Joan Walsh: "working class people haven't gotten enough help from this too-close-to-Wall St. admin"

[brentspeak]

Full paragraph from an article whose main topic is Cornell West. I agree: when evaluating politicians, cut out the personal attacks and instead get right to the heart of the matter.

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/barack_obama/?story=/opinion/walsh/2011/05/19/cornel_west

The most tragic thing, to me, about West's meltdown was the way he tried to frame it as a universalist defense of poor and working class people – who in fact haven't gotten enough help or attention from this too-close-to-Wall Street administration – but then somehow descends into personal attacks on the president as "a black mascot of Wall Street oligarchs and a black puppet of corporate plutocrats." If that wasn't bad enough, West claims Obama's problem is that he is afraid of "free black men" due to his white ancestry and years in the Ivy League. “He feels most comfortable with upper middle-class white and Jewish men who consider themselves very smart, very savvy and very effective in getting what they want,” West claimed.

[Kolesar]

1. Washington Post's Jonathan Capehart says that essentially, West is "no better than a birther"

Washington Post's always terrific Jonathan Capehart says that essentially, West is "no better than a birther," challenging the president's credibility on specious, deeply personal racial grounds.

[DJ13]

2. West's message about the lack of action to help the average person is why

the Obama faithful have come out and smeared him.

It reminds me of how the diehard Republican faithful wouldnt accept any criticism of Bush for 8 years.

[Enrique]

3. i really hope West apologizes for that part

the bulk of his message is so important.

[vaberella]

4. No. The bulk of his message was not important.

The bulk of his message was to attack the President, his family, his lineage, and then his life. That was the bulk. He said thing about Obama not doing enough for the poor and that is the smallest part of his message. And added to that----West goes on to say that Obama's disconnect with the poor is because he's half White and the people he associated with. So for you to tell me the bulk of his message was important---I find that disingenuous. Because he went as far as to explain away Obama's disconnect with the poor----not to be about Oligarchs alone---but because he's half White.

[Enrique]

5. I hadn't heard him talk that way before

if I had, I wouldn't have liked it.

I don't care for bogus positive analyses of Obama's ethnic background either, though they're not as bad as the negative analyses. It's especially bad coming from a professor. Professors should stick to legitimate theories.

[vaberella]

8. Legitimate theories? About what? Obama's life?

He shouldn't be mentioning anything theoretical about anyone's life; unless said person is dead (which at times if the person is recently passed away---there's enough factual evidence."

What "positive" analyses of Obama's ethnic Background? He had a lot of people participating in his ethnic background, so do many of us. I don't see any sort of positive thing about it. Unless you say when people suggest he's probably our Kal-El are okay, but that's a comic book superhero. There should be no negative analysis'---because Obama had no way to choose his family life.

[BernieSandersIsGod]

6. yet Wall St seems to hate Obama. Damned if he do, damned if he don't. nt

[treestar]

7. The Executive branch can only carry out programs based on

laws that have been enacted. The WH does not have the general authority to "help" - it has to be by a specific law.

[SkyDaddy7]

9. Left says too close to Wall St. & Business while Wall St. & Business...

say this president is trying to turn America into a Socialist state & is anti-business...Maybe this President is doing a good job.