Obama To America: It's Time To Grow Up

There has been action on political topics of note around the country - like the latest infuriating news about the attempt by the Keystone Cops of safe oil handling, TransCanada. They continue their efforts to drive the Keystone pipeline through places in Nebraska where the people who live there really don't want it. Today, though, we're going to follow the President's lead from Wednesday.

We're going to address this issue just one more time.

In case you missed President Obama's press conference on Monday, we can give you the "Shorter Obama" as they say on Twitter. In short, he presented his long-form birth certificate, and told the nation - especially the media - to grow up.

We have a whole slew of problems to handle as a nation, problems we discuss and debate with you every day here at The Daily Felltoon. The Federal budget. The Federal debt ceiling. State budgets. State laws. Wars that our country is involved in, like Afghanistan and the cleanup still going on in Iraq. Wars we're just sending drones and aid supplies to, like the evolving civil war in Libya.

We've got diseases to fight, education to fix - and even our professional sports franchises aren't immune from the war on workers.

There are more challenges facing our country at one time than we've ever seen before. These challenges don't just affect one small group of us;  they are facing all of us together, regardless of race, creed, sexual orientation, or any other divisive measure one can conjure up. Yet millions of idiotic Americans have chosen to consciously, purposely, be obtuse about the truth of this President's birth - Americans who we feel are, to be blunt, racists.

No other President has EVER had to go through this kind of a ridiculous media circus before. This insult to logic and decency called "birtherism" has dishonored the office of the President, in ways no botched election, no ginned up excuse for war, and no stained intern's dress ever could have. In short, it's an embarrassment.

Yet, instead of simply calling out the idiots and the racists, our President has been courteous, genial, and tried to ignore the insane accusations of the birthers for years now. He has given them not just the initial, fully legal birth certification that Hawaii considers the ONLY legal proof of birth (which he did over two years ago). He has also finally gotten the clearance to release the "long-form", not technically "legal" birth certificate - which he did Wednesday.

We are proud of how he stood up for himself on Wednesday, as are all Americans who actually want to get to work solving the problems we collectively face.

There are still those who will say that this was just another ploy by President Obama.

So instead of insulting those people, and calling them worthless, we're going to let President Obama have the very last words on this topic that we hope to ever write:

"I know that there’s going to be a segment of people for which, no matter what we put out, this issue will not be put to rest.  But I’m speaking to the vast majority of the American people, as well as to the press.  We do not have time for this kind of silliness.  We’ve got better stuff to do.  I’ve got better stuff to do.  We’ve got big problems to solve.  And I’m confident we can solve them, but we’re going to have to focus on them -- not on this."

Now Is Not Then

For our faithful readers, the fact that we have a long-standing dislike of false equivalencies - especially in politics - is nothing new. It's not that there aren't similarities between the parties and their supporters, especially the fanatics on both ends of the spectrum. We've pointed out those comparisons numerous times over the years.

The problem we've always had with false equivalencies - especially in the modern political sphere - is when those comparisons are based on superficial similarities, and not true factual differences.

Like the comparisons that are beginning to pop up in the media on the town hall meetings we're seeing all over the nation right now.

In case you missed it, during the current Congressional vacation - the fifth one they've taken so far this year - Congresspersons of both parties have been holding town hall meetings. Some of these town hall meetings have been passionate affairs, much like the raucous events of the summer of hate in 2009.

If you were paying scant attention to the news, you might simply dismiss this latest round of town hall meetings as another group of disaffected, ignorant people, probably supported by some kind of outside money.

If that's what you're thinking about this current set of events, you'd be wrong.

On the merely superficial level, there have been no significant acts of violence at any of the current town hall meetings, to our knowledge. Nor have there been credible threats of physical violence towards congresspersons, or attendees toting weapons, loaded or otherwise. Those factors alone make the current meetings different from those of 2009.

