Posted by the webjefa, from a public email from MALCSista Francisca James Hernandez, Instructor of Anthropology, Pima Community College, Tucson, Arizona
The taking hostage of the country by Tea Party Congresspeople, and Obama’s accommodationism, has me upset and concerned enough that I just wrote him a letter, and I wanted to share it with you. It was inspired by Paul Krugman’s brilliant clarity on the political and economic conflicts in Washington. (Please read his articles at NYTimes such as his latest at https://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/29/opinion/krugman-the-centrist-cop-out.html.) News reports today were talking about what might happen at my college if the country defaults as we depend a lot on federal student aid funds, esp since the state has gotten out of the higher edn business, as our chancellor has put it. Right wing avarice and rapaciousness is hitting so very close to home, esp here at ground zero in Arizona…..
All my love,
Francisca
Dear President Obama,
Do you read Paul Krugman’s columns in the NYTimes? I am a lifelong Democrat. Wouldn’t dream of voting Republican. But for the first time in my life, I am seriously thinking of not voting Democrat in the next presidential elections. I think you have seriously mishandled this so-called debt crisis (actually a Tea party crisis) as well as most of your presidency. You are so beholden to the corporatists and the militarists, you seem to no longer be able to see the proper course for the country according to your once-held progressive views (if Dreams of My Father was at all sincere, a truly beautifully written book).
In 2008, WE THE PEOPLE voted for a progressive, not another Republican. If you sign legislation that does not raise taxes on the most wealthy and the corporations and that cuts SS, Medicare and student aid AT ALL as in ONE PENNY, then my vote was wasted. Voting for even a write-in candidate would be preferable in 2012. WE THE PEOPLE have been making concessions to the corporatists and the militarists since at least 1980. I will not continue to enable the Democratic party to sell us down the river with my humble little vote.
It is distressing to see the continued rise of the right-wing. It is equally, if not more, distressing to see your and your administration’s enabling of it. I will have no more to do with it as a voter. And I haven’t even mentioned my abhorrence at your immigration and border policies. For those I say, shame on you!!! As a Latina, I think I will be part of a trend among Latinos as well as progressives that will be abandoning the party in 2012 if you capitulate to the Tea Party Republicans. Risky? Yes. But much less so than the accommodations you make with those who would enslave us and are, therefore, our enemies. Perhaps you believe slavery no longer exists in the U.S.? Well, WAKE UP!! It does! Blacks in prisons, Browns in the agricultural fields, and women in the sex trade. It is on the rise in this country as well as elsewhere, and everyone is in debt servitude with no jobs or minimum wage with conservatives and the rich trying to steal the very little we have left. I pray, Mr. President, that you will do the right thing. But given your history, I am more fearful than hopeful.
Paul Krugman’s columns express, I believe, a correct political as well as economic analysis. There are many out there who are offering good advice such as Robert Reich, Matt Taibi, and Michael Tomasky. Please take it!
Francisca James Hernández, Ph.D.
Anthropology Program, Pima Community College
