So why did Obama stop community organizing? Does he believe that in the past eight years, power has dramatically shifted to the once powerless in order to bring about the radical changes required to put the stories he’d heard of poverty and hunger to rest? Did he think it was finally time for the community to take over, ready to exercise its power gained through decades of effective organizing, leadership development, and development of community-based institutions focused on human rights, social justice, and economic fairness?

Or is it that Obama never was a community organizer, but rather an organizer of the Democratic Party, building a base for himself within his party by going out to the community in order to build a winning narrative that starts with “when I was with the common folk” and ends with “and now that I am President”?

All I can do is watch what Obama does. First, I can see that he is a Democrat. He is now the leader of the same coalition that “ended welfare as we know it” in 1996, that largely supported the invasion of Iraq in 2003, and that recently bailed out Wall Street bankers. Obama, and the party he now leads, supports the expansion of government surveillance and of American forces in Central Asia, and has no plan or even a promise to de-privatize health care by creating a universal single payer system.”

Read the full article at Infoshop.org/news.

As chants and the explosions of Roman candles from marchers echoed throughout this capital city, Obama looked out from the television screen in a La Paz bar, offering words of wisdom that were somehow connected to many Bolivians’ sense that democracy and good politics depended on a mobilized public taking to the streets.

‘For as much as government can do and must do,” Obama said, “it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies.’”

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The Washington Post’s Thomas Ricks predicted in his recent authoritative history, The Gamble, that Obama would keep 25,000 to 50,000 troops in Iraq as a “residual” force indefinitely. Ricks reports that generals like David Petraeus and Raymond Odierno were expecting at least that many troops, and predicts that the fighting will continue for decades.

Obama’s announced new policy must shock Ricks and the military leaders he extensively interviewed. Obama’s official stance comes after many months of appearing to support the notion of residual forces, which many in the peace movement correctly believed could lead to low-visibility counterinsurgency and a permanent military occupation. Obama said nothing to dissuade the critics until Friday’s speech at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina.”

Read whole article by Tom Hayden on TheNation