CommonDreamer's Blog

Obama's substantial legislative record

2008-04-19T17:01:08Z

Since Hillary supporters continue to push this nonsense that Obama is all talk and no action and that his legislative record is thin or manufactured, I thought it would be helpful to provide the link to the Obama campaign's listing of his record on their fact check site.

http://factcheck.barackobama.com/factcheck2/2008/01/

Notice that the lobbying reform bill that he got passed in Illinois was passed in the 1990s and the Earned Income Tax Credit bill he sponsored and which passed was a bill passed around the year 2000. His bill on videotaping of confessions was passed in 2003.

That puts the lie to this article by Todd Spivak that Hillary supporters keep sending around saying that Obama's accomplishments were all manufactured by Emil Jones in the last year Obama was in the legislature because Jones had decided to "make a Senator" -- a quote I would point out is not verified by Jones himself but is instead the heresay of an unnamed source.

There are a whole bunch of other pieces of legislation that he was also involved in that passed in the 90s or early 2000s when the legislature was not fully Democrat controlled that are also listed in this fact check.

Obama supporters should all check it out and make sure that everywhere you see Hillary supporters posting this nonsense, you counter it with these facts.

CNN also did something on Emil JOnes that was a bit fairer.

Cross posted at Daily Kos.

Bill Clinton's Comment Fair

2008-03-22T19:14:55Z

I'm an Obama supporter but I think this Bill Clinton comment that has some riled up is fair:

Clinton said today in Charlotte, North Carolina, that it would be great if the general election were between his wife, Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton of New York, and Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona. The vote would involve ``two people who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country,'' Bill Clinton said.

``People could actually ask themselves who is right on these issues, instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics,'' he said.

Obama has said from the beginning that one of the reasons to vote for him over Hillary is that Hillary brings a lot of divisive polarizing baggage -- whether her fault or not -- that detracts from talking abou tthe issues.

With the Wright flap, Clinton is noting that Obama now also brings in stuff that's polarizing and detracts from the issues that Hillary wouldn't bring in.

I think that's true and accusing Clinton of McCarthyism as some have done doesn't address his point.

I'm not pursuaded by his argument for several reasons:

1. Patriotism is an issue in itself that needs to be discussed and worked through. So having it brought up in the campaign is not a bad thing. The Right's abuse of this issue is something we need to address head on because it is used over and over again to affect policy. It must be dealth with.

And by the way, I think Obama's speech Tuesday suggested an answer. He stood by his pastor and community despite the fact that they said things he agreed were offensive. Isn't that the definition of loyalty? If he applies that same attitude toward America -- that he stands by his country even when it does things he disagrees with -- isn't that the definition of patriotism?

2. The polarizing nature of what comes in if Hillary is the nominee is worse and harder to deal with because it's all personal and revolves around issues of trust. You can't really turn anything like that around without trust.

3. Obama has, in my opinion, show this week that he response to such attempts at injecting this kind of stuff into the campaign far better than Hillary does and in ways that diffuse it rather than feeding into it.

In defense of Wright and Obama's patriotism

2008-03-14T04:32:51Z

A story I was told in history class:

During the Kennedy administration, when the civil rights marches were just getting started, Bobby Kennedy went south to meet with black civil rights leaders. He was to convey to them that the Kennedy administration wanted to help but ask if they tone down their rhetoric and marches because they were making the US look bad and there was a cold war on.

Black leaders responded angrily and made a lot of anti-American statements, saying why should they care about America's image in the world. It wasn't their country anyway.

Bobby Kennedy -- a true blue patriot -- left the meeting and went back to Washington, mad as hell.

But reportedly, a couple weeks later, he called one of his senior aides into his office and said something to the effect of, you know, if I'd been treated the way they have, I might feel the same way about this country.

From then on, the Kennedy administration fully supported the civil rights movement.

In regards to Jeremiah Wright and Michelle Obama's comments, I think we should trust the American people to be just as fair minded.

The truth is that most of them haven't thought about this from the other side. Like Bobby at that time, they've just not put themselves in the other person's shoes.

We need to remind the American people that America first enslaved blacks and then forced them to live under a descriminitory set of laws and the unbridled rule of lynch mobs.

Even President George Bush recently said, in regard to whites in the south hanging nooses out of their trucks, people need to remember what blacks have been through.

And we need to ask all those people, given that history, how would they feel about a country that had treated them that way or their relatives -- many still alive to remember it -- that way?

Would the fact that the country had finally stopped treating your people badly but only after being repeatedly pushed to do so, assuage you? Would you look upon 30 years of affirmative action as enough to make up for 400 years of oppression -- oppression witnessed by a generation of people still alive today?

I personally am not surprised by the notion that there's a fair amount of anti-American feeling in some quarters of the black community, but I sense that most Americans of African descent WANT to believe in this country. There's a desire to love America and be proud of it, but there's the fear that America maybe won't return the favor.

If Obama is elected doesn't it say, more powerfully than anything else could, that those fears are unwarrented and that Americans of African descent can rest assured that they are full members of this country. Does it not offer the potential to change once and for all how Americans of African descent feel about America? It has already apparently changed how Michelle Obama feels. What is the impact for our country if that change in feeling becomes universal? If you're concerned about the lack of patriotism of people like Jeremiah Wright and other cynics who say America is a racist nation, isn't the best response to show him he's wrong about the country?

