Yes, Obama IS to blame for foreclosures AND the bank bailout AND the new Vietnam

Yeah, tell me again how we dirty fucking hippies are being so MEAN to that nice black man in the White House.

That nice black man in the White House who threw desperate homeowners to the wolves and then gave the wolves billions of new tax dollars for dessert.

Kevin Drum:

Atrios on the Obama administration's weak response to the recession:

I'm sympathetic to the argument that a bigger stimulus couldn't have gotten through Congress. So what did they do wrong? They failed to actively support judicial bankruptcy for primary residence first mortgages (aka cramdown) and they totally screwed up HAMP. The latter was entirely under their control and the former would have stood some chance of passing if the White House had thrown its weight behind it. It didn't.

Actually, it's even worse than that! Stephen Labaton of the New York Times, who has done some of the best reporting on the legislative nuts and bolts of financial reform, wrote the definitive account last June of how the banking industry teamed up with Republicans and centrist Democrats to defeat the cramdown proposal. Their secret? Lots of money, a solid front of opposition from Republicans, and, yes, a lethargic effort by the White House:

In the end, the banks’ startling success in defeating the provision, which was pushed hardest by Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, caught even their lobbyists by surprise. Not only did they defeat the cramdown provision, but the banks walked away with billions in new bailout money.

....While Mr. Obama reaffirmed his support for the proposal shortly after becoming president, administration officials barely participated in the negotiations, a factor that lobbyists said significantly strengthened their hand.

SNIP

....While Mr. Durbin had trouble rounding up Democratic votes, Republican leaders kept their members — and potential renegade banks — in line....There was no counterweight to that legislative muscle. Bankrupt homeowners do not have a political action committee or lobbyists.

SNIP

And remember, this all happened in April of 2009, when the banking industry was at its absolute nadir. Isn't America great?

And Digby on Petraeus laying the groundwork for cancelling the 2011 Afghanistan withdrawal:

Replacing McCrystal with Petraeus was a brilliant political move by Obama if he wanted a way out of his timetable. Petraeus is the General Jesus (as opposed to Jesus' General) and there will be no withdrawal until he's good and ready to do it. No one would dare cross him. I suspect the Obama administration understood that very well.

You can't push this administration to do the right thing if you won't open your eyes and see the reality and the truth of what's really going on.

No, I have not given up and never will. So yet again, click here to call or email President Obama and your members of congress to say this:

I voted for Democratic presidential nominee Barack Hussein Obama, who earned my vote through his supposedly sincere promises to end the bush reign of unconstitutional terror prosecutions, close guantanamo, arrest climate change through carbon reductions, rein in Wall Street financial predators, stop mortgage foreclosures, put Americans back to work, protect social security, end DADT and fight the smart way out of Afghanistan.

He has broken every single one of those promises. It is too late for me to find and support a real liberal for Congress in my district for the 2010 elections, but just the right time to start helping one prepare for 2012.

And I'll be looking much more kindly on liberal challengers for the presidency in 2012.

In other words, Mr. President: get your act together, motherfucker.

Cross-posted at They Gave Us A Republic ....