What happened to my sabbatical?

POSTED BY JHW22

Whenever I max out and want to get away from all of the political madness, I feel compelled to fight for MY core values. And, believe it or not, my core values are the same as the President's and NO they are not the same because I am some blind, loyal, lemming robot. Why I am loyal to the President is because he DOES share my core values. Why would I not agree with the very things I think and say? There is this odd assumption out there that people like me don't form our opinions until Obama says what those opinions should be. No. I form my opinions continually. I am a rather stubborn and dramatic person. But when I evaluate what I think about an issue, it's evolving based on new input, new facts, forcing myself to see other perspectives. And you know, I am pretty fond of that value. I enjoy knowing that I developed my own thinking. Obama may influence portions as do many Senators and friends and family and, yes, even journalists. And guess what? That's what the President does. He is consistently absorbing and seeing.

But that process is seen as something weak by the very people who I feel are the real culprits of blind, loyal, lemming-like robotery. Yes, I made up a word.

I have written several times about the course Democrats take along the message train. Democrats are called asses for a reason -- they are stubborn. The problem is that Democrats dig their heels in before they even leave base camp. We pride ourselves on being the smart party. The reasonable party. The compassionate party. Well, for the last two years, I feel fewer Democrats have actually acted out those values.

Let's look at what our party has become and where we are on this tax cut debate.

Democrats have been calling their own President spineless, weak, ball-less, Bush-like, a sell-out, a Republican, a traitor. The DEMOCRATS have called him that! THE DEMOCRATS!!

They have pretended that they are doing their civic duty of questioning the President. They have said they are only doing what he asked of them, to keep him honest. To watch him. They say they are fighting for the middle-class and poor while he is fighting for banks and big business. They say he hasn't acted fast enough, strong enough, exactly as they want enough, on EVERY GODDAMN ISSUE. EVERY ONE.

They tell him to "fight" but can't define what they mean. They want him to be a different person, as if he campaigned as someone else. They then mis-remember who he was during the campaign and have actually turned on him because he didn't turn out to be the actual Messiah. I wonder if he isn't more of a Job. Taking punches, facing unrealistic demands with only the reward of further challenges.

So when the President was bluntly asked what his core values are because Democrats want to know, he unleashed hell. And I was thrilled. This man has taken hit after hit from his own party despite his major successes and consistent progress. He has been verbally pummeled by voters who have placed themselves on a pedestal above God because they think they are the sole reason he is President in the first place.

Now, what's most telling in all of the coverage for the last, not even, 24-hours, has been the wounded left. Poor babies. Just like when they flipped out over the "professional left" comment, which I also cheered, Democrats are ignoring the articulate, rational, detailed and compassionate reasons Obama laid out for his tax compromise. They have IGNORED the benefits to the very people we say we protect as one of our core values because he yelled at them. They even ignore the fact that he was pretty cutting toward the Republicans as well. The President said that protecting the wealthiest people's tax cuts is the Republican party's "holy grail". Dang, that was pretty harsh (and true). But Democrats are so busy pouting that they are missing the opportunity to highlight the fact that he just said the opposition puts the wealthy above all else.

In the meantime, the Senators from Vermont and several key Democrats in the House and Senate are saying they can get something better. Well, they voted last Saturday and didn't get anything better. In fact, in addition to the extension of the Bush tax cuts for the "rich", Obama got more benefits for the middle-class and the poor than the House and Senate did last week.

But Democrats are ignoring all of the details. In fact, Democrats are doing what we often accuse the Republicans of: voting against our best interests. Obama made a two-fold promise: not raise taxes on the middle class and to allow some tax cuts for the wealthy go away. He went beyond on the first promise by actually LOWERING taxes for the middle class. And he has delayed his second promise.

Now, some say that by delaying the second promise he is giving the Republicans a chance to make the big tax cuts permanent. Why? Because they will have the House starting in January? Well, OK, but on the issue of making expensive tax cuts permanent they won't have the Senate or the teabaggers and OBAMA HAS VETO POWER. Sadly, our party is too busy running in circles yelling and crying that they can't see that.

They can't see that this compromise has shitty parts but it also has wonderful parts we didn't imagine being there. But instead of taking the time to understand that, people are angry and distracted.

Now the media is saying that "Democrats" are mad. I correct them: SOME Democrats are mad. The rest of us, those who are as valuable to the base as the Jane Hamshers and Adam Greens and Paul Krugmans and Bill Mahers and Keoth Olbermanns see clearly the situation at hand. WE see the compromise as a necessity that actually helps those we care about most.

What disgusts me THE MOST, the thing that makes me really hate the shit coming out of the left is the MANY comments I have read in blogs, articles, seen on cable TV, etc is the WILLINGNESS of DEMOCRATS to say, "let it all go and let America see what the Republicans really are". Our party has the gall to question the President's core values yet they are willing to throw every unemployed American and every middle and lower-class family who NEEDS the Bush and Obama tax cuts off a cliff to make a point! Yet, when he calls them out on that, they can't see how absolutely hypocritical and vengeful they are being at the expense of the core values they falsely claim as theirs and theirs alone.

How dare any Democrat question the President's or my core values while they are spitting on their own.

I have to say, though, the funny thing is that the Democrats with their chests puffed out may be loud, but I don't think they are the many. I am seeing more Democrats like me fighting the good fight and not the knee-jerk fight. I see more Independents saying that Obama is doing the right thing and love that he is telling the angry left to chill out. Some think he is losing "his base". Well I am his base and he hasn't lost me. And I think that he is actually building his base with people who think the angry left need to be put in their place.

I'd like to add that not only are we getting MORE from this compromise than the Democrats in Congress were able to get us, but we KNOW that Susan Collins is willing to vote to repeal DADT but only AFTER the tax cut situation is resolved. We have Republicans holding up REAGAN'S START Treaty because of this. The American tax payers are not the only "hostages" here. And all the "purists" need to remember that we have DADT in the first place because Bill Clinton had to negotiate. I'd say that negotiation tool was far worse than ANYTHING we have here. It's taking today's negotiation to get rid of that monster.

And in closing, to all the people who think they can negotiate better than Obama I say I think you would walk onto a Lexus car lot and sputter off in a Gremlin and you'd think you got a great deal because you only paid $2. Obama is getting us a brand new sedan. We have to take out a loan but at least we can get to work and we will be able to pay off the loan early once the paychecks start rolling in.

EDIT: A new Gallup poll shows that most Americans support the compromise. I hate polls because what will happen is that the people FOR the compromise will laud this and the people opposed to the compromise will ignore it. Then another poll will come out saying the public doesn't support the compromise and the players will flip. Angry Democrats celebrated polls that showed support for the public option but will ignore this completely. THAT is why I hate polls. But I wanted to point this out to raise a "watch the fun that ensues" flag.