President Obama Uses A Watering Can Instead Of A Fire Hose

George W. Bush liked to play with matches. He was the one president who started and maintained fires all throughout his play dates in the White House. His first fire was to ignore the threat of terrorists planning to fly planes into a major American city. He let a smaller fire grow into a raging fire by pouring gasoline onto what eventually turned into the biggest economic firestorm ever to sweep the nation. He started a horrible fire in Iraq, and then in Afghanistan. He set fire to the Veteran’s Administration, soldier physical and mental health care. He set a nice fire upon American jobs and wages and retirement savings. He gathered brush and let a health care fire burn to a point where 40 million Americans could not get treated for the burns they received from the heat. He decided to take a match to public education by not providing enough funding for his No Child Left Behind fire. He started a huge torture fire. He loved to throw huge piles of money on his debt crisis fires. He threw a firebomb onto civil liberties, American and real free market principles. He gave a fire trench of escape to the banking fraudsters. He threw fire propellants all over the environment, as well. It has become very clear to many, or most, Americans that Little Boy Bush was a pyromaniac.

Now Barack Obama has stepped into these multiple fires of his presidency with a watering can in hand. During his bid for the presidency, he filled arenas all around the country with his message of change—the change that we can all believe in. And, a “Yes We Can”, ‘we must put these fires out’, ‘together we can clear the debris’, or ‘rebuild from the rubble’ message, which has left us waiting for something more than a good speech. A ‘Phoenix Rising’ message with teeth is what was expected. This was not the message from his opponent representing Phoenix, Arizona. The voters called out for a Phoenix-rising-from-the-ashes-of-a-nation-left-to-burn message to be put into play on day one. We are still waiting.

A voting majority was listening intently, with hope in their hearts, since he talked of it everywhere he stopped to speak. His Phoenix Rising message had saturated the Democratic and hopeful Republican psyche. We were expecting it, for crying out loud! He went from swooning a ground swell of loyal stadium-sized supporters, to a rising bunch of folks wondering what the heck happened.

Of course, there were many who were not paying attention. Those who were not listening thought Barack Obama was a Muslim. They instead listened to the Right wing messengers, such as Limbaugh, and O’Reilly. Many of these same people did not know which state of the union KFC—the fried chicken franchise—first came from; or could name a country that began with the letter “U” (such as the United States); or, what is the religion of Israel (the answer is not Israeli); or, what religion are Buddhists; or, who won the Vietnam War (and yes, the U.S. was in that war.); or, who is Fidel Castro; or, how many sides does a triangle have (the answer is not NONE or ONE!); or, what is the currency used in the United Kingdom (the answer is not “the Queen Elizabeth’s money”); or, what country in the Middle East should be invaded next (the answer should not be Italy, France, Brazil, Korea); or, place a marker on the world map showing Iran (placing it on Australia is wrong); or, who is Tony Blair (the answer should not be “I don’t even know”, “Linda Blair’s brother”, or “an actor”); or, what is a mosque (the answer should not be “I don’t have any idea”, nor “an animal”); or, how many kidneys does a person have (the answer should not be one); or, what is collateral damage (the answer should not be “they just made a movie about it, and it must be something to do with what the movie is about”), or; how many world wars have there been (the answer should not be three); or, Star Wars is based on a true story: true or false (the answer should not have been answered “true”); or, what is Hiroshima and Nagasaki famous for (the answer should be Judo-wrestling); or, how many Eiffel towers are there in Paris (the answer should not be “about 10); or, what is Al-Qaeda (the answer should not have been “a suicide group in Israel and the president of it is Yasser Arafat. Everybody knows that.” Or, “a wing of the Masonic Order.”); or, where was the Berlin Wall (the answer should not have been “Believe me. I don’t know the answer to this question, but I am thinking. Israel?”). I cannot make such answers up. These were real people, on a city street in America, giving such answers to a person with a video camera and microphone for all to see on Youtube. They were young, middle aged, and old. This is the intellect of a significant population of this country. Maybe 90 million. Many of these Americans are functionally illiterate, yet able to get by everyday. They are able to work, pay bills, shop for groceries, buy beers, watch Fox News, listen to Limbaugh on their car or personal pocket radios. Some might call them marginalized individuals working for minimum wage, receiving government assistance, and living from check to check.

Such Americans may not know, or understand, what President Obama is trying to do with his “watering can”. But, there are millions of Americans who fully well know that to use a “water can” on dozens of raging fires will have little difference; and, when he eventually realizes that what he needs is an experienced team of firefighters, not afraid of putting on the protective gear and battling the fires and pyromaniacs with the utmost of professional understanding that fire hoses are required and not his useless “watering cans”, it maybe too late. By then, he could easily be dealing with a “Scorched Earth epidemic instead of just major fire damage.

Such a viewpoint can be very defeating. Many Americans had put their hopes in this man who they worked hard to get elected President of the United States--the most important position on Earth. Yet, when he pranced out the likes of Timmy Geithner, and Larry Summers, to just name two people who were fully engaged in the firestorm that Little Boy Bush had emblazoned, all we could do was place our heads in our cupped hands and cry. This president has let millions upon millions of hard working Americans burn badly through foreclosures, bankruptcies, disappearing retirement savings, stagnant wages, vanishing jobs, and more, while the fire starters and pyromaniacs continue to make critical decisions that affect all of us.

The “Shared Sacrifice Bitter Pill” that President Obama demands working Americans to swallow without complaint, has been discarded by the very financial corporate thieves and CEOs, as well as government officials who should, instead, be making the greatest “shared sacrifice” for all. Unfortunately, this is not Barack Obama’s agenda. His agenda is for Americans to suspend belief and support his illusion act which takes taxpayer’s wealth, hands it over to the largest financial banking entities when their own net worth just prior to the bailout panic attack was far less than what had been given to them by the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve pretending that they were made solvent by their own accounting magic when in reality they were actually owned by the U.S. government and taxpayers. This is what is called crony capitalism. President Obama has elaborated on the Bush version of crony capitalism, which has now been made bigger and more corrupt. ‘My crony capitalism is bigger than your crony capitalism!’

Any Credit Card Bill of Rights will not be in place until 2010 allowing the credit card companies to launch their final assault upon the working American. There will be no investigation championed by this president to peel away the layers of lies and war crimes committed by the last administration. There will be no hurried round-up of corporate tax dodgers stuffing their wealth in undisclosed and protected off-shore bank accounts located in “Tax Haven” countries. There is no earth-shaking outcry or heated body-checking against the army of lobbyists hired to take down any government created health care plan endorsed by this president, let alone the American people. There has been little lecturing of the Democratic Party congressional leadership to act tough on behalf of working Americans. Now, this president speaks in support of Little Boy Bush’s complaint that Valerie Plame and Joseph Wilson should not take their lawsuit against the government to a higher court in order to seek justice against the wrongdoing that was done to them by the Boy Bush administration.

All of this has been done in less than 200 days as president. The track record does not look good. The Change That We Can Believe In has been diluted down by his flimsy watering can to read The Occasional Sorta Change That We Might Be Able To Try And Believe In.

Barack Obama was given a huge mess by the outgoing regressive administration. I will grant him that. He has been trying to repair the damage done, and put out the raging fires, which are overwhelming in scope, but it cannot be done with a dime store watering can.

"Laws alone can not secure freedom of expression; in order that every man present his views without penalty there must be spirit of tolerance in the entire population." Albert Einstein.

thanks for reading, jerry