Michael Moore: An Open Letter to President Obama

[babylonsister]

Too much snipping...read it here:

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mike-friends-blog/open-letter-president-obama


November 19th, 2012 8:46 AM
An Open Letter to President Obama

By Michael Moore

Dear President Obama:

Good luck on your journeys overseas this week, and congratulations on decisively winning your second term as our president! The first time you won four years ago, most of us couldn't contain our joy and found ourselves literally in tears over your victory.

This time, it was more like breathing a huge sigh of relief. But, like the smooth guy you are, you scored the highest percentage of the vote of any Democrat since Lyndon Johnson, and you racked up the most votes for a Democratic president in the history of the United States (the only one to receive more votes than you was ... you, in '08!). You are the first Democrat to get more than 50% of the vote twice in a row since Franklin D. Roosevelt.

snip//

At your first post-election press conference last Wednesday you were on fire. The way you went all "Taxi Driver" on McCain and company ("You talkin' to me?&quot was so brilliant and breathtaking I had to play it back a dozen times just to maintain the contact high. Jesus, that look – for a second I thought laser beams would be shooting out of your eyes! MORE OF THAT!! PLEASE!!

snip//

1. DRIVE THE RICH RIGHT OFF THEIR FISCAL CLIFF. The "fiscal cliff" is a ruse, an invention by the Right and the rich, to try and keep their huge tax breaks. On December 31, let ALL the tax cuts expire. Then, on January 1, put forth a bill that restores the tax cuts for 98% of the public. I dare the Republicans to vote against that! They can't and they won't. As for the spending cuts, the 2011 agreement states that, for every domestic program dollar the Republicans want to cut, a Pentagon dollar must also be cut. See, you are a genius! No way will the Right vote against the masters of war. And if by some chance they do, you can immediately put forth legislation to restore all the programs we, the majority, approve of. And for God's sake, man – declare Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid untouchable. They're not bankrupt or anywhere near it. If the rich paid the same percentage of Social Security tax on their entire income – the same exact rate everyone else pays – then there will suddenly be enough money in Social Security to last til at least the year 2080!

snip//

10. ASK US TO DO SOMETHING. One thing is clear: none of the above is going to happen if you don't immediately mobilize the 63,500,000 who voted for you (and the other 40 million who are for you but didn't vote). You can't go this alone. You need an army of everyday Americans who will fight alongside you to make this a more just and peaceful nation. In your 2008 campaign, you were a pioneer in using social media to win the election. Over 15 million of us gave you our cell numbers or email addresses so you could send us texts and emails telling us what needed to be done to win the election. Then, as soon as you won, it was as if you hit the delete button. We never heard from you again. (Until this past year when you kept texting us to send you $25. Inspiring.) Whoever your internet and social media people were should have been given their own office in the West Wing – and we should have heard from you. Constantly. Need a bill passed? Text us and we will mobilize! The Republicans are filibustering? We can stop them! They won't approve your choice for Secretary of State? We'll see about that! You say you were a community organizer. Please – start acting like one.

The next four years can be one of those presidential terms that changed the course of America. I'm sure you will want to be judged on how you stood up for us, restored the middle class, ended the s***ting on the poor and made us a friend to the rest of the world instead of a threat. You can do this. We can do it with you. All that stands in the way is your understandable desire to sing "Kumbaya" with the Republicans. Don't waste your breath. Their professed love of America is negated by their profound hatred of you. Don't waste a minute on them. Fix the sad mess we're in. Go back and read this month's election results. We're with you.

P.S. President Obama – my cell number to text me at is 810-522-8398 and my email is [e-mail]. I await my first assignment!

[countmyvote4real]

1. Thank you, bsister.

Your posts are always some of the best.

[jimmy the one]

2. republican outreach

.. your understandable desire to sing "Kumbaya" with the Republicans. Don't waste your breath. Their professed love of America is negated by their profound hatred of you. Don't waste a minute on them..

Michael Moore might be talking simply of republican 'upper management', and not republicans as a whole - if so no complaint; but if he's speaking generally of republicans, I think there should be some republican outreach, attempt to bring in disgruntled repubs unhappy with their current party & it's deviant directions, into the democratic party - not a blatant 'go away we can't stand you' approach. Vinegar/honey.
Sure it wouldn't be a high percentage but a quarter million republican switchovers would be welcome, if only to 'try us out you might like us'. Welcome to the, well, satisfying democratic party which encompasses most all peoples rather than a select few.

Remember, republican people are generally good decent folks (far right more the problem) and are republicans for lotsa reasons, tradition, family & relatives, co-workers/peer pressure, as well as being under misconceptions which goes with being young; it's the latter which could & should make good democrats, if they see thru the lies & deceptions their upper mgmt proffers them, and are more willing to bend with the winds, rather than remain rigid & break.

[Aristus]

7. You may be right there. My wife, who calls herself a staunch Republican,

but who I think secretly is a right-leaning moderate Democrat, voted for President Obama this year. The first Democrat she voted for since Jimmy Carter. She didn't vote at all in 2000 or 2004 (she despised George W. Bush even more than she despised Ronald Reagan...)

