On Saturday (7 Sept 2013)
Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor in
Bill Clinton's administration, wrote this assessment of
Secretary of State John Kerry. On Facebook.
Indeed... I found this astounding:
Kerry is an intelligent man, but he has a fatal flaw. He craves the limelight. He wants to be in the center of the action and attention. Over the years I heard again and again from his Senate colleagues that Kerry grandstanded and wanted all the credit, said things that would get him on the evening news, pushed too fast and too far in order to make his mark.
Reich writes that Kerry has convinced
President Barack Obama to "stake much of his second-term presidency on it." Why? So a "grandstanding" loving Kerry can etch out this
Munich Moment as
his crowning moment? Is it the opportunity to act presidential, embracing his inner
commander and chief?
As we watch this cartoonish keystone kop-like crusade unfold with ever more absurdity, Kerry actually says this about Syria, with everybody listening:
John Kerry Promises ‘Unbelievably Small’ Action in Syria
"We’re not talking about war. We are not going to war, we will not have people at risk in that way. We will be able to hold Bashar al Assad accountable in a very limited, very targeted, very short-term effort that degrades his capacity to deliver chemical weapons. That is exactly what we are talking about doing. Unbelievably small, limited kind of effort.”
reported by Tommy Christopher | Mediaite, September 9th, 2013
Subtext to this? The failure of President Obama's LEADERSHIP, instead Obama appears too willing (yet again) to be led by what Reich characterizes as "the loudest voice in the room."
This is a disaster of immeasurable scale, whether or not we actually attack Syria. The leadership, both political and corporate, of United States has willingly boarded a runaway train and seems to love this ride, riddled as it is with blood lust and power madness.
We can't stop these fumbling fools and I do mean most, if not all, of the powerful Democrat leadership, and without doubt, the Republican leadership.
No. We can't beat them at their own game. We CAN change the game. LOCAL.
Let me ask: if the ground game works, and we saw its success in the re election of Obama. We've been the victims of its success as fundamentalists, tea partiers and Republicans worked the ground in town after town instilling Jesus Rode a Dinosaur mentality throughout the land. Why haven't Democrats pursued this effective strategy of taking back our towns, cities, counties, and states?
The control over police, how many laws are wielded, prisons, education, even health care can all be worked at the state level down... and yet we continue to pursue national elections, praying to a god unknown that Hillary or whomever is going to stop the madness. Except most of the madness is perpetrated by people of Hillary's ilk and they are, as I write, continuing (virtually unopposed) to position law, resources, and a place at the proverbial table outside of our reach.
We need sites like Daily Kos, with its membership and influence, to help progressives realize and implement creative, inventive and effective strategies to regain secular, sane, and socially just laws and governance. We need to play the long game, the politics-is-trickle-up game. In fact, whatever happened to the very wise understanding that "all politics is local?"
We need to fashion new kinds of political models and politicians. We need integrity, intelligence, and vision to make a come back.
To continue to ask for people's efforts and cash to elect Democrats to send to Washington is a losing strategy. That much must be clear by now... we will NOT stop these people in power. We can NOT win playing their game. We don't know how to manage it.
The world seems to be crumbling in front of our very eyes and yet we cling to the same old ideas and strategies that have simply accelerated this mess.
But we could change the game. Just do it. It has to be done. Consider:
“You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.”
Buckminster Fuller