I haven’t sat down to watch President Obama speak in a while.  During the 2008 election, I heard candidate Barack Obama speak often and I appreciated the tone of his rhetoric contrasting with the W years.  Then he just kind of fell from my attention as I spaced out living the rest of my life free of President Barack Obama.  Somehow in the silence of his voice things in the world still seem to be falling apart when I listen to the news or radio.

I’m not expressing a need for him to do something, but rather analyzing his lack of presence he projects on my daily life compared to W.  The W years made everything black and white and in your face.  W’s cronies, like Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Condolezza Rice, could really whip up a crowd too.  There always seemed to be a lot of excitement with W, even though the mood was often bad.

W I assessed on a daily basis.  Obama I haven’t truly assessed in a while.  So I watched President Obama’s June 29^th, 2011 speech about reducing the deficit.  He gave a much briefer address than what I was expecting, but he said a lot with few words.  The images he used to represent the American middle class were people looking for: work, more money, or a better education.

We’re an industrious lot, but we’ve got broken refrigerators and busted transmissions working in partnership with layoffs and the expense of a college education beating us down.  President Obama said these problems won’t be fixed overnight and then he laid out what he is trying to do about it (“it” being the erosion of the middle class.)

According to the president, the American Executive Branch is trying to create jobs in America by: eliminating unnecessary business regulation; producing small-business loans; and sponsoring or supporting public private cooperations.  Afterwards, he had a few choice words for the American Legislative Branch.  He charged them with getting it together and helping the American Economy by: changing patent law; improving trade with South Korea; and sustaining the Middle Class tax cuts.

The Republican Party’s ideological resistance to tax increases for the wealthy has become unseemly.  It’s not polite to wipe your butt in the chocolate pudding, and although President Obama didn’t go so far as to say it I will, extravagant wealth is a country’s possession.  It’s everyone’s chocolate pudding and to pile it higher than your butt cheeks is just disgusting. 

To hear House Speaker John (don’t call me boner) Boehner say it the woes of the elite sound like a list of demands.  First, we have to stop spending money we don’t have.  Second, raising taxes destroys jobs.  He offers no proof because none is needed.  According to Mr. Speaker, the people we need to grow our Economy and hire workers “are not going to” pay higher taxes.  Therefore, he declares a tax hike won’t and can’t pass the House of Representatives of the United States of America. 

From Representative Boehner’s perspective America’s spending problem is simple.  The American People have to pay off many years of debt without revoking tax cuts given to the wealthy by W and extended by President Obama.  Boenher doesn’t say it quite that way because his message is black and white, shades of W.  His message, like W’s, also contains an urgency in its code.

He says, “We don’t have anymore time to lose.”  Then later he declares, “this is the moment folks.”  Implying that “the sake of our kids and grandkids” are at stake.  John Boehner’s worldview would seem to be quite dire based on just this analysis, because he is adamant taxes won’t be raised on the wealthy.  His voice has a twinge at one point as if he might crack and piss all over his audience.  His rage at times tastes palpable.

Against the one-dimensional, black and white aspect of Republican Party Rhetoric, President Barack Obama stood out with his rhetoric of hope and change.  He is in office and he has looked tired at times.  He hasn’t done many things that I personally wished he had, but to hear him speak is still comforting like a college lecture.  After sitting through his speech today (and a healthy portion of the Q & A) I still feel pretty good about Barack Obama.

In today’s speech he argued against Speaker Boehner’s construction of the world.  Boehner’s narrative: the American Economy can only be fixed by paying off Our Debt without raising taxes on the people we need to grow Our Economy.  President Obama characterizes those actions as trying to balance the budget by managing 12% of it and then having seniors pay more.  President Obama presents a multidimensional approach suggesting cuts in federal entitlements in addition to getting rid of millionaire tax breaks given to both individuals and corporations.  A corporate jet was a significant metaphor he tried to build in to his speech.

President Obama was most honest when he admitted both political parties “agree on the scale and urgency of the challenge at hand.”  He is not to be found without dire consequences of his own much like John Boehner.  The president warned that food safety and college education are being put at risk.  The theme of his speech echoed his admission that he believes Republican and Democrat will ultimately come to terms over the current crisis taking place in the American Economy.  The American Economy being that entity which requires the American Middle-Class to give money to American Business.  Upon viewing his latest speech, I’m still convinced President Obama still seems to be looking out for the interests of the American Middle-Class.

The American Dream is a dream of living a middle-class lifestyle.  A dream we all dream together in order to keep it alive.  This middle class fantasy is a desire for satisfaction of personal needs.  It is a desire for food, shelter and clothing at first, but then the realization of so much more.  As youth grow up in American society they see what the companies offer in order for them to turn over their money.  American companies try their hardest to make even the cheapest things seem enthralling for American youth.  As youth turns to old age, a middle class existence makes life easier to endure.  This desire has spread within individual people across the world as the American Dream.  This fantasy of a middle class lifestyle which is rich compared to Third World countries. 

The middle class fantasy needs to be kept alive in reality as much as in thought.  It provides hope for people who might not otherwise have any.  One sign of hope illuminated by the middle class fantasy is a cut across traditional loyalties and biases of race and nationality quieting dissent.  The reason for the passivity evident in the middle class existence is that “now” is so much better.  When “now” is a decent place to be then the world is a better place.

To Rebuild the Dream we must see the American Middle-Class supported.  Who else shall we find with the disposable income and time to distribute money to the American Economy?  The survival of the middle class is an economic problem.  The American Economy runs on 70% consumer spending.

The American GDP is over $14 trillion dollars.  As the American Middle-Class denotes a condition of having expendable income to give away; economic policy in the United States should favor the continuance of a middle class.  If the middle class must consume in order for the economy to work, then the American Middle Class must be nurtured and supported.