Michael Roth: One of the striking things that this week's elections forcefully represents is the dramatic erosion of trust in President Obama. Two years ago he hadn't yet earned our confidence, but he did inspire deep trust. Our frustration with his leadership has not just been disappointment with specific policies that haven't worked. The frustration and the anger seem also to come from a feeling of betrayal -- feeling that we trusted the wrong guy. The elections don't really show any movement to "the right guys." They just demonstrate a vacuum of trust -- the triumph of suspicion. This can be fixed. Click here to read more.
We typically like the idea of two sides locking horns and compromising on the matters of the day. But the era when Republicans would compromise with a Democratic president is long gone. Welcome, everyone, to the suck that never ends.
Our experiment in democracy depends, the founders told us at the beginning, on an informed citizenry. Fat chance, American people!
Before we take the VA health system away from veterans, we should look at the facts.
Have we gone from the year of the woman in 1992, to the year of the woman II in 2008, to the year of so-what in 2010? Even as women in politics is becoming no more newsworthy than women in business, the arrival of a new crop of generally young, seemingly bright and overwhelmingly Republican women does raise a question. Are we seeing a shift in women as a reliably progressive bloc on social issues?
If there is anything this nasty, fear-driven, political season has demonstrated, it's that no politician -- Democrat, Republican, or otherwise -- has any compelling solutions to what ails us. How, then, to feel more control over our destiny?
| | |
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment