In his recent, highly effective efforts to offend me and other Democratic progressives in his headlong tumble rightward on the political spectrum, Barack Obama has renamed the President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board to the the "President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness." "Jobs" I can go for. "Competitiveness," in the current context, sends a shiver down my spine.
Who are we "competing" against in this arena, China, India, Indonesia, Korea, the Philippines? How will we enhance our "competitiveness" here? Who is it who will be doing the actual "competing" on the field of play, in a manner different from what we're doing today?
It is my very deep and abiding suspicion that the goal here is to increase exports by making American products cheaper. I also strongly suspect that the decreased costs will be achieved largely through the suppression of American wages and benefits and increasing automation that will put many more Americans out of work. I very seriously doubt that we're talking about improving our educational system or restoring a reasonable degree of protectionism to international trade, a couple of things that might restore American prosperity but at the expense of those persons and corporate entities (redundant since the "Citizens United" decision) whose campaign contributions permit them to own elected officials.
I am not interested in seeing the compensation of American workers fall to a level that would be competitive to those in Bangalore or Djakarta. For one thing, we don't get to rent our apartments for $35/mo. and our metabolic systems are ill-suited to diets consisting largely of rice. But to me and whatever foresight my long years of observing political change has permitted me, this is where we appear to be headed, and Barack Obama seems to be prodding it along.
This analysis is reinforced by President Obama's choice to lead this "Council." He selected the CEO of General Electric (not "former" CEO, but their CURRENT one, and he does not intend to step down), Jeffrey Immelt, a man who has opposed nearly every worthwhile reform Obama started out advocating for us back in what I now regard as the "Good Old Days." Indeed, Mr. Immelt has led the corporate stampede toward outsourcing American jobs and industrial capacity to third-world nations, and has transformed GE from a company that once built fine products for fair prices into one whose revenue largely derives from financial securities and credit.
Do any of you think this is what we need right now? If so, please explain to me why you think this is the case. Do you think it will somehow win Republican admiration for Obama? Let me ask you: In the political arena, how did his "deal" with the health insurance companies work out? How many congressional Democratic candidates did they support last November?
I have had it with this guy. He has been completely co-opted by our political adversaries, and America -- at least that part of America that works for a paycheck, or that wishes it could have the privilege of working for a paycheck again, will be the worse for it for many decades to come, with no hope of recovery until I am long dead in the ground. It has consigned most of us to a lifetime in peasantry, in service to our aristocratic corporate overlords.
I will not forgive him for squandering the huge political mandate we gave him and for betraying our hopes. I'll vote for any real New Dealer who promises to stand up for the American worker and broad-based American prosperity. Barack Obama is not that man.
Obama's a fucking Republican or a Trojan horse to put through Republican policies. I wish more people had seen what I had seen way, way, way back when he was first promoted by the media.
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