It's all about demanding R-E-S-P-E-CT

Maybe President Obama should have requested Aretha Franklin, sing her hit song Respect at his Inauguration as the first (and if TeaPublicans have their way,the last) African American President of the United States of America instead of My Country Tis of Thee.   H/T Mack Lyons who says This President doesn't have any rights and conservatives are bound to respect. Here is the money quote;

I can't remember any other president being disrespected to the degree President Obama has over these past 4 years. I can't remember Bill Clinton catching this much hell over the Monica Lewinsky mess. And while legislators may have held a low opinion of George Bush, they maintained professional decorum and didn't blatantly disrespect the president over such. But #44? Whoooo boy..

Psst Mack! Did you forget republicans impeached Bill Clinton over the whole Monica Lewinsky mess? I would say that was hell, wouldn't you? :) But it goes to show republicans don't have an ounce of respect for democrats, strike that, real (liberal) democrats regardless of race. And you know why? Because they don't demand their R-E-S-P-E-C-T they plead for R-E-S-P-C-T.

"Respect" is a song written and originally released by Stax recording artist Otis Redding in 1965. "Respect" became a 1967 hit and signature song for R&B singer Aretha Franklin. The music in the two versions is significantly different, and through a few minor changes in the lyrics, the stories told by the songs have a different flavor. Redding's version is a plea from a desperate man who asks a woman for his due respect. In Franklin's version, however, she declares that she deserves respect rather than pleads for it.

And therein lies the problem with not only this President, but the democratic status quo in general. They won't demand no damn R-E-S-P-E-C-T so they get no damn R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

These days, it seems like everyone wants to disrespect the president. If it isn't foreign leaders and news media outlets pushing the man around, then it's the usual suspects -- die-hard white conservative members of the "grassroots" Tea Party and other similar organizations. Even the people you'd figure would have Obama's back are now gunning for the man to be primaried within his own party. No disrespect intended to Digby's Hullabaloo or Firedoglake, but I do find it disturbing when you piss and moan about the guy just because he hasn't shoved a stack of hundreds or a pony under your pillow just yet.

Uh, why should we the people have Obama's back when he hasn't had ours? And NO, that doesn't mean shoving a stack of hundreds or a pony under our pillow that means standing up for the agenda he campaigned on instead of compromising and capitulating to the TeaPublicans at every turn.

As reported by the NY Times, Senators Susan Collins, Harry Reid, Arlen Specter, Olympia J. Snowe and Joseph I. Lieberman after an agreement was reached.Congressional negotiators announced Wednesday afternoon that they had reached agreement on a $789 billion economic stimulus bill, clearing the way for final action and President Obama’s signature.“The differences between the House and Senate versions, we’ve resolved,” Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic majority leader, said in a Capitol news conference. The differences were resolved by a lot of intense “give and take,” Mr. Reid said, “and if you don’t mind my saying so, that’s an understatement.”Negotiations had been going on all day, following extensive talks on Tuesday night, to close the gap between the Senate and House versions. In the end, the agreed-upon package will pare back Democrats’ proposed spending on education and health programs in favor of tax cuts that were needed to win Republican votes in the Senate. Senator Susan Collins of Maine, a centrist Republican whose support was crucial to the outcome, said the final package includes $150 billion in spending on infrastructure, including transportation facilities, and considerable tax relief. Moreover, she said, it includes significant money to aid state governments.Despite intense lobbying by governors, the final deal slashed $35 billion from a proposed state fiscal stabilization fund, eliminated $16 billion in aid for school construction and sharply curtailed health care subsidies for the unemployed.

AAPRP: you read it right, Despite intense lobbying by governors, the final deal slashed $35 billion from a proposed state fiscal stabilization fund, eliminated $16 billion in aid for school construction and sharply curtailed health care subsidies for the unemployed.

See what I mean? But this is just one example of many where our President compromised democratic principles. Hope for Change We Can Believe In turned the winners into the losers and the losers into the winners. *sigh*

Unfortunately, the current color aroused bout of collective insanity will end only when the goal of removing Obama from office has succeeded and a white president, preferably a white Republican with southern tendencies and a lack of empathy for poors, blacks and other detritus collecting at the bottom of America's social swimming pool. The red cloth will disappear from in front of the bull and all of the glass in the china shop will be swept up and thrown away. All will be well with the world once again, as far as many are concerned.

If my friend Mack Lyons is right (no pun) and this comes to pass, America will show the world we are a country who can't demand R-R-E-S-P-E-C-T because we don't deserve R-E-S-P-E-C-T.
"It is difficult, at this day, to realize the state of public opinion in relation to that unfortunate race which prevailed in the civilized and enlightened portions of the world at the time of the Declaration of Independence, and when the constitution was framed and adopted. But the public history of every European nation displays it in a manner too plain to be mistaken. They had for more than a century before been regarded as beings of an inferior race, and altogether unfit to associate with the white races, either in social or political relations; and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect, and that the negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit." Chief Justice Roger B. Taney's opinion on the Dred Scott decision, circa 1857

I agree with most of what my friend Mack Lyons writes in this piece regarding the racism, but I don't cast the blame entirely on conservatives, the media and those who are supposed to have President Obama's back. Some of the blame has to go to the President who let the white, male dominated media define him thereby enabling the gop to obstruct his agenda.

I blame this President who surrounded himself with key people who publicly refereed to liberal activist(aka the people who VOTED for him) as F*cking Retarded and the Professional Left like that was a bad thing.

As a black man, he has no rights which his fellow whites are bound to respect. As the president, he still has no rights that are worth respecting, as far as his fellow whites, conservatives particularly, are concerned.

This President could have demanded R-E-S-P-E-C-T by standing up to the right wing Bully's from the beginning, but for what ever reason he chose not to. And therein lies the problem.