Modeling Journey

It might be the only way you can keep your own job come November.

Is President Obama doing anything to help those struggling to modernize the ossified political systems in the Middle East to actually implement realistic, significant and long-lasting change?

The new stage brings new, more complicated challenges.

The Armed Forces Supreme Council, the body of top generals that now rules the country after Mubarak's ouster last Friday, has laid out a transition that emphasizes speed, not the sweeping democratic change the protesters want. The military has left the remains of Mubarak's ruling party to dominate the caretaker government and the levers of power, including the powerful police forces.

The organizers fear that unless the ruling party is broken and major change guaranteed, Egypt can fall back into an authoritarian rule, a Mubarak regime without Mubarak...

Also, the protest coalition is trying to fend off fragmentation that has plagued past reform movements, which tended to coalesce behind a single figure in a personality cult and then fall apart over personal disputes.

The new ruling generals urged the protesters to form their own political party. But the coalition refuses, saying a party now would bring out the divisions among them and break their bond of common demands.

The coalition tried to bring in Wael Ghonim, the Google executive who worked on a Facebook page that rallied hundreds of thousands of Egyptians behind the protests. But he has decided to work independently. He has set up a webpage to gather suggestions of what Egyptians think should be done now — so far collecting at least 37,000 entries.

The military has also only suspended the constitution, not dissolved it. It appointed a panel of legal experts that has 10 days to draw up just enough changes to the constitution to allow a multiparty election.

Egypt rises

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George Lakoff telling some Untellable Truths

The differences between Democratic progressives and the president over the tax deal the president has made with Republicans is being argued from a materialist perspective.

That perspective is real. It matters who gets how much money and how our money is spent.

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Stung by comments that the Gulf oil spill amounts to Obama's Katrina, the president's men (and women) have sprung into action on two fronts in an attempt to get control of the framing of the issue, and to avoid this comparison with the Junior Bush's mishandling of New Orleans taking root.

But in doing so the Obama Administration runs the risk that it will deliver less than is required to solve a problem fingered and blasted by the administration (just as its response to the financial meltdown and the problem of banks being allowed to run risks that should not be run, through use of derivatives and trading activities, is far less than the scope of the meltdown problem really requires).
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When running against the hapless Senator John McCain, Obama pooh poohed McCain's policy of giving homeowners who were underwater some relief reducing their amount they owed on their mortgages, in recognition of the drop in home prices after the financial meltdown of 2008.

Now it seems that the same problem is even bigger, and the president is faced with doing exactly what McCain proposed, because Obama's first stab at the problem has been unsuccessful.


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A little spat has broken out between Natanyahu of Israel and President Obama. The VP visited Israel and the Israeli government and it seems Biden took offence because the Israeli government announced further building in Jerusalem when he was there. Hillary Clinton climbed into the foray, castigating the Israeli government before she softened her stance.

And then Bibi visited Washington, and Obama decided to teach the leader of this little country a lesson, by not dining with him.
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With a vote apparently scheduled for this Sunday, the vote counters are out in full force, trying to figure out if American Congressmen and –women and Senators will finally drag the US by the scruff of its sorry neck into the advanced land of universal health care, something that the rest of the industrialized West has had for a long long time.

And one of the most interesting analyses of who is going to vote for Obama's limping, muddled-middle-of-the-road health care hill is that of the Washington Post, which has a table showing politicians' votes last time, plus the percentage of voters in each constituency who do not have health care.

And plus the amount of contributions made to each one by the health industry.

Very interesting table, especially if you have your head stuck in the sand and still believe the American political system has not been privatized, and throw open to the highest bidders.

President Obama held a press conference one day after the Republicans whipped the Democratic candidate for the senate seat of Massachusetts, sending that candidate (and the Democractic Party) into a tizzy.

That tizzy was shared by Obama, who somewhat belatedly threw his weight behind the Democratic candidate last week, but could not prevent the historic upset.
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Yesterday was a bad day for the president and a worse day for American democracy.

Commenting on a case before an American court, Obama said:

"“I don't think it will be offensive at all when he's convicted and when the death penalty is applied to him,” the U.S. President said Wednesday before leaving China."
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Keep your fingers crossed for Hope Plus.

"President Barack Obama and Bill Gates are being invited to back a website that promotes social politics.

The web portal, entitled Hope Plus, aims to offer online tools to enable social projects such as building schools and fighting pollution.

