The South African Civil Society Information Service
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
13 Jan 2011
In recent days, president Barack Obama of America announced his new Chief of Staff, William Daley.
For the past seven years, Daley has been a senior executive at JP Morgan Chase. Before that he worked for a hedge fund and in telecommunications. He was also Bill Clinton's commerce secretary for three years and he managed Al Gore's failed run for the Presidency in the year 2000.
Paul Jay of the Real News Network speaks with Glenn Ford, co-founder of Black Agenda Report, founding member of the Black Commentator and the Washington Chapter of the National Association of Black Journalists, to gauge his views about Daley's appointment.
Ford contends that Daley's appointment is "just more proof that this is Wall Street's White House."
"He is a hell of an operator for corporate interests and now he is directly at the president's side. And he is there, not because Wall Street forced him on the president, but because the president likes it that way…I am of the opinion that Barack Obama is not compelled by his campaign contributors, which were overwhelmingly Wall Street, to behave in this fashion politically, but that he really is the corporate guy; that he is simpatico with the rule of capital and that he feels more comfortable having their direct representatives right there at his side," says Ford.
Moreover, according to Ford, African Americans have given Obama a pass even though his policies have negatively affected them.
Ford says, "Political conversations in Black America, since the ascent of Obama, don't usually revolve around what the president is doing, (or) the details of his policy decisions and appointments. They revolve around 'how' the president is doing. Black America is so psychologically invested in this president that the discussion is not about whether his policies are impacting negatively upon us, but how the president can be protected. Who is trying to bring him down, rather than how his policies are crushing us as well," argues Ford.
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