He Shall Have Nay

I am currently reading Winston Churchill's account of World War II. In talking about England and France's endless, fatal dithering about what to do in the eight months leading up to Germany's invasion of Norway, he quotes the following lines:

He who will not when he may,
When he will, he shall have nay.

I guess it's pretty obvious what I am talking about.

Everywhere I turn today, I see stories implying that the Democrats are about to strip their health care "reform" bill of the provision to forbid insurance companies to deny coverage on the basis of existing conditions.

What do we have left in this mockery, if this happens? A law requiring millions of people to buy insurance from the existing companies that savage us for profit, with no compensating demands on the insurance companies. That's what I see: A gigantic transfer of wealth to these jackals, and nothing else- a bill which actually increases their ability to feast on the American people.

Well, that seems to be what Obama and Harry Reid are about to buy us: Nay. In fact, as the English and the French found out in Norway, less than nay- in fact a total victory by the very forces that the bill was supposed to protect us against.

And now, Obama is talking big about controlling Wall Street, when he has clearly demonstrated, by his choice of administrators, and his utter lack of action over the last year, that he has no intention of moving one step beyond empty promises with these guys either.

And no meaningful government action on unemployment. The only thing the government can do is get tough on the lenders, and have a bigger stimulus. But that is apparently never going to happen. All it took was for one pathetic Democrat to lose one interim election, and Obama and Reid and Rahm and the rest of them are ready to throw all of their promises, all of their alleged audacity and hope, into the sea.

I hear that Obama is switching into "campaign mode" in preparation for the 2010 elections. I only wish that he would think of switching into "president mode," and accomplish something to run on.

I am also reading the second volume of Arthur Schlesinger's book about FDR. You only need to read the first few pages to see the energy, the decisiveness and the action of Roosevelt immediately following his inauguration- starting the very next day- to realize how far Obama is falling short of this man, after whom he claims to pattern himself. Roosevelt "campaigned" for the 1936 election by working to enact a host of real accomplishments for the American people. Here is what Roosevelt was able to show the American people as the election approached: The Works Progress Administration, which gave jobs to 9 million people, the National Youth Administration, which provided constructive lives for millions of young adults who, at the time, had no real chance of entering the private job market, and above all, the Social Security Act. What will Obama have to show for himself, when he asks the American people to give him another four years in the White House?

It was Roosevelt's early attempts to placate the rich that prevented him from carrying out a truly progressive program. Then, he realized that he had to stand with the people, or turn the country back to those whose behavior had caused the depression. The same is true today. Will Obama have the courage to stand with the people, or, as seems all too likely, will he collapse in the face of the onslaught by the rich, and be content with just promising change, instead of delivering it?