Progressives 'Break Up' With Obama

As readers know, I lost faith in Barack Obama a long time ago and find the efforts of Organizing for America to get me to resubscribe beyond annoying. If you want my support, then do something and act like a leaders as opposed to a timid follower. I am hardly alone in this feeling. Many at the Netroots Nation gathering in Minneapolis hold similar views and are even more outspoken about their dissatisfaction with Obama's leadership - or more accurately, the lack thereof. A piece in the Huffington Post looks at Obama's alienation of progressives through his timidity and spinelessness. Here are some highlights:
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MINNEAPOLIS -- President Barack Obama is decidedly "not [the left's] boyfriend anymore," progressive supporters of gay- and immigrant-rights said on Thursday, rebuking the White House for breaking promises to the left while also asking them for money.
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The message to those in the room for "What to Do When the President is Just Not that Into You," a Netroots Nation panel, was be more demanding, don't take no for an answer and compromises aren't good enough.
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The four panelists -- Choi, immigration reform supporter Felipe Matos, America Blog writer John Aravosis and Fire Dog Lake Founder Jane Hamsher -- said they are planning to hold the White House's collective feet to the fire for its decisions on civil rights, whether it would hurt Obama's reelection chances or not.

"I would probably vote for the president in the end, but I'd also do everything that I can to shame him," said Aravosis, who writes about gay rights issues. "But I don't think they realize how damaging that is." Although Obama signed a repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell in December, the panelists decried his failure to take a hard stance for gay marriage.
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"We always say we simply expected what he promised," Aravosis said "The White House would rather not engage at all -- at least with the big stuff. We were told he'd be a fierce advocate, and he's been not fierce at all and not much of an advocate."
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On immigration, Obama has been even worse, panelists said. . . . At the same time, the White House has courted the votes of the gay and immigrant community. "We're angry, and we know he's courting our vote right now," said Matos, an undocumented man who lives in Miami. "He went to Puerto Rico, he went to Texas... we're onto him. [As] a friend of mine said, we are not the type of people he wants to mess around with."
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Immigrants rights supporters are beginning to mobilize against Democrats -- including Obama -- for 2012. "That's the big threat that the president is scared of: That we're not scared to stand up anymore," Matos said. "We're willing to go as far as we have to go to pressure him to stop the deportation of DREAM Act students."
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One way to ensure Democrats do not take progressive votes for granted is to stop voting for Democrats, Choi said.