Okay Joy Behar, now listen to some reality

There have been many things I could have written today. I thought about writing about how the economy has been said to have turned the corner. I could have written about the layoffs at work. I could write about the beer-flavored potato chips I have found intriguing tonight (for sale at ALDI).

I admit that I am writing with a harder attitude tonight. I am being critical of a public figure. I would be surprised if she reads this because I am sure this is not being picked up by Google.

But it is the eve of Barack Obama being ignaurated as the 44th president of the United States. Some of the idealistic black and white thinkers are expecting him to be the magical liberal who is really going to make changes.

I work during when The View is on but I get to see clips now and then. On this show, I see ignorant people talk about politics. They are far more personalities than they are intellectuals and it shows.

Joy Behar is someone that comes to mind the most. She comes across as the consumate ignorant, self-righteous liberal who talks in black and white terms in all the clips that I have seen. Bush was all bad. Obama is all good. According to my source, she wore her 01-20-2009 button today. Well Joy, you do not have my respect.

For the record, I respect educated liberals. My favorite was the late Patrick Moynihan, senator from New York. I also respected the late Paul Simon, distinguished senator of Illinois (whom I personally met in 1987). On TV, I like Allen Colmes, and I hope FOX puts him back on soon. Eleanor Clift also impressed me. Bob Bechtel also seems to impress me with his ability to give grounded analysis. But Joy is not one of them.

Also For the record, some Marxist analyses such as that by David Harvey and Christopher Pickvance makes sense to me. We can thank them for giving us Urban Political Economy and new objects for study and to give some critical thought about neoliberal economics.

But Joy, I say two words to you: disjointed incrementalism. It is the principle identified by Clarence Lindblom that says government moves slowly and in very messy directions. What this means in our current context is that President Obama is going to be obstructed by Congress--both the DEMOCRATS and the Republicans.

Did you get that Joy? There will be gridlock. We actually like it that way because we as Americans do not like change--contrary to Obama's election campaign slogan. It got the vote of all the overly-idealistic people. The majority of on-fire liberals have no concept of this.

Obama is not going to get all his plans accomplished. He will get very, very few things done. Surveys will show in a few years that the American public will be dissatisfied with him.

Yeah, he will pick a few pieces of low-hanging fruit by executive order, but he will not resolve the Middle-East wars. One of the greatest secrets, Joy, is that both Democrats and Republicans were in favor of us going over there, and many Democrat Representatives to the US House are going to keep their options open for spin purposes in the 2010 elections. They will keep voting for us to be over there to be the iron hand.

Now, if you are reading this, and you are not Joy Behar, I think that the first step in reducing your sense of disappointment about the upcoming months and years of more of the same Washington gridlock, is to accept disjointed incrementalism. Do not expect miracles out of Washington, D.C.

The only way we will get any dramatic change is if there is another national crisis like 09-11-01. The only way we will get nationalized medicine is if there is a national crisis in healthcare. Otherwise, it will be business as usual because to many people have their hands in the pot and have too much money at stake.

Last time I checked, this was America. Yes, you have a choice. You have a choice to think for yourself, even in this time of crisis. Getting some understanding on how government works makes for improved coping in times like these.