Whether I believe these crazies, (who are the left wing version of "birthers") - with the spliced videos of speeches, the calls to raise arms against the NWO army or the compelling thought that the NWO are really reptilian aliens who have returned to their planet to re-colonize us (hello, Tom Cruise? Don't you scientologists have the reptilian alien thing trademarked or something?) - isn't really the issue. According to an article in the Huffington Post today, these people may be onto something.
No, it isn't about reptilian aliens gosh darn it, but it is about the "shadow elite." Author Janine R. Wedel has just written a book appropriately titled Shadow Elite: How the World's New Power Brokers Undermine Democracy, Government and Free Markets. It's basically all about how people with money and power basically get whatever they want. Headline news, I know. I mean, we've seen this all along with the GOP and evangelicals, the whole congress and the health industry, the masses of white population throughout history . . . I mean, this goes back through time to imperialism, colonialism and so on. Wedel's point is that it's destroying our country, and she's right. I mean, Naomi Wolf has been writing about this since Bush Jr. and Naomi Klein wrote about our economics based on Milton Friedman were failing way before the recession. So what Wedel is writing about isn't big news to me, it's just a state of our affairs.
However this where The Big O comes in. And I will get this out of the way now: yes, I am a neo-hippie, tree hugging liberal, I make no qualms about that. And I will also say that while I make no judgements on Bush Jr. as a human being, I will say that he was the worst person possible to be president for 8 years, as we can now see. I will also say that while I have issues with The Big O, the thought of McCain and Caribou Barbie in office is, to understate it, horrifying. So Obama may have his problems, but the alternative was too scary to even consider.
However. Reading this article in Huff Post, (which I realizes tags me as neo-hippie, tree hugging liberal), and actually for a while now, I can't help but feel somewhat betrayed by the whole "Change" and "Hope" campaign. I mean, most of the country - even those who aren't Democrats - watched as The Big O got elected and we had tears in our eyes as he spoke that night in Chicago, along with most of America. There was partying in the streets. In my almost 30 years, I had NEVER seen a presidential election enthrall my generation like it did. The fact that young people, and minority young people, actually cared about an election was victory within itself.
I will also say, that no matter what Obama does in office - even if his presidency is a complete failure - what his election has done for race in in this country is worth every day he is president. I've had this argument with many a white person who tells me that it really didn't do that much and that to elect a president based on race is not only not patriotic, but but not democratic, etc. And while they have some points - mostly that Obama got 90% of the black vote, even over Hillary - his campaign singlehandedly paved new roads for minority leadership. What academics spend decades theorizing on and wishing into fruition, he did within the course of a couple years. And if you whities out there don't believe me, go have a conversation with a minority, specifically an African American about this issue. It would do you good.
Again though: However. My biggest hope with Obama taking office was that the days of the Bush monarchy would be long gone; that the US would be going back to a Democratic (and dare I say liberal) ideology for the country. And when I say "democratic" I don't mean party, I mean that the people would once again have say in the way that their country is run. This is turning out not to be true. The biggest thing that Bush ever did was to turn the nation into one of fear and hate while stripping away civil liberties. Through the indefinite "War on Terror" to the Patriot Act, we as a nation became afraid to do much of anything except elect officials to act on our behalf in bombing the Arabs. With the Obama campaign, it turned that fear into "Hope" and into "Change" - both of which we have yet to see fully.
We've come close: the almost closing of Guantanamo, Obama speaking at the HRC, Health reform, education stimulus, etc. But for each one of those, Obama did just the opposite of his campaign promises. For every Elizabeth Warren, we got a Timothy Geithner. For every across the aisle gesture in Bob Gates, we got an inside report on how Goldman Sachs, the main contributor to the Obama campaign, got a pass on Wall Street reform. And while I realize that some consideration must be paid to the way politics is played, my concern lies far beyond politics.
If Obama can't get his shit together, he is going to ruin a whole generation who were willing to participate in the way their country is run. And if we learned anything from the Shadow Elite, that's just what they want. That's part of the reason why this country is in the shape it is in now. Through fear, instilling apathy and under or mis-education, the government and those who run it have whipped the American public into submission. They have scared the masses into thinking that everything is out to get them and that there is no vision beyond what one sees right in front of their face. And while this has gone on way before Bush, Clinton, Reagan, etc, Obama is perpetuating it. Instead of going against The Patriot Act, he is enforcing it. Instead of speaking out, he is being muted, sometimes from within his own party. Instead of being the change he promised, he is becoming part of the problem not the solution. He is slowly being beaten down into the pegs of how Washington works, and he is accepting it.
