Sirotablog
David Sirota is a political journalist and nationally syndicated newspaper columnist at Creators Syndicate. David writes about political corruption, globalization and working-class economic issues often ignored by both of America's political parties.
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July 17, 2007 7:12 AM
Webb - Dems Future Lies In Rejecting Rubin Wing; Is Obama Listening?
Following the New York Times' belated report on how economic populism is on the rise in the Democratic Party, I caught this from Virginia Sen. Jim Webb (D) in today's Washington Times:
"He criticized what he called 'the Rubin wing of the Democratic Party,' after Robert E. Rubin, former President Bill Clinton's Treasury secretary, saying those Democrats share the same problem as many Republicans: 'We're not paying attention to what has happened to basic working people in the country.' He said of the freshman Senate Democrats, six of them take a 'populist' view, and said they are bringing needed reinforcements to the Senate: 'We've got a number of us that pretty well see the economic issues the same way. I think that's the Democratic Party of the future.'"
This critique from Webb echoes his earlier statements, and regular readers know that I couldn't agree more.
Whether it's wages, jobs, outsourcing, globalization, health care or pension protection, the future of the Democratic Party lies in leaders who are willing to take on the fundamental issues of corporate power and wealth concentration in a sustained way - David Broders and Joe Kleins be damned.
At the presidential level, John Edwards (D) should be congratulated for making economic populism the centerpiece of his campaign. And I'm encouraged by signs that suggest Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) seems to be figuring it out as well. The Washington Post reports this morning that "Obama's campaign is doing some retooling: He is focusing more on the economy, which was the subject of a town hall meeting in Iowa last week as well as recent events in South Carolina." And the New York Times reported yesterday that Obama smacked down what I have called the Great Education Myth - the Tom Friedman-ish concept that the path to economic success is not to challenge any Big Money interests, but simply to educate our way out of our troubles - as if that's possible. Here's Barack smackdown:
"While campaigning in Iowa last week, Senator Barack Obama, Democrat of Illinois, suggested that even those who followed the standard advice for coping with a globalized economy — get more education for higher-skilled jobs — were losing out. 'People were told, you’ve got to be trained for high-tech jobs,' Mr. Obama said, “and then it turned out that some of those high-tech jobs were being outsourced. And people were told, now you need to train for service jobs. And then it turned out the call centers were moving overseas.'"
This is a fairly different Barack Obama than I met a year and a half ago when I interviewed him for The Nation. It's unclear whether this apparent change is happening because he's reacting to Edwards, or because he's trying to differentiate himself from the Establishment campaign of Hillary Clinton - or, perhaps, because he's a good politician and sees the truth that Webb stated. Either way, I say the more Democratic politicians who stand up for ordinary folks and refuse to parrot their Wall Street donors' rhetoric, the better.
UPDATE: A reader emails to remind me that before I get too psyched by Obama's potential populism, I should remember that the Illinois senator lists executives at Lehman Brothers ($160,760), Citadel Investment Group ($152,150), Goldman Sachs ($103,550), JP Morgan Chase ($101,950) and Rubin's employer Citigroup ($61,125) as his campaign's top contributors. That is, indeed, troubling - though I will counter by saying that at least his campaign has thousands of small-dollar contributors to counter the influence that these Wall Street titans undoubtedly are exerting to "refine" his economic positions, as Businessweek has reported.
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About David Sirota
David Sirota is a political journalist and nationally syndicated newspaper columnist at Creators Syndicate. He is the New York Times bestselling author of Hostile Takeover. He lives in Denver, Colorado. His daily blog can be found at CREDO Action. He contributes regularly to the Denver Post's Web site, is a senior editor at In These Times magazine and is working on his second book. He has been profiled in Newsweek and the Rocky Mountain News and is widely known for his reporting on political corruption, globalization and working-class economic issues often ignored by both of America's political parties. Sirota serves as co-chair of the Progressive States Network, a 501(c)3 organization that supports state legislators and that is a partner of CREDO.
You can subscribe to Sirota's e-mail newsletter by going to davidsirota.com and signing up in the lefthand corner. To find out more about Sirota, download his official biography or see his recent media appearances. You can e-mail him at sirota@credoaction.com.
The views expressed on this blog are his own, and do not necessarily represent the views of Working Assets (publisher of CREDO Action) or the institutions Sirota works for.
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Discussion
But does Obama mean it? Or is he just mouthing rhetoric that will bring in votes and promptly forget about the voters if he wins the election?
Service jobs are not nor will ever be the answer, they are and have always been the lower paying jobs at the bottom of the pay scale.
