[lbo-talk] That Changiness Thing

dredmond at efn.org dredmond at efn.org
Thu Feb 26 22:02:15 PST 2009


On Thu, February 26, 2009 7:53 pm, C. G. Estabrook wrote:


> when George Kennan, who had created and
> headed the State Department's internal think tank, the Policy Planning
> Staff, wrote in 1948,
>
> The day is not far off when
> we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are
> then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better."

Quite a contrast to the US Empire circa 2009, no? The New Deal people actually got things done. The current gang can't even organize a basic bank bailout without tripping over themselves.

So far, we've got a measly stimulus package which does fund some good things, but won't even compensate for the loss of home equity withdrawals ($400 billion/year), let alone the hammer-blows of the ongoing stock, bond and 401K meltdowns. We have a regular budget which pisses another $1 trillion away on military-industrial boondoggles and looks depressingly like the previous year's budget. We have more cannon fodder being sent to die in a lost war in Afghanistan. We have a "stress test" and dithering instead of a proper bank bailout. We have an impending Massachusetts II instead of single-payer health insurance.

It's nice to see more taxation of the rich, and of course the stimulus package is a step in the right direction. But it's likely this is about as radical as Obama will ever get. Only a mass social movement can push this administration in a more progressive direction.

-- DRR



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