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LETTITOR

 

 

Yes, he can... so why doesn’t he?

    

Liam Britten
editor in chief

in American politics was the presidency of
Bill Clinton. I consider Clinton to be one
of the best American presidents, a man of great
vision and intelligence but hamstrung during his
years of power by a Republican Congress and
Senate that stymied his progressive vision at
every turn. .

It was with the Clinton experience in
mind that I became really optimistic when
Barack Obama was elected. His Democrats
had taken both the Senate and the House in last
November, and it seemed like there was nothing
to stop Obama from really making America a
decent country.

So, with no major obstacles in his way,
why has Obama really made no appreciable
progress on the issues he was supposed to stand
for? It’s been just under a year, and the U.S.
looks no different than when Bush left office.
Large segments of the American people support
his agenda (believe it or not, his 50 per cent
approval rating is pretty good for a president
at this point), he’s got the political resources
behind him, so what’s the hold up?

I hate to say it, but I think the issue here
is the man himself. Obama campaigned on
bringing hope and change, but hope and change
are inconvenient. It seems as if the man’s
already eyeing a second term and he doesn’t
want to offend the conservative masses with his
highfalutin’, elitist liberal ways. He promised
to build bridges and support bi-partisanship, but
in doing so he’s really abandoned everything
that defined him as a politician. He’s made
compromises alright; he’s compromised all of
what he stands for.

[« always thought that the biggest tragedy

I'll admit that some of Obama’s plans
couldn’t be accomplished within a year. The
largest reform of health care in American
history? Yeah, that’ll take a while (especially
when his own Democrats are in the pockets of
big health insurance companies). But closing
Guantanamo Bay? How much time can that
really take? And does he really need his justice
department to fight in favour of the Defence
of Marriage Act, which defines marriage as
between a man and a woman only? For a man
once considered one of the most liberal senators
in America; it seems that the presidency has
made a full-fledged Republican out of him.

I’m pretty confident that Obama’s actions
“moderating” his administration have been
done with a second term in mind but I don’t
know if he realizes that by turning his back on
the liberal voters who elected him, he could
be committing political suicide. Pundits are
still in awe of the massive, well-run grassroots
machinery that put Obama in office— you know,
the “Obamaniacs?” Those devoutly liberal
Obama supporters came out in full force in
the ’08 election, knocking on doors, talking to
people on the street and generally spreading the
gospel, and if those supporters aren’t as inspired
in 2012 as they were in 2008, all of Obama’s
reaching out to conservatives might not mean a
damn thing.

Obama should remember what put him
into office in the first place—a message of hope
and change. And more importantly, he should
remember who put him in—citizens inspired by
his message, citizens who could become very
uninspired, very fast.

Your friend in high fidelity,
Liam Britten

Editor in chief

The Other Press

 

 

An open letter to the students of Local 18 of the Canadian Federation of Students

 

 

 

 

ear Students of CFS Local 18,

We’ re writing to your student

newspaper directly because
we feel it’s the most transparent way to
communicate our concems to you as a
student body.

There’s been a lot of discussion
about Canadian Federation of Students
membership in recent months on various
student campuses across Canada. Over
10 student organizations across Canada
have delivered or organized petitions to
re-examine their membership in the CFS.
Contrary to what you may have been
told, that’s not a bad thing. Deciding as
a student body that you want to review
your membership within CFS or question
what the CFS has done for you does not
mean you're ill-informed or part of a
small group of people with questionable
motives—it means you care about your
representation.

Ultimately, we believe this
decision should be placed in the hands
of students— directly. Unfortunately,
there is a motion at the upcoming CFS
Annual General Meeting (November
25-28, 2009) that will erect even further
barriers to impede what should be an easy
and straightforward democratic process.
And so, in the interest of solidarity of

the student movement, the University of
Calgary Graduate Students’ Association
would like to share our concerns about a
motion that will fundamentally affect this
process of re-examination.

Local 78—Carleton University’s
Graduate Students’ Association—has
put forth a motion (2009/11:N06) for
the upcoming CFS Annual General
Meeting (November 25-28, 2009). Some
disturbing highlights include: -

* changing the number of
signatures on the referendum
petition from ten per cent to
twenty per cent of your student
population;

* — increasing the period between
referendum votes to 60 months
(five years);

* and limiting the number
of referenda on continued
membership to a total of two
referenda every three months.

The University of Calgary GSA is very
concemed with this proposed motion as it
is one of the over 10 student associations
that submitted CFS petitions this year. It’s
not clear how these proposed changes will
affect the petitions because a lot depends

on how the CFS will interpret these
changes. It is clear that any groups trying
to exit the CFS in the future will have a
very difficult time doing so.

The U of C GSA is trying
desperately to understand why Carleton
has proposed this motion. Their preamble
for the motion claims that having more
than two referenda on “continued
membership” at a time is “anti-
democratic” and that it would stretch
CFS’s resources too far. Interesting. They
suggest placing a limit on the number of
organizations that can vote to leave the
organization, but do not limit the number
of referenda that can be held for joining
the organization at any given time. This
seems to be quite contrary. In order to
further understand their rationale, the
U of C GSA investigated whether these
proposed changes came from the Carleton
GSA’s own best practices.

If one visits the Carleton GSA’s
website, they wil! find what we presume
to be their most recently amended
constitution. Interestingly enough,
Article 14.2 of their own referendum
requirements states: “The Executive,
Council or any graduate student may
initiate a referendum of GSA members.
Council shall have the power to approve

or amend questions, set a voting date, and
give public notice of the question at least
2 weeks prior to the voting date.” As well,
no petition seems to be required to initiate
a referendum and only 6 per cent of their
population needs to vote to make the
referendum binding.

Alas, we are baffled as to why they
suggest more stringent rules for other
student organizations than they require of
themselves. We are so concerned about
these changes we’ ve sent similar letters
to every single student newspaper with
a CFS local across Canada. We will,
of course, discuss this issue with the
Carleton GSA directly at the upcoming
CFS AGM. Likewise, we invite you to
question Local 78 as to their rationale for
these changes, and to question how your
CFS representatives will vote at the AGM.
After all, what Local 78 is proposing
will not only affect our future, but that
of all student organizations who seek to
question their representation.

In solidarity,

Matt Musson, Director of Campaigns and
David Coletto, Director of Research and
Advocacy

University of Calgary Graduate Students’
Association