Beef - Head Exploding Experience

Obama's Kettle of Hawks (by Jeremy Scahill, Counterpunch)
We were told repeatedly during the campaign that Obama was right on the premiere foreign policy issue of our day – the Iraq war. "Six years ago, I stood up and opposed this war at a time when it was politically risky to do so," Obama said in his September debate against John McCain. "Senator McCain and President Bush had a very different judgment." What does it say that, with 130 members of the House and 23 in the Senate who voted against the war, Obama chooses to hire Democrats who made the same judgement as Bush and McCain?...

Obama's starry-eyed defenders have tried to downplay the importance of his cabinet selections, saying Obama will call the shots, but the ruling elite in this country see it for what it is. Karl Rove, "Bush's Brain", called Obama's cabinet selections, "reassuring", which itself is disconcerting, but neoconservative leader and former McCain campaign staffer Max Boot summed it up best. "I am gobsmacked by these appointments, most of which could just as easily have come from a President McCain," Boot wrote.
Jeremy, you were taken in. In his 2002 supposedly anti-war speech, Obama said he was against “dumb” wars, but he didn’t say he thought attacking Iraq would constitute a dumb war. He didn’t say that if he were a U.S. senator at the time, instead of just a lowly state senator, he would vote against any authorization that might, by the wildest stretch of even Dick Cheney’s imagination, lead to war with Iraq. And his war votes as a member of the Senate were exactly the same as Hillary’s. But Hillary, nevertheless, was the warmonger and Obama the peacenik. These imaginings once again prove my new theory of life: Most of the people WANT TO BE FOOLED most of the time.—Caro

A New Clinical Syndrome: PEBS! (by Arthur Silber at The Power of Narrative)
For you non-clinical types, that would be: Progressive Exploding Brain Syndrome. There's only one cure for it: you have to think! Hahaha. That's like no cure at all! I'm such a meanie. I'm just piling on. You betcha! Being confronted with monumental self-delusion and stupidity on an unprecedented scale brings out the worst in me. But I admit it, 'cuz I'm an honest son of a bitch. More than I can say for certain other people. But here's some good news. You may have voted for Obama -- but you're getting the McCain Cabinet! Is that still being mean? Okie dokie.

Howls from the Progressive Wilderness (by dakinikat at The Confluence)
I don’t find it the least bit odd that the criticism of the newly appointed Obama team isn’t coming from Republicans. Every Republican talking head from Karl Rove on down has been talking about the wondrous Team Obama. These appointments were evident back in the primary days. The Wall Street money was going to the Obama campaign from the very beginning. Where were you all when I was going on about Jason Furman and Austan Goolsbee?... I remember the entire gang at FDL trying to roast me over an open flame when I kept saying you’re listening to campaign rhetoric and not watching the greater game… It seems to me they were much more in love with the idea of a black progressive president on the mirror’s side of wonderland.

Will Obama Stay the Course? (by Robert Scheer)
[I]t all does hang on him. Yes, him. Obama. The man. The superstar, and not that supporting cast of retreads from a failed past that have popped up in his administration in the making. Now that we have the list of his top economic and foreign policy picks - mostly a collection of folks who wouldn't know change if it slapped them upside the head - we've got to hope that it's Obama who is using them, and not the other way around… The problem with Obama's national security team is not that he has picked hawks who he cannot control; they are all professionals, who took the job expecting to go along with his game plan. The danger here, as with his economic advisers, is only that Obama may stop being Obama, the agent of change who electrified a nation.
You, too, were taken in, Robert. Obama was never an agent of change. Never has been, never said he would be. He just said the word “change”, never mentioning WHAT he would change or HOW he would bring it about. Would you sign up for an insurance policy with that little information? Buy a house or a car? I certainly HOPE not.—Caro

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Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com