Thomas Franks on the Pitiful and Painful Plight of the Pathetic Billionaires

This appears to me to be the "money" graf in a recent interview by Truthout with author Thomas Franks about his new book, "Pity the Billionaire: The Hard-Times Swindle and the Unlikely Comeback of the Right." I've inserted breaks to facilitate reading & to emphasize the points:

I don't know about crossing the Rubicon, but it's clear to me that we have missed what will probably prove to be our generation's greatest opportunity to reverse the direction of history. In 2008 and 09, Wall Street was in such high odor - so hated by the American public - that we could easily have chosen a New Deal type of direction. The conservative economic policies of the last forty years were in ruins around us.

But Obama wasn't willing to point this out. The opportunity was squandered, but "squandered" isn't a strong enough word.

Barack Obama had a once-in-a-lifetime chance to take the financial oligarchy apart - not just for electoral reasons, but because that was what democracy requires - and despite the right's perception of him as Robespierre reincarnated, he didn't do it.

Yes, he may win re-election this fall, but at best he will be remembered as another Clinton: a guy who triangulated and got the best deals he could while facing down a right-wing nation.

That the nation isn't right wing, and that it would have followed him had he led with boldness, is something that people like you and I will get to meditate on sourly for the rest of our lives.

Any list of so-and-so-many of brave Sir barry's "accomplishments" ONLY exists to distract from and/or try to paper over the massiveness of his failure to act aggressively to reform the system. He COULD have done it--if he'd been ANYBODY but Barack Hussein Obama...So he didn't.