THIS JUST IN—WEDNESDAY EVE: THE UNION HAS LOST ONE OF ITS TRIEST PATRIOTS AND HISTORIANS

All of us have lost a teacher, friend and activist for democracy.

STATE OF THE UNION EDITION

Washington Post Today:“The state of the union is obstreperous. Dyspepsia is the new equilibrium. All the passion in American politics is oppositional. The American people know what they don’t like, which is: everything.”

State of the Union Draft Leaked To Mediachannel.org

This draft was slipped under our door. We cannot verify its accuracy, nor do we know who worked on it besides, possibly the President in an off-message moment, perhaps to expunge his demons. It’s not clear if this is real text or if it is, if President Obama will have the guts to deliver it. Confused, read on:

For Your Eyes Only

“LEAKED” DRAFT FOR STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS

Madame Speaker Pelosi, Mr. Vice President Biden, Senate Majority Leader Reid, Members of the House And Senate, and Fellow Americans.

As is our custom and as required by our Constitution, I have come to the hill to deliver my first State of the Union Address.

And the Union is, as we all know, in a terrible state. Let’s admit it, it is sinking. Sp let’s deal with it.

Over the years, these speeches have often been long, and frankly boring, filled with platitudes, laced with political polemics and driven by what we call applause lines.

My predecessor’s last address was 5760 words revolving around one date: 9/11. Our first President, George Washington’s first address was only 1089 words.

I hope to be even shorter (although I am often wordier than the two Georges were) and more to the point. I will skip the applause lines and the introduction of individuals in the gallery who have been used in years past to provide a human face for the issues Presidents exploit.

Let me be blunt: we are a nation in a world of trouble.

We are menaced by crises we want to deny, we are paralyzed politically and seem incapable of passing legislation to promote the general welfare. There are objective problems that are beyond our ability to control, but also ways in which all of us, and I include myself, have allowed our rancor and our rhetoric to get the better of our judgment.

Our political system has been corrupted by big money and special interests, Last week’s Supreme Court decision could lead to the sale of our democracy to the highest bidder. It is all that serous.

Despite our best efforts, the economy is not reviving, the wars we are fighting are not resolving, and the political process is characterized by covert and overt manipulations by special interests, finger pointing, political payoffs and scandal. Thomas Jefferson would not feel comfortable in the America that he help found.

The last time I was in this chamber, I was shouted down by a member of the House who called me a liar and then used his rudeness as a way to raise money for his re-election. I don’t think that has ever been done in our history.

His behavior was winked at by the opposition party which has become the party of, “NO,” offering zero ideas for solving our problems, spurning every offer of bi-partisanship and clearly captive to political manipulators who cynically use populist appeals to camouflage a narrow ideology. They tap public frustration to advance agendas that enrich private interests and sneer at the the public interest.

We are living in a country where a small group of Wall Street plutocrats have insured that only 1 % of the population controls 70% of our national wealth, who milk the system for personal advance, excessive compensation and oversized bonuses. It is obscene. Everyone knows it is wrong and yet it goes on because they control so much wealth and power. Our government is captured by these interests. As my former colleague from Illinois, Senator Dick Durbin said candidly, “Frankly, they own the place.”

At every turn, the desire for “change” that brought this administration into office has been thwarted and blocked by a small number of politicians and lobbyists who play to fear and frustration. Some of them are, I must admit, Democrats or perhaps Democrats in Name Only.

They have, together, been captured and run by vast well funded lobbies who have created a stranglehold on change and so manipulated the terms of our national discourse so that everyone, including myself, has reacted defensively, pandering to a minority while downplaying our responsibility to the majority.

I am here to tell the American people that this cowardly avoidance of the fights we need to wage and win, stops now.

We will stand up for our values and vision. We will call a spade a spade — yes, I said it — and we will work to turn this country around.

We may be able to win against all the powerful forces that refuse to accept the will of the people in 2008, who want to reverse history not just by impugning my character but by dismissing yours with labels and stereotypes, but it is right to fight for right.

