Sadeq Khan
In his 7th (and final) State of the Union address before at a joint session of the US Congress, President Barack H. Obama told the Congressmen, the Justices and the military chiefs present that “because it’s an election season, expectations for what we’ll achieve this year are low. Still, Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the constructive approach you and the other leaders took at the end of last year to pass a budget and make tax cuts permanent for working families. So I hope we can work together this year on bipartisan priorities….. We just might surprise the cynics again.”
In Republican response as broadcast after the President’s address, indications were given that the country’s sharply divided Congress and political parties, under pressure from disillusioned public opinion, may be coming around to work together through the last year of President Obama’s office, while maintaining combative rhetoric in electioneering.
Change is of essence
Addressing the people from the same podium, President Obama told Americans not to be nervous about the changing economy, and not to fear the future, assured them that terrorism was not an existential threat, and called for rejection of venomous politics:
“We live in a time of extraordinary change; change that’s reshaping the way we live, the way we work, our planet and our place in the world. It’s change that promises amazing medical breakthroughs, but also economic disruptions that strain working families. It promises education for girls in the most remote villages, but also connects terrorists plotting an ocean away. It’s change that can broaden opportunity, or widen inequality. And whether we like it or not, the pace of this change will only accelerate.
“America has been through big changes before wars and depression, the influx of immigrants, workers fighting for a fair deal, and movements to expand civil rights. Each time, there have been those who told us to fear the future; who claimed we could slam the brakes on change, promising to restore past glory if we just got some group or idea that was threatening America under control. And each time, we overcame those fears. We did not, in the words of Lincoln, adhere to the ‘dogmas of the quiet past.’ Instead we thought anew, and acted anew. We made change work for us, always extending America’s promise outward, to the next frontier, to more and more people. And because we did, because we saw opportunity where others saw only peril, we emerged stronger and better than before.
“So let’s talk about the future, and four big questions that we as a country have to answer regardless of who the next President is, or who controls the next Congress.
Rule to work for most
First, how do we give everyone a fair shot at opportunity and security in this new economy?
Second, how do we make technology work for us, and not against us especially when it comes to solving urgent challenges like climate change?
Third, how do we keep America safe and lead the world without becoming its policeman?
And finally, how can we make our politics reflect what’s best in us, and not what’s worst?”
On the first question, he prescribed essentially as follows: “Anyone claiming that America’s economy is in decline is peddling fiction. What is true and the reason that a lot of Americans feel anxious is that the economy has been changing in profound ways, changes that started long before the Great Recession hit and haven’t let up. Today, technology doesn’t just replace jobs on the assembly line, but any job where work can be automated. Companies in a global economy can locate anywhere, and face tougher competition. As a result, workers have less leverage for a raise. Companies have less loyalty to their communities. And more and more wealth and income is concentrated at the very top.
“Immigrants aren’t the reason wages haven’t gone up enough; those decisions are made in the boardrooms that too often put quarterly earnings over long-term returns. It’s sure not the average family watching tonight that avoids paying taxes through offshore accounts. In this new economy, workers and start-ups and small businesses need more of a voice, not less. The rules should work for them. And this year I plan to lift up the many businesses who’ve figured out that doing right by their workers ends up being good for their shareholders, their customers, and their communities, so that we can spread those best practices across America.”
On the second question, he elaborated: “How do we reignite that spirit of innovation to meet our biggest challenges?
Political hot air
Sixty years ago, when the Russians beat us into space, we didn’t deny Sputnik was up there. We didn’t argue about the science, or shrink our research and development budget. We built a space program almost overnight, and twelve years later, we were walking on the moon. That spirit of discovery is in our DNA. We’re Thomas Edison and the Wright Brothers and George Washington Carver. ….. We’re every immigrant and entrepreneur from Boston to Austin to Silicon Valley racing to shape a better world. And over the past seven years, we’ve nurtured that spirit.
“But we can do so much more. Last year, Vice President Biden said that with a new moon shot, America can cure cancer. Last month, he worked with this Congress to give scientists at the National Institutes of Health the strongest resources they’ve had in over a decade. Let’s make America the country that cures cancer once and for all.”