Although still being created, the site is billed as "a place where people can meet, congregate and participate..to change the world online".

It aims to launch in December at the Copenhagen Climate Change conference."

If it is launched, this idea could really take off.

Imagine tens of millions of people signing up to help fight global warming ….

Step aside, climate sceptics, the people are on the move!

The outleak is bleak, right now, says Zogby:

"President Barack Obama's job approval rating has sunk to a record low of just 45%, the latest Zogby Interactive poll shows. Fifty-one percent of likely voters now say they disapprove of the President's job performance."

But Obama still scores well with Democrats, although he is losing the independent vote:

"While this latest poll shows Democrats continue to overwhelmingly approve of Obama's job performance (84%), just 6% of Republicans say the same. Most independents (59%) now disapprove of the job the President is doing."

None of this is surprising, given the major changes which this president is trying to make in a very short space of time.

And none of these results should cause Democrats undue concern. After all, what Obama is seeking to do is change the very contours of American politics, by tackling tasks of a scale which only three other presidents have dared to deal with (Lincoln, fighting to keep the Union alive; Roosevelt, pushing through the New Deal despite strenuous and misguided opposition; and LBJ, putting into law civil rights bills which even Jack Kennedy would not have been able to enact).

Revolutionary presidents like these four men will be opposed, and the size of the changes they force upon their societies will cause concern.

But when the dust settles, in a year or so, watch his ratings rise again, just in time for his bid for re-election.

Just what is going on with President Obama and the Democratic health care plan?

Try this take for an attempt by Robert Reich at understanding the dynamics of this intensely interesting clash of interests in the US:

"Pollsters are fascinated that Obama's personal popularity endures -- his "favorables" have fallen a bit, but still hover over 50 percent -- even as support has declined for much of what he broadly endorses, notably universal health care.

Republican pollsters, alert to this discrepancy between person and policy, have advised the GOP accordingly: Trying to get the public to distrust Obama is more difficult than arousing distrust for the platoons of government bureaucrats they say his policies are unleashing.

Obama's political advisers are trying to do exactly the reverse -- using the president's personal popularity to sell policies, much as Madison Avenue uses trusted personalities to promote products. Obama's town meetings have been enormously successful; he's fielded questions well, and showed himself to be every bit as thoughtful and engaging as he was during the presidential campaign. But the politics of product endorsement aren't working terribly well nonetheless.

This is partly because Americans have sealed off the man from his agenda. For most Americans, the more they see of Obama (and the rest of his family) the more they like him. But likeability isn't rubbing off on specific policies. The longer universal health care hangs out there, for example, the more vulnerable it has become.

It's also because Obama hasn't yet taken full responsibility for detailed policies, such as the public option, or, on environmental legislation, whether cap-and-trade pollution permits should go to polluting industries free of charge. Keeping distance from the specifics has been a wise tactic -- both Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter got too far into specifics and paid a high price on health care when Congress wrested back ownership. And it helps Obama to separate his own approval ratings from public worries about legislation. But it has also made his policies more vulnerable to scare tactics and caused the Sallies in the Democratic base to worry about Obama's willingness to fight. Obama may be temperamentally incapable of being more combative and identifying enemies. But surely he can state less equivocally what he does and does not want -- and, with regard to key matters such as the public option, what he'll sign and what he won't.

The widening gap between admiration for Obama and cynicism about his policies also reinforces passivity in Obama's base, which makes it even harder to advance a specific agenda. His presidential campaign strengthened the nation's political grass roots and spawned hope for a new era of public engagement, but Obama's reluctance to fight for any specifics is causing the base to lose interest. Neither the Freds who trust him nor the Sallies who have become cynical are motivated to do much of anything.

But their activism is crucial. If it comes to a choice between trust and cynicism, America will never achieve lasting change."

Well written, and probably most apt.

Listen to this:

"We don’t know for sure that Obama is about to give up on the public option. I think, in the end, he will not. I think he may be tougher than some think and stronger than the polls show. But I admit there are troubling signs.

“The public option, whether we have it or we don’t have it, is not the entirety of health care reform,” Obama said at Grand Junction. “This is just one sliver of it, one aspect of it.”
But it is a very important sliver, a critical aspect. And how Obama acts right now on health care reform could tell us how he will act for the rest of his presidency.

Sometimes it is not enough to have just your heart and your head in the right place. You have to have your guts there, too."

And the same article raises this question (posed by Hilary Clinton during her campaign for presidency) – does Obama have the courage needed to govern properly?

