel file with interesting data on number of people without lifetime caps, number of young adults insured, number of people with added preventive coverage)
Bloomberg – Income Gap Widest in Republican Leading States (links to US Census Bureau report on income inequality by county around the US)
Re: The Incomplete Greatness of Barack Obama.
President Obama has probably achieved as much as he can, considering that Congress and –let’s face it– his own White House are extensions of the Financial Services industry. Regulation of futures trading , which is the basis of the Wall Street casino, is still non-existant, while CDS remain unregulated and are a ticking time-bomb in the heart of world banking. I don’t expect any action on these fronts unless there is massive unrest in the streets during his second term or as the result of a follow-on banking sector meltdown that leaves no recourse.
Americans need to understand that the primary job of any President under our current National Security State is to manage the day-to-day functoning of the worldwide military/corporate Empire. Everything else is secondary. Does anyone really feel comfortable with a President taking on the power to designate an American citizen as an “Enemy Combatant” and order their assassination or indefinite arrest in complete secrecy without charges being filed in court or any access to legal counsel? It isn’t difficult to imagine how these powers will be misused in the future, if they can in fact ever be used ethically at all. The obsessively paranoid Nixon would have loved this. He could have cleared out his “Enemies List” in a matter of days.
This is why I am less than overwhelmed by Barack Obama and will vote for him as the lesser-of-two-evils, because the other guys are just frigging nuts.