Make Him

The last week has marked a real turning point in the Presidency of  Barack Obama.

Until this week we have allowed ourselves to obsess over the incoherent and morally bankrupt opposition to the President's political right. Now events are forcing us to consider growing anger to his left:

1. The War Against Oil is not being fought because the President's nominal allies in the Democratic leadership are scuttling plans for cap and trade.

2. The Health Care Reform so essential to continuing Democratic governance is being compromised away, again by nominal Democrats.

3. Arlen Specter has  become a nominal Democrat and now feels free to act like a Republican again.

4. Perhaps most upsetting, the President seems ready to let the entire  Bush Administration skate on the torture regime, accepting the precedent that when the President does it then it is not, in fact, illegal. Even if it directly contravenes international law and treaties the U.S. has previously signed. We're all Banana Republicans now. 

Left Blogistan has not taken kindly to any of this. And this week MSNBC finally began following its audience, with Keith Olbermann making the President one of his "worst persons in the world" and both him and Rachel Maddow leading with the torture story. 

Of course even MSNBC is not pure. One of Olbermann's regular guests remains Jonathan Alter, whose convenient amnesia over his own 2001 call for torture is matched only by his current sanctimony for not holding anyone accountable today. 

It reminds me, again of how Franklin D. Roosevelt treated the liberals of his own time. "I want to do what you say. Now make me do it."

Liberals need to wake up and make President Obama do what he promised. 

The election of President Obama, and his promise to create a new consensus significantly to the left of the old one, moved many Democrats, including me, to feeling we need no longer be as engaged in politics as we once were. We could relax, concentrate on other things, because our guys were in charge.

But we're not. The current Administration represents a coalition between Democrats and Spectermen, with the Specter Party having the upper hand. 

Rahm Emanuel is the President's chief of staff and a member of of the Specter Party's Democratic wing. He is aligned with the Money Power and has made promises to that power he intends to keep. Howard Dean, meanwhile, is on the outside looking in. 

It's time for Democrats to understand that, and get back in the game. 

It's no longer about more Democrats. It's about better Democrats. Critics will claim it's about ideological purity, but it's really about supporting Democrats who will do what the party platform has long committed them to doing.

In doing this you really do come to the aid of the party. Because the War Against Oil, real health reform, meaningful financial reform and justice for the crimes of the last 8 years are generally popular with the American people. They are the platform that made Barack Obama President. His nominal allies are trying to make him turn his back on these goals.

I know this won't be easy. The media still thinks we have a two-party system, which is why Maddow, who supports the idea of real Democrats, has been welcoming Ron Paul to her show whenever he wants to come by. In terms of the 1969 Game, Ron Paul is Ron Dellums. The grassroots may love him, but the national party will never get anywhere by following him. 

Real Democrats must make the President move forward on his own agenda. Now is the time for all good men, and women, to come to the aid of the Democratic Party.