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(1 vote, average 5.00 out of 5)
Written by Jamakaya
Aug 25, 2011
I have a goofy bulletin board with an image of the notorious slacker Homer Simpson wagging his finger and whining, “Trying is the first step towards failure.”
I thought of Homer immediately when I read that the Obama administration is vacillating over whether to propose a jobs program to get Americans back to work. The president and his advisors are said to be calculating whether Congress could pass a jobs program and, if not, how the failure of such an effort would affect the president’s re-election prospects.
Earth to White House: Obama’s chances of re-election are fading more each day that our economic crisis deepens. His failure to do anything beyond mouthing platitudes about getting Americans back to work is a failure of leadership.
He doesn’t want to propose anything because it might not succeed? The “Yes, we can!” president? It boggles the mind.
Obama’s recent tour of the Midwest garnered tons of media coverage. But all the expense and publicity were wasted, because he failed to propose any new initiatives, most notably regarding jobs. Polls show jobs are the No. 1 concern of Americans across virtually all classes, ages, sexes and racial and ethnic groups. Even conservative economists concede that until we get people back to work, supporting themselves and buying things, the economy will remain in a funk.
At what point do 25 million unemployed and underemployed people get a president’s or Congress’ attention?
I have a theory. It’s when 25 million people get militant. Angry. Pissed off. When they march in the streets. Sit in at politician’s offices and job centers. Chain themselves to the White House gates. Hold mass hunger strikes. Demand attention. Find creative ways to paralyze private and public business in this country until the folks in charge really take notice.
We are a country that spends hundreds of billions bailing out crooked banks, subsidizing agribusiness, funding endless foreign occupations and giving huge tax breaks to the filthy rich. Yet we cannot find productive work for our people.
We don’t produce anything anymore. It’s like the system has become so utterly corrupted and unbalanced that it is collapsing in on itself and more and more of us are getting buried in the rubble.
Almost as frustrating as the passivity of the current president is the apparent passivity of the unemployed themselves. I understand the apathy, because I’ve experienced periods of unemployment. I see it in many of my friends who are struggling today. Unemployment is depressing, isolating. To some, it’s shameful. The loss of income, health insurance and security is downright scary.
The powerful American ethic of individualism – what the right ceaselessly flogs as “personal responsibility” – sees unemployment as a personal rather than a structural or systemic failure. That adds another layer of psychological burden to folks already losing their hope.
It’s unlikely that armies of the unemployed will spontaneously arise to militant action. Grassroots groups and labor unions, which provided the leadership for jobs and workers’ rights campaigns in the past, have been defunded and weakened of late by corporate-funded hit men.
There are many things we can do as individuals to support our friends and neighbors and to demand action. I’d like to see much more pressure on the president right now. It’s shocking and unacceptable that he is using a Homer Simpson defense to avoid protecting the American people.
If Obama fails to lead on jobs, he deserves to lose the 2012 election.
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