She voted for McCain in 2008, but only because she still wasn't ready to vote Democratic. Her ineffable shame at having voted for the ticket with Sarah Palin on it may have done her in with the Repubs. She voted for President Obama this year without a qualm. Undoubtedly because, as you pointed out above, she is a good decent person, and thinks President Obama is, too.

[Tutonic]

3. bit of useless trivia.

He predicted around September that Romney would win.

[bamacrat]

4. He's an attention whore.

I get it that he is on our side and I am supposed to like him, but I wish he would just go away.

[sammytko]

6. I agree.

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

8. He worked his ass off to depress turnout on our side

Last edited Wed Nov 21, 2012, 01:41 PM - Edit history (1)

pushing tinfoil hat theories concocted by a rightwing writer that Obama co-ordinated the Occupy crackdowns. He spewed that 'they're all the same' nonsense all through the occupy protests.
Moore is only out to promote his massive ego.

[bamacrat]

9. Agreed...

All of his opinions center around him or some way he can be in the spotlight. His movies are over-rated and he is a hack. He doesn't even do that great of a job defending his positions if he doesn't have time to think and write it out. He was on Maher a few weeks ago and a puke was attacking something Obama did (too many to remember which) and MM tried to defend it but just sounded like a whiny elitist douche.

I love the progressive left, but we need new spokespeople. Michael Moore is our version of Rush, not as hateful but still our version. Both need to go. I like progressives like Bill Maher and Van Jones. Michael Moore had his day, and it has passed.

[sammytko]

10. WAs it when he was on with David Frum?

I thought MM kept giggling weirdly and didn't bring much to the conversation.

[bamacrat]

12. Yeah pretty much.

I think for the last show of the year it was pretty weak. The Republican lady was essentially a Faux News talking point robot, and MM added little if anything. Pretty much Bill and Frum talking to Eric Idle..

[Festivito]

11. you mean you wish Romney would go away.

I wonder how much that cost.

[Jakes Progress]

16. You are shallow.

[bamacrat]

17. Way to bring back a month old thread, but how am I shallow?

Because I think Michael Moore is a tired, played out political hack? Or because he jumps at any chance to be in front of the camera, decrying the media and political establishments he so badly wants to be liked by in an effort to remain relevant? Or that the level to which he promotes the outlandish who gives a fuck positions he does nears that of Rush Limbaugh? Michael Moore is a beat down to watch, a sloppy man with two good points in the middle of a rambling diatribe of tin foil hat conspiracies and false equivalencies. He isn't a liberal, he doesn't care about progressive ideals, he cares about the promotion of Michael Moore.

I don't get how I am shallow.

[Jakes Progress]

18. Just because you don't get it

doesn't mean it isn't so. Your whole post proves your superficiality. You claim things that you do not know and have no proof for other than your own prejudice. You make accusations that have no basis other then a reflection of your own shallow values.

Sorry you don't get it.

(I didn't bring up the thread. It was at the top of the forum because others had commented. Way to not understand how forums work.)

[bamacrat]

19. Ok.................

I am not the only person on this forum who feels that way. Secondly, there is a lot of proof. He is on TV all the damn time. All my accusations can be clearly illustrated any time he has been on Real Time. HBOGO it, Youtube it whatever you want but the evidence is out there for easy view.

[SunSeeker]

5. I just got a (nonfundraising) e-mail asking for input.

It was addressed to all who donated and/or volunteered in the campaign. I basically told the President what MM said. One of the questions was what could he have done to get me even more involved. I said if he had said we should push for Medicare for All and drop the retirement age to 60, I would have gone out into the streets and pulled people out of there cars to vote.

[davidpdx]

13. Everyone who reads this in the US

Please send MM a spam message.

(just joking, that probably isn't even his real number)

[Captain Spaulding]

14. MM

Love him or hate him, Michael Moore is a unique American treasure. I think we need more people like him in this country.

[Filibuster Harry]

15. One great letter. Thanks Michael. I hope he takes your advice.

[meow2u3]

20. DECLARE THE KOCH BROS. ENEMIES OF THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES

Two brothers, descendents of Nazi corporate thugs, have declared all-out war on American democracy and are using their ill-gotten billions to overthrow the Constitution one rethug-run state at a time, looking to supplant it with a totalitarian regime where corporations rule without question and anyone who questions them will be arrested without trial and tortured and murdered at will. They have bought off countless elected and appointed officials, paying them a handsome sum to look the other way while they run their racket with impunity.
Dear President Obama, do America a favor. Declare the Koch Bros. domestic enemies and initiate civil forfeiture proceedings to confiscate their assets. If you're unable to bring them up on criminal charges because of the gaping loopholes in the law, civil forfeiture will be an effective way to punish them with hardship instead of prison. The way to hurt an evil man is to hurt his bank account.