We need to get back to real base jobs, in manufacturing and innovation, and rein in this "lower costs, lower quality, more profits, money is everything", greed that is going on among the major corporations.
We are in a headlong rush to the bottom, and it is destroying the environment, people's lives, our future, and turning our first world nation into a third world oligarchy.
We need to reinstate the controls on the corporations that the Bush administration has done so much to destroy. We need to make the rich and greedy pay their fair share of taxes. We need to re-institute sustainable capitalism as opposed to parasitic capitalism where the rich and greedy suck the live out of the people, the environment, and the future.
Sustainable capitalism is possible, we've had it before, mainly because of the checks on monopolies, price fixing, support for workers rights, environmental protections, and other areas of concern.
Without those controls, we have only parasitic capitalism, exploiting workers, destroying the environment, and pandering to the worst in politicians and corporate executives.
The Republicans have gone a long way toward destroying our country, and we have to stand up and turn things around in order to fix it.
I'll believe Obama when he throws the Rubinites on his staff overboard and stops taking campaign funds from major WallStreet investment houses. And until then his so-called change of heart is nothing but a response to Edwards populist campaign.
To me though what is scary that the two Democratic front runners are essentially DLC style centrists and one of them a warmonger. Makes me wonder WTF is the base thinking by pushing the kind of candidate that gets slaughtered in a general election. Guess they never heard what happened to Duckworth.
Why do we have to believe any of the campaign rhetoric? As Ronald Reagan admitted, it's all a pack of lies. He called his own lies campaign rhetoric. There needs to be a higher test to select president's such as a written pledge of their beliefs. It has never been more clear that our present method is a beauty contest fit only for dummies. Hitler was bought and paid for by the large German corporations to protect them from the communists. The payoff for their backing caused his fatal blunder of invading Russia. Our president's are now the same bought suits. Invading for oil currently. Iraq could be yet the same waterloo for us. Wall street throws chump change at a likely winner like Obama or Clinton as a down payment. For a way out of our political morass read Parity Democracy. amazon.com or BN.com None of this is going to make sense as long as we do our best to perpetuate an obsolete system that is ungovernable. The reason it is ungovernable is it is based on a lie. It is not representative democracy. It is representative dictatorship.
Obama better watch his mouth.
NEA/edubiz types enjoy living off our boot camps for mega-corporate shills/officers.
The book play here for today's post-labor Democrats is to insist on state financed "college for all", pre-school, after-school, universal child care, etc.
Hillary gets it.
Hillary is the Republican's first choice as an opponent in 2008 but if Obama gets the nomination they will go running into the streets crying "Thanks you Jesus" all over America..!
The middle class earnings and Rubin has said this are stagnant for almost 25 years..!
There is a need for solutions and as much as I support him Edwards has still not taken the leap to the real solutions for the huge problems we face..!
One: Single Payer Health Care..!
Two: Nationalize the American Oil Industry and all Energy..!
Three: Nationalize the American Airline Industry as it is a disaster waiting to happen..!
This is the future..!
We are still dealing with 19th century hold overs and templates of robber baron economics..!
I'll tell you one thing. If Webb keeps it up, he'll shatter the DLC dominance that has plagued the Virginia Democratic Party for decades. Chuck Robb was never anywhere close to the kind of populism Webb has shown. The fact that back in my state where Webb holds his convictions no matter how the rightwing lunatics or the social-only libs badmouth him has actually generated more Democratic supporters who would have otherwise kept voting Republican especially in Virginia Beach, home of the anti-Christ devil Pat Robertston.
Also, Obama was never this brave as Webb was 6 months into his first Senate term. John Warner is now forced to pedal back more often on the issue of Iraq alone. I hope Webb can force him to pedal back even more on the economic and environmental front. Like him or hate him, everyone in VA knows that unlike George Allen, Webb is no rubberstamp for any party. Sadly, this is the kind of independence this country is going to need. So David, I think you've found someone close to Mr. Smith, well remotely close, yes?
By the way, Hillary Clinton cowardly stops by in Richmond, VA and does another "we'll help the poor" trick just like her ROTTEN husband.
In Richmond, Clinton pushes health care for poor children
Too bad she won't do it in DC where the voters from her state want her to do it ! Also, she must be trying to garner the minority vote since Richmond city is where most of the minority population lives amongst the otherwise pro-GOP region of the state.
Harry Truman said it a long time ago, but it is just as pertinent today: "If the choice is between a Democrat who acts like a Republican, or a Republican, the voters will choose the Republican every time."
David is absolutely right. The DLC and their Republican Rubin suck!
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