Doesn’t seem like change at all

A RECENT SocialistWorker.org editorial titled "When Wall Street loves reform" piqued my interest. What are regular people saying about Obama's health care "reforms"? What would I say to Obama if given the chance? I decided to write a letter:

Dear President Obama,

I was thinking back to your State of the Union address and remembered how much you liked referencing the letters you received, so I thought I would give it a shot and see if I make it into your next speech.

Let me be clear, though--I did not vote for you. "Why are you writing me a letter," you might ask, "if you did not vote for me?"

Let me try to answer your question: Maybe I did not vote for you because I knew that you only represented corporate interests. Please, don't tell me that you don't. I am tired of the talk about how "Wall Street works for Main Street"; all I know is that on my Main Street, there are homeless people, and on your Wall Street, there are some fat--and I mean fat--fat cats.

You received a lot of money from regular people, and if not their money, then their time, their energies and their hopes. People really did believe in you and many of them still do. But you continue to pander to the interests of Big Business, Big Pharma and continued U.S. military "might," and people are fed up.

And me? I just didn't think you'd be so good at what you do--that is, supporting the corporate class. I just didn't think you would fail us so hard. Yes us, your constituents, even the ones that didn't vote for you. All of us are in debt, brokenhearted and confused over the rhetoric of "hard work and American Dreams" that contradicts our daily experiences.

It really does seem like our parents had it easier. That our grandparents traveled the world a lot more. I can't afford to watch a movie because that is ten dollars that I could use to buy groceries.

IT MIGHT be worth it to tell you that I cried this morning. I woke up to a text message from my stepfather, who said that he and my mom were too swamped in debt to pay the monthly payment on a loan that she took out years ago. It was no longer their responsibility.

Maybe it isn't their responsibility, but I sure as hell can't pay it either.

When I went to college, I got in with scholarships, grants and loans. I was doing pretty well with some help from my mom and grandma. But then my grandmother was diagnosed with cancer, and then my mother was "let go" because her employer did not want to renew her contract.

And yet it was going to be okay because there were resources for kids like me--at least for the first two years, when I got sizeable financial aid packages.

Think of it like those "teaser rates" that mortgage companies like so much. You get a good chunk of money the first year, pay a little bit here, work a part-time job there--but you make it work. Next year, you work two part-time jobs and take out a loan, because your university increased its cost of tuition 7 percent. And then state and federal financial aid runs out, because juniors and seniors get less, if any, financial support.

And if that happened to you every year for four years, when you graduated from that upstanding university you would have over $50,000 in debt, like me!

"I bet you're smart. You could have applied for outside grants," you might admonish me. Sure, I could have tried. But outside grants and scholarships are not based primarily on financial need. I was told point blank by my financial aid counselor that I needed at least a 3.75 GPA to apply. I had a 3.6.

Sallie Mae didn't have a minimum GPA requirement. But she does have 10-12 percent interest rates on all student loans.

Now I'm in graduate school at the University of Arizona, where the state legislature has a keen interest in cutting funding to all public education. I could trouble you with statistics like what departments have been cut and how much the tuition has increased. But you are a busy man and I am tired of looking at those numbers.

If you would be so kind as to believe me when I say that it's a lot, then we could move forward. We could move on to your commitment to the war in Afghanistan and waging a global "war on terror."

Or we could talk about that new health care bill that fines me for not having health care. How much is the fine? Seven hundred and fifty dollars. That's how much my monthly rent is. Do I have to choose?

PRESIDENT OBAMA, how are your policies implementing "change we can believe in"? We aren't being bailed out, the banks are. We aren't getting improved health care benefits; the insurance companies are getting millions of new customers. We aren't fighting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; nor are we invested in your war on terror because we have nothing to do with the people over there.

Neither should you.

The people of Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, Haiti, they deserve more than your National Guard and predator drones. And the CEOs of Chase, Citibank and General Motors did not have to pick between their bonuses or their companies. They got to keep both. But working people have seen their coworkers laid off, their unions busted, their health plans attacked. We get to watch as the fat cats get richer as we get poorer.

Today, I watch as the students I teach learn the meaning of debt. I watch as their backs start to hunch as their hopes and dreams bloom into far flung fantasies because opportunities are no longer theirs. I can't tell them that it is worth it to work hard because we are competing in a race to the bottom. I cannot tell my partner to just go back to school, because he only gets one GI Bill, and it would be a waste to go back to school if you don't know what to study.

What would you suggest? Business? I suggested marketing, because in this economy there is never a shortage of selling something. , there is a shortage of buying, but your status quo economists don't seem to get that. But there is a never a shortage of selling, like when you sold us that tune about repealing "don't ask; don't tell."

Certainly the crisis is not your fault, but you sure aren't helping. You got in because people believed that you were different, that yes we can change the world in which we live.

People took that to heart. They took it to their school boards, to their town halls, to their workplaces, to the streets. They took it to D.C., when 200,000 people marched for equal federal rights for lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgender people. And again, when another 200,000 marched for immigrants rights just last month.

These people are not selling you a song, they are telling you: "We want change." The change they want is the change I believe in.

But the change you want does not seem like change at all. Maybe that's why I didn't vote for you.

Sincerely,
Angela Stoutenburgh, Tucson, Ariz.