Do you suffer from ODS????
And no, I am not referring to Obstinate Defiance Syndrome (although, come to think of it, that sure might be a symptom!)
What I am referring to is......
Obama Derangement Syndrome!!!
..............where all your political opinions are shaped, first and foremost by your hatred of President Obama....where you instinctively flip your position based on whatever you find out the President is doing....if he changes to your position, you act like you've never had that position, and that the President's position, which WAS your position, is now evil and wrong and socialist and unamerican!!!
This dates all the way back to President Obama's inauguration when Senator McConnell declared the Republican's major goal was going to be to destroy Obama's presidency. Help the American people? Fuggetaboutit! Pull us out of recession? Why? - when you can keep blaming Obama? Participate in reforming healthcare? Heck, no! Just gripe and oppose and rail - EVEN WHEN HE TAKES YOUR IDEAS!
The first time it really super irritated me, and the ODS was pulsatingly clear, was not with a Republican, but with so-called "Independent Democrat" Senator Joe Lieberman. In 2004, he ran for President, promoting his idea of starting medicare at age 55. Now whatever you think of that idea, it was HIS idea. When it came time to negotiate the Affordable Care Act in 2009 and 2010, the President really needed Lieberman's support. So the idea of extending medicare to age 55 was promoted as a bipartisan solution, and it looked like it was going to take hold. But once it was clear that it was an important reach out to Lieberman, he PUBLICLY stated that if the President and progressive/liberal Democrats were for it, than he was against it. One of the most disgusting reversals I've ever seen in American politics, fueled by ODS.
Now, we have the incredibly blatant reversal of many conservatives regarding the release of POW Bergdahl, where they were pouncing on Obama for not acting. They were even aware of the potential exchange of the five Taliban. They were for it until the President actually did it, and then...BLAMMO! A complete reversal!
Right now the disaster that was the Iraq invasion is coming back to bite us. DO NOT LET THE RIGHT WING PRESS DELUDE YOU! This is a mess created by Bush, Cheney and the Republicans and IT ALWAYS WILL BE. I and many others said at the time that this would cause problems and damage for DECADES TO COME. But ODS will figure out a way to blame Obama for this.
But you can prevent ODS! You do not have to suffer anymore!
1) Find out what you really believe and stick with it! Even if it is right wing douchery, stick with it! And then when the President comes around to parts of your position, instead of running to a different position, say "Thank you, Mr. President! Thank you for coming around to the right way of thinking!"
2) Examine without prejudice the President's positions and achievements and find one or two places you might have some agreement. My right wing friends ask me to do this all the time, but in the reverse direction. Tell me where you disagree with Obama, they ask me, or do you just blindly follow whatever he supports? Then when I list a litany of things (mostly because he is not liberal enough), they get confused and their eyes glaze over. So try it the other way, which I never hear you do. Give it some serous thought. Special note to Kentuckians: Kynect IS Obamacare.
3) Ask yourself how you would feel about someone who blindly attacked the President if he were somebody you did admire, like Reagan or...OK, I'm lost after that, but you know what I mean. In 2002/2003, if I dared utter a word in opposition to Bush, Jr., especially connected to the awful decision to invade Iraq, I was considered unpatriotic and anti-Christian, a socialist loving miscreant. Now it's reversed. Now the same super patriots condemn, sometimes in the most vile terms, anything Obama does, giving him ZERO respect for being President.
4) Stop watching Fox News, or getting your opinions from a friend or family member who does. No compromise on this one. It is not a news source. It is a propaganda machine. And yes, there are other news channel talk shows that have biases (although most of them are corporate, not liberal), but I will not indulge in a game of false equivalencies with you. Nothing, other than some conservative talk radio, is more biased and hateful than Fox News. End of story.
Really. Seriously. I do want us to get along better. I do want us to solve problems. But as long as you are blinded by ODS, it makes it impossible to get things done.
Here's to the cure!
May it free us to move forward!
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