On the third matter, he was emphatic about American’s intrinsic strength: “I told you earlier all the talk of America’s economic decline is political hot air. Well, so is all the rhetoric you hear about our enemies getting stronger and America getting weaker. The United States of America is the most powerful nation on Earth. Period. It’s not even close. We spend more on our military than the next eight nations combined. Our troops are the finest fighting force in the history of the world. ….. When it comes to every important international issue, people of the world do not look to Beijing or Moscow to lead they call us.
“Economic headwinds blow from a Chinese economy in transition. Even as their economy contracts, Russia is pouring resources to prop up Ukraine and Syria states they see slipping away from their orbit. And the international system we built after World War II is now struggling to keep pace with this new reality. It’s up to us to help remake that system. …. Priority number one is protecting the American people and going after terrorist networks.
Focus on ISIL, instability
“Our foreign policy must be focused on the threat from ISIL and al Qaeda, but it can’t stop there. For even without ISIL, instability will continue for decades in many parts of the world in the Middle East, in Afghanistan and Pakistan, in parts of Central America, Africa and Asia.
“We also can’t try to take over and rebuild every country that falls into crisis. That’s not leadership; that’s a recipe for quagmire, spilling American blood and treasure that ultimately weakens us. It’s the lesson of Vietnam, of Iraq and we should have learned it by now.
“Fortunately, there’s a smarter approach. ….. on issues of global concern, we will mobilize the world to work with us, and make sure other countries pull their own weight. That’s our approach to conflicts like Syria, where we’re partnering with local forces and leading international efforts to help that broken society pursue a lasting peace. That’s why we built a global coalition, with sanctions and principled diplomacy, to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran.”
He answered the last question pointing fingers to the vicious demagogy that is muddying the election climate in USA: “We need to reject any politics that targets people because of race or religion. This isn’t a matter of political correctness. It’s a matter of understanding what makes us strong.
Bridging the gap
“The world respects us not just for our arsenal; it respects us for our diversity and our openness and the way we respect every faith. His Holiness, Pope Francis, told this body from the very spot I stand tonight that ‘to imitate the hatred and violence of tyrants and murderers is the best way to take their place.’ When politicians insult Muslims, when a mosque is vandalized, or a kid bullied, that doesn’t make us safer. That’s not telling it like it is. It’s just wrong. It diminishes us in the eyes of the world. It makes it harder to achieve our goals. And it betrays who we are as a country.
“A better politics doesn’t mean we have to agree on everything. This is a big country, with different regions and attitudes and interests. That’s one of our strengths, too. Our Founders distributed power between states and branches of government, and expected us to argue, just as they did, over the size and shape of government, over commerce and foreign relations, over the meaning of liberty and the imperatives of security.
“Democracy breaks down when the average person feels their voice doesn’t matter; that the system is rigged in favour of the rich or the powerful or some narrow interest. Too many Americans feel that way right now. It’s one of the few regrets of my presidency that the rancour and suspicion between the parties has gotten worse instead of better. There’s no doubt a president with the gifts of Lincoln or Roosevelt might have better bridged the divide, and I guarantee I’ll keep trying to be better so long as I hold this office.”
Divergence within
Looking back to our own country situation after hearing that speech, we find our politicians are not concerned at all about the “extra-ordinary change” that is happening all around. They are living in the past and quarrelling over the past. The political divide appears to have degenerated to the point of no return.
Strangely contradictory sounds are emanating from one section of the ruling coterie ordaining prohibition of the mainstream opposition party in the name of people’s will, the other section striking a holy posture that the ruling party is not in the business of banning dissident politics. It seems the idea is to intimidate dissenting politicians into falling in line to play the role of “loyal opposition” in an oligarchic rule with centralised power, to ultimately merge into a “BAKSAL”-like one party system.
The economy, despite tremendous micro-level productivity and enterprise, is being manipulated by merciless market oligarchy, rent-seeking orgy, crony capitalist accumulation and capital flight. Far from building the future, rabid carousal of past savings and present surpluses is going on. The political elite and the privileged class are failing the nation.
Source: Weekly Holiday
