--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "ShempMcGurk" <shempmcg...@...> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "authfriend" <jstein@> wrote: > > > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "ShempMcGurk" <shempmcgurk@> wrote: > > > > > > Give ME money I don't have and I'll spend it like a drunken > > > sailor, too! > > > > > > No one -- and I mean no one -- has spent more money more > > > quickly than this president. > > > > No president has *needed* to spend money more quickly > > than this president. In fact, he didn't spend enough > > quickly enough. But if he hadn't spent what he did when > > he did, the economic situation in this country would be > > far, *far* worse than it is now. > > Well, then, you have to acknowledge that that figure > of hate, George Bush, did a good thing because HE > started all the spending
Right. He didn't have any choice if he wanted to avoid major financial disaster. > and it was done with Obama's approval (remember that > meeting in the oval office while the campaign was going > on with Bush, McCain, and Obama) and Obama continued it > and expanded it. > > So it was NOT change we can beleive it...it was unchange > and expansion of a George Bush policy. Neither of them had any choice once the economy began to collapse (largely as a result of GWB's policies, including the billions spent in Iraq and on tax cuts for the wealthy, as well as lax oversight of financial institutions, many of which Obama is working to reverse). > > But I guess that's what you > > > get when you elect a community organiser for president. > > > > > > What do community organisers do? Why, they knock on > > > the doors of various levels of government with hand > > > extended asking for money. > > > > Uh, no, that's not what community organizers do. Maybe > > that's called community organizing in Canada, but not > > in the U.S. > > You have obviously done very little community organising > in either country. Again, I was referring to the upper > echelons of community organisations and that is precisely > what their main activity is. Community organizing doesn't raise funds from government because government is the *adversary*. Ever heard of Saul Alinsky? Community organizations formed as a result of community organizing (as distinct from other types of community organizations), if they were to be funded by government, would end up being coopted; they wouldn't be able to confront the very governments that were funding their existence. > People on the lower echelons - like, obviously, you, > Judy, if that has been your experience -- don't go to > government to raise funds. They either do the peon > work or go to individuals and small companies to ask > for money. > > That's not what the Harvard educated elitist Barack > Obama was engaged in (and, indeed, it would have been a > waste to use him doing that kind of stuff). As a community organizer, oddly enough, Obama was primarily engaged in organizing the community, not in any kind of fundraising. The idea of community organizing is to get the community to recognize its self-interests, and then empower the community to confront local government and *demand* that it take various kinds of action to further those interests. This may include working for the election of sympathetic candidates, demonstrations, picketing, negotiating with local officials to improve community services, etc. But the community organizer's job is to organize and empower, not to make the actual demands him- or herself. The community organizer, rather than being a community leader, facilitates the community electing or appointing its own leaders; they're the ones who make the demands. I think you may be confusing other types of community organizations, whose leaders may well beg the government for funding, with the process of community organizing and the organizations that result from that process. None of this is to say that the ultimate goals of community organizing don't often involve getting the government to spend money, but it's a very specific confrontational approach that's quite different from standard hat-in-hand fundraising activities.