As journalist Josh Marshall pointed out yesterday, there are those in the media who will simply stop with the ostensible resemblance, come up with some simple label to slap on the current discontent of voters, and attempt to blow off the real reasons behind this current display of anger about what Republicans, under the proposed Ryan plan, would do to Medicare.

As another journalist, Steve Benen of Washington Monthly pointed out on Tuesday, Democrats and those who support Medicare are hammering Republicans  everywhere over the insane idea of a voucher-based, all-private health insurance plan for seniors replacing what we now know as Medicare. Republicans and corporatists are crying like babies, accusing left-leaning Medicare supporters of scare tactics.

As Mr. Benen also points out, "Political rhetoric isn't "demagoguery" when it's true. If a political message leads the mainstream to feel scared, it's not necessarily "scare tactics" if people have good reason to worry."

The fact is, the current Republican budget plan will end Medicare as a stable, long-term, entitlement for American citizens - one that most working Americans have already paid into and have earned. Further, it's a plan that not even all Republican leadership fully supports.

This year, 2011, is not 2009, and we wish some of our colleagues in the media would stop for a minute and focus on the facts, and not just the stupid pictures and audio coming from the current set of town hall meetings.

The Real Fuel Problem

If you're a consumer in the United States - and that's pretty much all of us - it's been almost impossible not to notice the rising price of gasoline. Even if you use public transportation, the cost of most goods and services has gone up sharply as higher fuel prices put more pressure on the costs of doing business.

For partisans on both sides of the aisle, we have to note that your standard bearers are not doing as well as we think they should be on issues related to energy policy. We don't even have to look at energy policy as a whole - just gas and oil - to see both positive signs of acknowledgment, as well as failures to act, from both political camps.

We're aware the President recently had the U.S. Attorney General's office form a new commission - the Oil and Gas Price Fraud Working Group - to supposedly root out cases of fraud and collusion. Recent events give us at least a small sliver of hope - for example, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's recent $30 million civil penalty on a less than honest natural gas trader.

Still, we think our skepticism of President Obama's actions on this subject has been earned. Every President since Jimmy Carter - Republican and Democratic alike -  has promised they'll organize a committee to search out fraud and price collusion in the energy industry over the years. Their success rate has been about the same as George W. Bush's at finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

For those partisans on the right, it was somewhat of a surprise on Monday when Speaker John Boehner admitted to ABC News reporter Jonathan Karl that oil companies share some of the blame for the ridiculous increase in gas prices. Mr Boehner even was willing to open the door to cutting some subsidies for the massive oil companies, according to his comments.

While it was a shock to hear those words coming out of the mouth of a Republican like Mr. Boehner, his conclusion is similar to one that President Obama already made last week. That slight admission that even our leaders have knowledge of collusion by the oil companies on the price of oil - and therefore, gasoline too - was something we've all assumed to be true for years. Our reaction is much like police Captain Renault in Casablanca being shocked to find out there was gambling going on in a place known for illicit games of chance.

There are those who still attempt to claim that the extreme increase in gas prices is driven by supply and demand pressures - but we're not sure how. That load of balony has been proven bogus time and time again. It's been debunked so many times, it amazes us that anyone with a shred of intelligence or decency even brings up the idea.

This time, OPEC just announced last week that they're cutting production due to weak demand. The Saudis admitted they see a glut of supplies in the world market for raw crude oil. Those who understand how oil markets work agree - it's the sharks on Wall Street, not the sheiks in the Middle East, who are responsible for the price of gas shooting up near or above $4.

Everyone knows what the true problem is. However, much like the problem of the U.S. not bringing in enough revenue - a different problem that even Mr. Boehner admitted to on Monday - no one seems to have the political will to actually DO anything about the speculators.

We all know what's broken. It's time to fix the problem. The problem isn't in the Middle East - and it can't be solved by drilling. The problem is on Wall Street.

No matter what the excuses of any of our politicians are on this issue, the problem needs action to fix it - and that lack of action is what is truly fueling the anger of most Americans.