"Could Hillary Clinton have been right about Barack Obama?

Could she have been right when she said that he was the candidate of lofty promises —“the skies will open, the light will come down, celestial choirs will be singing and everyone will know we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect” — and not the candidate of real leadership?

In her former life as a presidential candidate, Clinton warned voters that Obama would let them down. She warned them that when the going got tough, he would fold up.

She said it was not just a matter of Obama lacking experience — that was the least of it — but that he lacked the strength, the toughness, the will to get the job done."

Whether Obama fights for the public option in health care reform will tell us. This is the litmus test for him.

Let's hope the answer is a resounding Yes.

The chips are down in the Senate, as antediluvian Democratic senators on a committee gang up with the neanderthallic Republican senators in order to gut President Obama's health care proposals.

The battleground issue is the provision of a government-alternative (read: Like the sensible and workable Canadian system).

The so-called Blue Dog Democrats (almost indistinguishable conservatively-minded Democratic senators) are backing the Republican drive to avoid having this alternative in the President's health care bill when it passes the Congress.

The White House is starting to telegraph weakness on this issue almost as audibly as Michael Ignatieff laying down the rules for reform of EI in Canada (360 hours is the maximum. No? Well, then, 520 hours is the maximum … No? Well then …).

And now the man who is the architect for the resurgent Democratic victories in the Senate and House, Howard Dean, has thrown the gauntlet down before the President by public letter on his website, and given him some advice:

"Having dedicated ourselves for the last two years to getting you elected and working to help you enact comprehensive health care reform, I am writing to you today to share what I believe your most ardent supporters would like to see in the health care legislation we all hope you will sign this year.

First and foremost, it is time to cut the Republicans loose. The only thing that will be gained from continuing to try to work with them and adopt their amendments and so called "compromises" is an increasingly watered-down bill. In fact, I would urge you not to sign a watered-down bill."

And the letter goes on:

"Americans wants real health care reform and they want it now!

What they mean by that, is a single payer plan is not feasible, but:

-A STRONG PUBLIC PLAN option into which every single American can enroll if they CHOOSE with comprehensive benefits that are the same for EVERYONE (none of this bronze, silver and gold level benefits). We were created equally and we should be treated equally;

-LIMITS ON OUT-OF-POCKET COSTS so that NO ONE in America ever goes bankrupt from medical care again (no one should have to spend more than 10% of their family's income on medical care);

-SERIOUS REGULATION of the health insurance industry (no more pre-existing condition exclusions or limitations, no pricing premiums based on health status or age, gender or any other individual characteristic, no canceling policies, guaranteed issue and renewal, requiring that they spend 90% of premium on medical care, and finally requiring that all individual/family private insurance be sold through the Exchange);

-REAL SUBSIDIES for those who cannot afford coverage up to at least 350% of FPL; and

-PAYMENT reform for physicians and hospitals that fairly compensates them for the care they deliver REGARDLESS of the patient they are treating."

Dean's public letter recommends that the President not sacrifice health care in the interests of so-called bipartisanship:

"Here is what we don't want:

-We DO NOT WANT any more coddling of Republicans. Cut them out. They don't play fair. They weaken the bills with their amendments and still don't vote for the bills.

-We DO NOT WANT the bill to make the for-profit insurance industry stronger and more powerful. We want for-profit insurers to have to COMPETE with the public plan option, which we know, through the experience of Medicare, will be more efficient and equitable.

We want the PURPOSE of the bill to ensure that ALL Americans have comprehensive coverage that is affordable, provides them with access to the effective care they need when they need it, controls costs, and promotes their health. Period.
We are in the fourth quarter of this game, Mr President. We are so grateful that you have put yourself into the game, even though it is the last quarter and the minutes are ticking down. What will you do, Mr. President? So many people are counting on you. So many of us have put our faith and trust in you. So many of us having been waiting a lifetime for a President who will take back the soul of this country and be concerned for the welfare of its people. We believe you are the one.

Will you weave down the court and dunk it? Will you go for the three pointer and assure a win? We have seen you do it before. Will you pass the ball to another member of your team who is in the right position to make a basket before the buzzer rings? Or will you lose control and lose the game."

Gotta love that: weave down the court and dunk it

And really gotta love the warning of an alternative: Or will you lose control and lose the game?

Way to go, Dean.

Tell it to The Man.

And give Americans what Canadians have: a good, state-sponsored healthcare program.