Ep 770 No Fair Remembering Stuff: Obama's Beer Summit

A reader asks BG about the Debt Ceiling Deal

Reader C. writes:

Hey Driftglass & Bluegal. I really enjoy listening to your podcast every week. In the next couple of days I will be donating to your podcast cause so the shows keeps coming. I was just wondering how you felt about this debt ceiling fiasco. Will the American people understand the dilemma President Obama has been put in with this tea party faction in the House? With this media environment I am not sure if the blame will be properly placed. I realize that he is known for being the 'compromiser in chief' but I'm not sure if he had a way out of this mess. Any thoughts?

Dear C:

I'm sure we'll be talking about this this coming week and of course we were talking about it this weekend -- we agree that if Obama wasn't such a process guy -- if he'd said "negotiate around the debt ceiling, are you kidding? No, pass a clean bill and THEN we'll talk" -- he would have had a stronger position.

He still thinks* of himself as Google plus's Senator plus one, instead of the President. Collegiality may be his secret to "changing Washington," but the Tea Party's secret is a bottle of gasoline and a match. We can all see how this is working out for him.

Best,

Fran / BG

*My disappointment is, I'm finally coming to the conclusion he's not going to change in the second term.

My quick reaction to tonight's speech (not tweeted!)

It was a speech completely directed towards FOX news viewers and those who don't accept him as a legitimate President. He's got to get OVER being the first Black president. That's what's going on here, imo.

Those of us who are over it are scratching our heads, but listening to it thinking "he's the Kenyan usurper" it makes sense. Lots of God talk and we're going down the middle of the road. Safe. I think he's trying to make it easier for future Black presidents. It makes it hard on those of us who don't give a shit that he's Black.

Obama's Speech, Hope, and making stuff.

I used to have a shirt with this image on it. The shirt got absolutely tattered with frequent wear. Even now the message is a mantra with me. It's not my office, even though there's a computer and a couple of desks. It's my studio. It's where I make stuff. Sometimes it's knitting, sometimes sewing, occasionally a collage or sketch.

Most of the time, it's a blog post.

I think about this frequently as I hear the word "economy" talked about. The story of the hilariously failed job interview comes to mind, where the young woman, when asked why she wanted the job, said she loved to shop and since the office was close to the shopping district she could do more shopping.

Our economy has outsourced making things. Now we buy things. Proof that there is a problem: the proven-right prediction of a 2007 recession impelled our last President to suggest that we "go shopping".

This President isn't doing that.

What, shopping isn't gonna fix my world? Dang, I have to go SHOPPING for a t-shirt in protest!



I hope that as more and more of us lose our jobs and things seem as bleak as they do, that we are able to frame this time as an opportunity to give and make sacrifices, as citizens clearly did during World War II. But as I heard the new President's (yay!) speech yesterday, part of me despaired that we would instead fake ourselves out as we did during the energy crisis of the seventies. Jimmy Carter's "moral equivalence of war" over reducing energy consumption was derided (m.e.o.w. said Safire) but it was Carter who created a Department of Energy and even the concept of "energy policy." And Carter's presidency was a failure, they say.

I worry that we have given up the idea of "making stuff," when manufacturing is STILL such a critical part of our economy. Wouldn't it be nice if Obama was able to arrange for the Big Three auto makers to manufacture wind turbines, rather than WAIT five decades for the CHINESE to catch up with world demand, as we are now? Fuck.

Oh look, Obama's been President for one day, one hour, and forty-two minutes, and I get to say Fuck. Honeymoon's over! Ha ha ha lol!

Allow me to say I don't expect federal grants or bailouts for bloggers. Not in my lifetime. But writing for publication is making stuff, and those of us who do it are worthy of our hire.

In other words, don't ask me to blog for you Arianna, unless you are willing to put FOOD ON MY TABLE. Hit counts don't feed the three kids, Missy.

That said, apparently you're reading the blog of the Arianna Huffington of central Illinois. Blue Gal organized the party last night (and led the toast to the new President yay!) for Drinking Liberally/Move On in Springfield: it was a great turnout and lovely time had by all. And I can't remember another night where I had a third beer, ever. Thanks for coming out (and btw I learned last night that any time a blogger leaves her laptop to meet actual human beings that turns slacktivism not activism. Something Arianna figured out long ago.)

I'll clean up my sidebar later...

I made this for Crooks but wanted to share with my readers, too. Because none of you read Crooks and Liars. Right.

Blue Gal vlog 6/23

Blue Gal on the issue of "black enough/white enough" (seven minutes)

NY Times coverage of the Obama "Kansas values" ad (I excerpt comment 64) here.

Background on Congressman Artur Davis at his wiki page.

Snoop Dog (b. 1972) article at Esquire was appropriately bumped by George Carlin. RIP.

Skype salon is 9-10 Eastern. Just typing, no special equipment needed. Download Skype (seems spyware-free to me) here.

UPDATE: Emailer asks "what's that 'Marxist' shirt you're wearing?" I'm sorry, this is way too Regis and Kelly for me, but the shirt is here.

Congratulations, Senator.

It was a good speech, an uplifting speech. You have a lot of us on your train, Senator, but we're sitting in the last car talking to each other, not about hope or the future or fucking bipartisanship. We're not going with you that far, and here is why: Senator Obama, no matter how good it feels to rub ourselves with this:



We can't put this administration and its crimes behind us. Because what is happening in Guantanamo and Iraq and in the White House right this minute is NOT behind us, Senator. Not behind us.



(Thanks to Poetry Man for that.)

It's not behind us any more than lynching is, Senator. And you know it.



We're still prosecuting Klansmen and expressing outrage over nooses on Golf Magazines because that's the right thing to do. Crimes against humanity do not have an expiration date. And whether they're committed against the African American community, a community in Africa, or a country that had nothing to do with 9/11, the guilty must be brought to justice.

And by the way, that includes anyone implicated in the 9/11 crimes, too, Mister President. We had a justice system in this country before you took office. And if you say Osama bin Laden is the mastermind, you've had over two thousand days since your masterful reading of My Pet Goat to find the bastard, let alone bring anyone you've already locked up to trial.

And Senator Obama? Maybe I'm just a bitter old liberal hobo who has no business on your express. I don't look happy, and I have no fucking interest in looking electable. My flask is full of bitter swill, sure, and no one really wants to share it with me. I'm just stinking up your train...muttering to myself...ain't I, Senator? All about the past seven years...that if only I could just put all that behind me....it's a shame...a waste of a good Democrat...I stink of my own pissed-off-ness, and could never join you in the club car for a round of Era-of-Good-Feeling Hope-and-Faith Cocktails.