You elected me to lead, not bow down to the powercrats and bureaucrats. Time is too short – what with the threat to the world’s climate and, of course, the terror threats we face, both outside and inside this country.

I have no illusions that I can win this fight by myself, a fight for jobs and justice, for peace and prosperity. The power of the military-industrial complex that President Eisenhower, a former General and a Republican, by the way, warned us against, has significantly grown in power and influence. It has pushed me into fighting wars that I and the Pentagon doubt we can win. It has pushed me in expanding an expire, not just defending a country. This is wrong.

And, yes, I have placated them too, for fear of being labeled disloyal. I have been pressured and even threatened, however subtly or with leaks to the press. I can’t even cut their bloated budgets even as I am now forced to freeze government spending. It is a counter-productive stance, and one I rejected during the campaign, and yet here I am toeing their line. I am ashamed to admit it.

So much for democracy. We are losing it fellow citizens unless we are willing to act.

I tried to find a middle course for the war in Afghanistan but that is failing too. That’s why General McCystal and I are beginning to explore negotiations. The truth is we cannot impose our will on the world but have to work with people you don’t like or agree with. Peace is made with enemies, not friends. I know that our drones are killing innocent people but that’s the logic of the war we are fighting, and I not proud of it even as I honor or men and women in uniform. They know better than anyone that our strategy is not working, and cannot work.

I can only stand up for you, if you will stand with me, if you will fight with me, if you will make our political future an issue with which you will personally engage.

That means more than sending emails or occasional donations. It means mobilizing, organizing, and being willing to challenge the slick spin doctors who want you to believe that I am a terrorist or fascist or communist or worse. These calculated smears have gone unanswered for too long. We won this office with a people’s movement, by organizing, with passion from the grass roots but, frankly I got caught up in the trappings of the office. I took your support for granted. I realize now that I have to earn it by what I do, not just by what I say. Help me be the leader you voted for. Keep me true to the reasons you voted for me.

To the movement determined to “break me,” in the words of Senator DeMint, I say, “Bring It On.” If they want a tea party, let’s give them one. The American Revolution was fought against colonialism, and economic manipulation, against indebtedness to England and a lack of self-determination. It was not to protect the medical insurance business or the big banks about whom these angry people who pose as independents have nothing to say.

Are you ready to stand up, to go door-to-door, to persuade your neighbors and to march if necessary for the change we still believe in, however cynical or disenchanted we have become?

In the face of the greatest meltdown of our economy, caused in large part by greed and corporate crime, our adversaries blame the government. They don’t blame my predecessor who ran up the deficit and led us into unwinnable wars. They blame me and want to privatize every aspect of our lives. They want to deligitimize and destroy your government.

None of these loud mouthed critics, by the way are sending back their Medicare payments or social security checks. They like government funding when it benefits them. They just don’t want to see all Americans with access to health care. They don’t believe in fairness and equality.

They want to demoralize us and force us into compromises, political traps and, ultimately, submission. They use lies routinely and turn them into message points as in the so called swift boating of John Kerry in 2004 and poor Martha Coakley this year.

You know that what they are spewing nightly in the Congress, in the media, on the web and in the streets is not true but, to them, truth is what they say it us. Some of it is just absurd like the woman quoted on TV. saying, “I don’t want the government to mess with my Medicare.”

Much of this venom is racially coded and malignant. Some of it is just cuckoo and doesn’t deserve a response—like the comments by a certain radio broadcaster and evangelist opposing help to the people of Haiti.

We have always had people in our country who mouth off first and think later.

We have to fight back against the interests who are manipulating real frustrations with johlessness and foreclosures. We have to have a real debate about a new way forward. We must renew our country and stop building an empire.

We have to act as true independent thinkers and small d democrats, as men and women, as young people and seniors, as black, asian, latino and white, as we watch our economy unravel, our educational system collapse, and hear cries for 50 year wars that our politicians are never willing to fight themselves…….”

Unfortunately this “draft” we recived ended here — clearly a work still in process. Will the president give this version of the State of The Union or anything like it? We kind of doubt it…..

Tune in.

REMEMBER FDR

Transcript:

One example of another speech the President might take to heart and emulate.