My questions is where is the fire of hope and change now? Yes, he's only been in office a year and perhaps I'm not giving him enough credit for what he has tried to change. But he's become very soft spoken as of late. Sure, he could be worried about his re-election - he might not want to ruffle too many feathers before his next term. But if he doesn't start doing something soon, I'm not so sure he will get a next term. Then it will be back to the cycle of Washington puppets we've had all along. And signs of this are already happening. Everyone was so psyched when the Dems got full control over congress. Now what has happened now? Like always, the Dems go and fuck it up and the 2010 elections might once again shift everything. And this isn't to say that I'm against change or balance of power. But change should be for all not just for some. No pressure or anything, but if Obama can't fix this, it will never get fixed.
Actually scratch that - If Obama can't fix this, it won't get fixed until we as Americans become so afraid of the power our government has and we fix it ourselves. And I'm not talking tea parties and protests here, I'm talking about really separating church and state, limiting lobbyist influence in Washington, allowing ourselves to chose how our health care is run, not allowing corporations to run our elected officials, choosing to have affordable higher education so that we can compete globally, really knowing what it is that we are putting into our bodies from commercial food suppliers, treating all living things with respect and not just for consumption, etc etc etc. All things we should have the right to, not have to fight for. Why are we having to fight our government (via the corporation) to lead healthy lives?
For the most part, every time speak to most people about politics, they really don't give a shit. And this is cross-generational. I think the last time I spoke to a common person who actually knew what was going on in our government was from the WW2 era. Why? Most likely because they had to know what was going on. It amazes me when people tell me that politics "doesn't effect them." What the fuck?! Politics doesn't effect you? Really? It's twice as bad when it's a minority: racial, sexual or gender. It does effect you, everyday. It effects you in ways you never think about because some, perhaps the "shadow elite", like it that way. They don't want you to think about it because they don't want you to think about the power that you actually have, that you are given with citizenship to the US. This country was built on it's people. But now it's built on money. Yet that can change. There is hope. It's in us. And hopefully it's in a very charismatic man we elected president.
With the recent uprisings in Iran coming to a boil yet again, I can't help but long for a change in complacency from with the American public. Even the freakin' tea parties were some relief, albeit misguided. What this all boils down to is not whether the "shadow elite" are controlling us or whether we are being enslaved by alien reptiles, or even about how our constant morally skewed government is running things. It's about us. It's about us taking change and making the change. So after school special I know. But if The Big O doesn't get his shit together, then it's up to us to help him. We are just as much to blame as he is. The hope and change campaign hasn't ended, so why are we now sitting down expecting it just fall in our laps? I mean really, how American is that? "Oh, well I hoped and I prayed to lose weight, so I'm just going to sit here and munch this cookie dough and wait for it to happen!" Yeah no. Go out and take it. And make Obama help us get it back.
That's me and my soapbox for right now. I will say this though: no matter how bad things get, whenever I see Michelle Obama and her guns in the White House, I thank Jesus that it's her there and not Cindy McCain. The gay in me loves seeing a strong and fashionable woman back in the WH. See, there is always hope.
***Update, January 9th, 2010***
I was reading ArtForum's end of the year wrap up, and I saw Okwui Enwezor's top 10 list. In reference to my comment above about Obama and race, I thought the following piece from him was interesting. Although it does put more pressure onto Obama: not only does he need to live up to the standards of the American people, but Enwezor puts forth the call to live up to the international expectation as well. God speed, Mr. President.
"A year ago, my contribution to Artforum's annual rite of taking stock of the immediate past ended with a wish to see the transformation of candidate Obama to President Obama. In that wish lay my hope for what Giorgio Agamben might call the coming American community - or, to use the terms favored by the candidate himself, for a more perfect and equal nation. No event of this entire year, and perhaps no event for years to come, could rival the inauguration of Barack Hussein Obama as America's first postcolonial commander in chief. It was a wondrous scene to witness: Americans, with the eyes of the world on them, both watching and taking part in an epoch-making event - the son of a Kenyan foreign exchange student becoming the country's forty-fourth president."
Okwui Enwezor in ArtForm, December 2009, page 172.
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