When Senator Obama declined federal campaign funds totaling $84 million, there was a bit of a hue and cry. Some of the questions that flew included,
Why did he offer to take the federal funds?
Why did he turn them down, when his conditions for accepting them were met?
Why did he flip-flop?
What changed between the time he said he'd take them and then refused?
I got to thinking about those questions. And one very important one occurred to me but no one really asked it. And the more it wasn't asked, the more troubled I became. The answers to the well-trod questions seemed obvious.
In answer to the first, he said he'd 'aggressively pursue an agreement with the Republican nominee to preserve a publicly financed general election.' We know now that at its most aggressive, it was a 45-minute discussion between counsels for Obama and McCain.
Why did he turn the funds down, flip-flop? Because he wants more money and he figures we'll soon forget the promise he made in November.
What changed since he said he'd take the federal funds? Nothing changed. Just his mind. Perhaps that's the one real Change We Can Believe In.
Simply put, Senator Obama refused the $84 million, squandered our trust, and lied about the reasons for it because he's convinced he can rake in record amounts of money by asking us for donations.
And what I mean by 'us' is we, the less-than-wealthy. That's how he managed to break all fundraising records in the first place. Almost half his donors are middle and lower working classes who gave less than $200. The ceiling for giving to a campaign is $2,300. The senator's campaign is positively gleeful about the fact that they can go back to these same donors for more.
I find this contemptible. And thoughtless in the extreme. At the end of eight long years, when the middle and lower classes have truly suffered and are continuing to do so, this man who would be president has no compunction about asking us to give over two grand of the precious little money we must stretch between soaring costs for almost everything.
So I'm going to ask the important question, the one that just keeps troubling me.
Why...
when gas is approaching $5 a gallon,
when grocery bills have doubled and tripled,
when health care is simply unaffordable for so many and so expensive for so many more,
when traveling has become prohibitive because our dollar is in a subterranean hole,
when so many of us are losing the roofs over our heads and whatever savings we've managed,
when we have already given enough of our small salaries to the Obama campaign to have allowed it to break all fundraising records,
and when so many of us must refuse our children so much,
why, why should we be asked to give more because Senator Obama slammed the door shut on $84 million in public funding?
The arrogance boggles the mind.
The exploitation of the electorate is shocking.
But the lordly, vainglorious callousness is unforgivable.
3 comments:
For BO to have limited his abilities to respond to JM and the Mighty Wurlitzer which deftly cuts through the mental dung pits of this nation via the mighty Swift Boat vehicle would have been naive. Remember the repukes have PAC's able to raise bazillions and accepting fed funds means spending limits...repuke PAC's would do what dem's are unable to do...channel funds to the Mighty Swift Boat.
Doubt Nothing...Question Everything
Good to hear from you, Paul Revere!
I agree that underestimating the conservative money mill is naive, and Senator Obama hasn't got an iota of naivete. However, I'm looking for an ounce of integrity and pound of empathy from our next president and with this decision, the senator squandered both hopes, resoundingly:
He isn't naive and so never planned to accept the federal funds, but said and penned that he would..oops, so much for integrity;
He professes regularly to understand the crushingly devastating effect of a tanking economy on the middle and lower classes but doesn't understand what $2000 means to someone who makes that much in a month. I'm so weary of presidents who have no connection with the reality in which the majority of us live, and no desire to make that connection.
And while your point about the war chests necessary to win against disreputable, winner-take-all forces is well-taken, I must question a campaign without honor as its principal watchword.
PS Speaking of money and PACs and some real facts, please look for a eye-opening post to come.
I understand and empathize with your desire for a leader who 'gets' the plight of the common man. Then you must have been a Kucinich or Edwards supporter? for they were really the only two, besides Hillary (HC has/d some serious questions of 'connectivity' to the oligarchy in my opinion) who one could project even a bit of 'common cause' to. DK is fairly transparent in that regard and JE seems to have been on the little guys side (as was HC) most of his career.
BO cannot be discounted too heavily as he IS in the middle of 'practical politics'. My beef with BO, besides being The Great Unknown, is that in being charismatic he was only charismatic with no real substance and sold that to get the presumptive title. His following reminded me way too much of the spiritual teacher/guru mania of the late sixties and most of the seventies...bedazzled to the point of mindlessness...I mistrust that sort of energy because it takes discrimination and discernment and tosses invective from the 'fellows' as the great neutralizer.."you being critical is counterproductive", so in essence just STFU!!
I was Platform Chair(mind you this is starting in November) for my CC and had a very educated individual quit the committee in mid January because he thought that a bit of research on BO's money sources (Big Chicago, Wall Street, Pharma)that I sent out in the name of who is this guy, was propaganda and that I was just another HC supporter using dirty tactics. The freaks labeled anything HC or supporters did which was critical as dirty pool...in retrospect that is about as foolish as calling out the Pope for being a catholic zealot!
Not to wax too skeptical here but in my opinion, past the local level the hope of true citizens cut from the cloth of the founders and their contemporaries making it to the federal level is extremely thin. Either the money or 'practical politics' inevitably rears its ugly head.
Have a candid conversation with someone you know who has been involved in Nevada state politics and you will find their heads seriously knotted from banging into the glass ceiling of money and vested interests (Joe Neil for example). We, The People, cannot stop trying, for the real hope is in getting our citizen politicians elected in great enough numbers to allow them hope of coalition and political leverage.
Nevada's problem is all that internationally owned casino money bullying/buying the legislature and simultaneously sucking all the life blood from our workers via crappy wages and benefits and refusing to acquiesce to a fair share of taxes for education and infrastructure. Nevada needs a strong state funded commitment to bringing in a broader business tax base...subject for another discussion.
Anyway, it IS time for a revolution...ALL ABOOAARRRD!!
Doubt Nothing...Question Everything
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