The Rude One Counsels Patience
There's an old cartoon that was popular in government offices. It showed two vultures sitting on a tree branch watching an animal on the ground below dying slowly. One of the vultures says to the other:
"Patience, hell! I'm going out and kill something."
We've waited eight years to be rid of Smirky/Darth and all its horrid works, and every minute it takes is a minute too long.
But the Rude Pundit explains why we must continue to wait:
Disagree how you will with Barack Obama on some pretty serious issues (are we really debating whether or not to release a Gitmo detainee held because we mistook the video of him being tortured by al-Qaeda for him being trained as a suicide bomber?). Wonder who the fuck he's pleasing when it comes to some other issues (dude made some pretty explicit damn promises on the campaign trail when it came to Don't Ask, Don't Tell, among other shit). Accuse him of whatever you like, yell at him about whatever you like, call him a dirty smoker. But the man is trying to be a goddamned alchemist in transforming a vat of shit into a gold bathtub.
We're impatient, yes, yes, we are. The deluded who thought they were getting beautiful Barack to ride in on a giant stallion and slay the big, bad Bush machine are impatient. The realists who knew they were getting a really damn smart, slightly left of center guy in Obama and not an avenging liberal, they're impatient, too.
SNIP
Or, in even otherer words, it's gonna take a fuck of a lot of work to get us back to zero, to the way things were before George W. Bush came in and pissed on our beds, raped our dogs, tied us up, set the house on fire, and left without calling 911. And then, once it's back to zero, we can talk about how it gets better. Doesn't make any of us less impatient and it doesn't excuse some of the shit Obama's doing (like continuing to argue the Bush administration side on cases left over from it), but we gotta recognize that the circumstances are: "We're fucked - can we be un-fucked?"
We're five months away from the worst presidency in our history, heading in the opposite direction, thank Christ, Allah, whoever, or no one. But objects in the mirror are closer than they appear, motherfuckers. This ain't apologia and it ain't deluded belief. Just like we can yell that Democrats who oppose Obama's policies are forgetting that people who voted for the man knew what they were getting, so can we say to the jittery on the left that, despite the fact that getting fucked over is a very real possibility, we need to remember that we who voted for him also did so on the basis of trusting his judgment.
Read the whole thing.
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4 comments:
To put it more simply
---
for the pimply:
1. This administrations is an amalgam
2. There are so many oxen in the tent - and only one at a time can be gored - that a system of priorities has been developed and it's just not yet your turn to gore an ox
3. Get a life; get in line; your turn will come; get with the program and help others rock the boat their way and when it's your turn they'll help you rock the boat.
4. Jeez --- you ppipple are sooooo selfish!!!!!!!!!
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I'm glad that the Rude Pundit, of all possible commentators, said this. I've noted a significant LACK of patience on your part, YD, that I had thought about addressing a few times myself. But this doesn't speak directly to you, as my piece would have. It speaks to all who cop your 'tude.
Obama has just started. We cannot - or *I* cannot, and I hope you cannot - expect him to do everything perfectly (he's come damn close so far) or to be everything to everyone on the left so far, in his first six months. As I said, he's come pretty close.
IMHO, he's doing a damned fine job so far, I agree with what The Rude One says here, and the only place I agree with your stance, YD, is that we as citizens of this fine nation must keep nipping at his ass, so his right-wing (or 'centrist') tendencies don't get too far into the ascendant. Note I say NIPPING, not chomping down hard and drawing blood. That's for the repugs to do. We gotta have his back.
But if I may be so bold as to offer advice: lighten up, Dawg. Bimbeau is right. The Rude One is right. YOU are right in many regards, but just a little LESS right than some others. IMHO.
Cut the dude some slack. You might find it lowers your own blood pressure a little as well.
There is much wisdom expressed in all of these comments, plus in what the Rude Pundit has offered. I myself am grateful every day that the neocons have been rendered impotent and that Sparky and Darth will never be in control again. I share your frustration at some of what has transpired so far, Yellow Dog, and at the slower-than-I-wanted pace of transformation. But we HAVE turned our backs on the Bush era. Now we must continue to hammer away at the obstructionist and utterly insane repug wackos like Boehner, McConnell, Bachmann, Kyl, Bunning, Cantor, Pence, and the rest of those morons rather than Obama. We need to push his agenda along and to push it our way rather than render him weak due to attacks from both right and left. For if he is rendered ineffectual, that will lead to Gingrich, Palin, or even worse occupying the White House four years from now, and that CANNOT be allowed to happen!!!!
Jack -
Thanks for the help. We can't lose sight of the prize. It's going to take 40 years to get back the loss of progress we've endured for the past 30.
Democracy is slow and unwieldy. Dictatorships are quick and unyielding.
Take your pick - Dog.
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