You don't have to do that by necessarily electing Obama president, but you do have to do it by giving Obama a fair shake and by being understanding of the history that blacks have faced and the necessary attitudinal consequences of that which make it impossible for a black politician not to know and even be friends with someone of Wright's views regarding America.

The trouble is that this may not be an argument that a black person can make to whites as successfully as another white could make it to whites. Maybe someone like Senator Byrd or someone a little more conservative, who has credibility with more conservative elements of the white population?

Immunity for ATT worth American lives??!!!!

2007-11-09T18:31:33Z

David Kurtz is absolutely right in his post on talkingpointsmemo.com that Bush's threat to veto the surveillance bill over immunity for ATT really exposes the lie behind this being about threats to American lives.

If Bush's previous statement that not having this surveillance ability will cost American lives is true, then it means that the President is willing to see Americans die to protect ATT from liability.

Actually, it's worse than that. Bush has the ability to pardon ATT as president. So he's really just holding out for immunity so that he doesn't have to take the political hit for pardoning corporations for unknown activities, leaving everyone wondering exactly what he was up to that he felt the need to do that.

We should NOT wait for Democratic politicians to make these points. We need to be screaming the outrageousness of it from the rooftops. We need to get mad!!

We need to start building the public case right now that if Bush vetoes the bill to protect ATT, then he, not Democrats are responsible for any deaths that occur as a result. If we can make this case strongly enough, then it gives our vascillating Democrat politicians the cover they're looking for against the possibility that of another attack being blamed on them.

They know full well that an attack wouldn't probably be successful because of a lack of this surveillance bill, but they also know the GOP would claim it was. If they can turn it around on them, say that Bush and the GOP are the ones that ILLEGITIMATELY killed the bill, not Dems, then they --- the Dems -- might be more willing to not offer a new bill giving Bush what he wants. In fact, they should go for an override on the existing extension plan arguing that any GOP member who doesn't help extend it is putting American lives at risk to protect ATT's balance sheet. Get all Republicans on record as opposing extension of surveillance, and thus risking American lives, to protect ATT.

Impeach Cheny in the Name of the Unitary Executive

2007-06-25T18:20:32Z

One of the most misused terms in American political discourse today is the notion of the "unitary executive." This was a phrase Alexander Hamilton used in Federalist Papers to describe part of the reasoning behind the creation of the Presidency.

But all he clearly meant by the term was that the powers of the executive -- whatever those powers may be -- should be vested in only one person rather than something like a triumverant, which some people at the time favored.

The question of what those executive powers should be was a separate issue entirely, and there were very clear limitations noted in the same pieces by Hamilton.

But through creative extrapolation, conservative power mongers have turned this phrase to mean that any power a reasonable person might see as an executive power should belong solely to the president without interference of any other branch because the power is unitary.

Meanwhile, they are violating Hamilton's original meaning by having two people -- the VP and the President -- wield executive power, and as a result we are getting all the problems that Hamilton predicted in arguing that the executive power should be unitary.

The power of the President exists only in the President, but there is mounting that Dick Cheney is or has been running a lot of the affairs of state during Bush's term and has done so at times in ways that violate the President's own policies. This is in direct violation of the Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land.

So that we may be considered completely fair to the VP, Congress should first pass a resolution stating that it considers violation of the unitary executive by a vice president to be grounds for impeachment of the VP and at the same time charge all government employees to immediately report any attempt by the VP to exercise the powers of the president. (Fire a shot across his bow because it would help those fighting him within the White House)

Having established the grounds for impeachment, we then impeach the moment there is credible evidence that he is still working behind the scenes to dictate policy without discussing it with the President -- and I mean any little detail. The President cannot Constitutionally delegate his powers -- such as the ability to classify or declassify documents -- or any part of them to others under the unitary executive notion. If he does, then the executive powers are, in effect, no longer in the hands of one person. They are no longer unitary.

Impeach Gonzales

2007-05-18T18:04:19Z

Why are the Democrats limiting themselves to a pointless no-confidence vote in regard to the attorney general?

It seems pretty clear to me that the power to impeach applies to any federally appointed official. It's been used for federal judges fairly often.

Granted, it has been custom to allow the President to deal with such personnel matters where he has the power to do so. But he's been given a chance to take care of this and has refused.

So impeach Gonzales!

What Bush might mean by Constitutional Showdown

2007-03-21T14:58:24Z

Josh isn't taking Bush's threat of a constitutional showdown with Congress very seriously. And I understand his point.

But it occurs to me that Bush is the type more than willing to play chicken with Congress, and here's how he'd do it.

He claims executive privelege and the issue goes to the Supreme Court. If the court rules in his favor, it ends there. If not, Bush STILL REFUSES TO COMPLY.

The fact is neither Congress or the Court have any way of enforcing the supboenas, and Bush will claim that he reserves the right to ignore the Supreme Court's ruling in matters that interfere with his Constitutional powers -- just like he's done with signing statements.

This then leaves the Dems with no choice but to drop the matter or impeach, and if we impeach Bush, we then get Cheney for President. Plus it's a huge distraction from everything else.

Now you might wonder why Bush would take such extreme action.

There's only one answer to that question: What will be revealed by the subpoenas will destroy his Presidency anyway.

So what does he have to lose really?