I watched our President give, what I thought to be a petulant political speech, before the Greenbay Packers showed the nation what working men are all about. President Obama orchestrated a speech before a joint session of Congress and what looked like three foreign dignitaries.
I came away with an understanding that President Obama wants Congress to Pass the Jobs Bill right away.
Needless to say, the supine media cheerleaders at MSNBC likened the speech to President Harry Truman's 'Give 'em Hell' speech. Apples and lug nuts.
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You gotta love that 'sophisticated' belly scratch by Milky Matthews to lead off this 'sophisticated' dialogue.And that, boys and girls, is what passes for 'sophisticated' analysis. Sans, historical sensibilities of course.
Harry Truman was the real deal. He became FDR's Vice-President in 1944, when it became clear that Henry Wallace the Progressive was more Red, than white or blue.
Henry Wallace is the father of the Democratic National Committee that controls the national narrative, by dint of lots of money, control of the media, academia and public service PACs that pretend to be real labor unions.
The spiritual children of Henry Wallace waited a very long time to grab control of the Democratic Party at the national level and will not let go easily.
The children of Harry Truman, Democrat, are confused. I know that I am so. I became less confused in 2004, when it was obvious that the Democratic Party was firmly in the grip of Wallace Progressives and John Kerry sail-boarded into Boston Harbor greeted by crowds of dowagers sporting pink I HAD AN ABORTION T-shirts and the XXXL Purple T-Shirts of Mandarin Andy Stern's SEIU.
The DNC ushered in my former Illinois State Senator, Springfield bunky of Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart, and United States Senator Barack H. Obama in that very convention. Obama wowed the crowd. Four years later, Obama was the nominee of the Democratic Party and President of the United States.
President Obama has fulfilled every obligation owed to the spirit of Progressive Henry Wallace, the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, and the public service PACs, that were anathema to Harry Truman.
Harry Truman was a combat veteran and a failed small business man. More importantly, Harry Truman was a dedicated machine politician, tutored by Kansas City boss Tom Pendergast, a Roman Catholic. Harry Truman was a Southern Baptist. The idea of a woman choosing to murder her unborn child was thought best left to the pagan Greek tragedians. Medea was a monster.
Harry Truman, as we all know, was not a sophisticate. Therefore, he could not parse truth. When he need to decide to drop an Atomic bomb, rather than have American mothers witness the slaughter of a generation of their sons by landing in Japan, Harry Truman pulled the trigger. He did not call in Navy Seal Team Six.
With victory came the tumultuous economic downturn linked to going from a wartime to peacetime economy, Harry Truman took the heat. Railroad workers, union men, did not go to fight fascism as they were needed here at home and were paid a pretty good wage transporting troops and war material. After the war, things slowed and so did overtime.
In the spring of 1946, a national railway strike, unprecedented in the nation's history, brought virtually all passenger and freight lines to a standstill for over a month. When the railway workers turned down a proposed settlement, Truman seized control of the railways and threatened to draft striking workers into the armed forces. While delivering a speech before Congress requesting authority for this plan, Truman received word that the strike had been settled on his terms. He announced this development to Congress on the spot and received a tumultuous ovation that was replayed for weeks on newsreels. Although the resolution of the crippling railway strike made for stirring political theater, it actually cost Truman politically: his proposed solution was seen by many as high-handed; and labor voters, already wary of Truman's handling of workers' issues, were deeply alienated
In the early 1960's, disciples of Henry Wallace forced the issue of organizing public service workers into unions. America was wealthy. What's a few tax dollars? They bumped the pay. What about pensions? No sweat!
By 2008, American labor was dominated by the public service employees. They were not the heroes of labor. They were not shot at the coal mines. Beaten and stabbed in Flint. The public service employees became labor, long after labor lost its industrial muscle. They were the labor loudmouths. They bullied the weak and bribed the ambitious elected officials with the threat or reward of votes and money.
The American economy sagged and collapsed.
Which brings us to last night's speech. Empty rhetoric and more taxes.
The sophisticated Wallace still controls the microphone, the megaphone, and the Teleprompter.
America could use a Harry Truman unsophisticated President, who has some skin in the game.
