Wednesday, November 26, 2008
We Should Not Hold Off on Criticizing Obama Until He's Sworn In
In response to criticism of Obama's appointment of people who are not only at the center of the status quo, but who helped to create our current problems, many people argue that it is unfair to criticize Obama because he hasn't even been sworn in yet.
Are they right?
Well, as Naomi Klein says:
The key issue here I think coming back—the issue is Obama is coming to these
decisions because he is under enormous pressure from above, Wall Street.
How do you transition from a pro Obama campaign movement to an independent social movement that puts will counter-pressure on him from below? Those are the conditions under which Roosevelt sold the new deal as a compromise to elite. We do not have those dynamics right now. We have a situation where we have super-fans for Obama, constantly apologizing for every decision that he makes versus a gloves-off elite who are putting real pressure on him behind the scenes. And we are seeing the result.
In other words, the elites are successfully pressuring Obama to appoint insiders like Summers, Geithner, Clinton, and Gates - who will ensure that nothing really changes - because the American people are idly sitting by taking a wait-and-see approach.
Indeed, they are guaranteeing that - instead of change - all the American people will get in return for their trillions in taxpayer debt is chump change.
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