Shut up Bill Clinton, you are senile.

Bill "who's not black" Clinton recently said that:

"Because once you've reached a certain age, you won't sit there and listen to somebody tell you there's really no difference between what happened in the Bush years and the Clinton years; that there's not much difference in how small-town Pennsylvania fared when I was president, and in this decade." From The Huffington Post


Bill is right, there is a difference between the Bush and Clinton years. During Clinton's administration, prisons were built like condos. The prison population grew faster and quicker than any administration before him, even good old Ronald Regan- who most of us know as the devil. Clinton also abolished welfare, spent less on education than any other president before him, and increased military spending. Clinton enacted Conservative and often Republican change that had been brewing for decades before him. For once, that good ole boy is telling the truth, but that's besides the point.

Clinton's diatribe was a response to Obama stating that the problems facing this country "simmered" long before Bush took office. Obama is right in stating that. Clinton says that history isn't important, its what is happening now and what is going to happen in the future. I couldn't disagree more. How are we going to understand where we are at without analyzing our past? If we learned about the peoples history of the united states in school(I'm not referencing Zinn's book, it ain't even all that) we would have a better idea of where we were. White people wouldn't need Obama to tell them that race is still a problem if they had learned it in U.S History.

But i appreciate Obama's optimism that so many claim is fake or delusional, the fact he can talk you young people speaks to me. Clinton is criticizing Obama for mobilizing people left out of discourse. Whether you like Obama or not, he is creating spaces for people to talk.

The issues facing this country, and the inequalities which divide us start at birth. From the first shot we do or do not receive at the doctor, to our first year of primary miseducation, builds the foundation of our lives. Whether or not we go to public school and receive skills training us to be blue collar workers for the rest of our lives, or attend private schools and have opportunity hit us like a speeding bus, and end up an exec at JP Morgan. issues that affect the youth, affect the country today, and more affect who will be able to take power later.

A portrait of the current congress wouldn't look too different from an AARP ad. america isnt just old white people, its young, black, white and everythign in between. in no way am i saying senoirs should be absent from political discourse, as populations age needs particular to those demographics need to be addressed. but our political representation should be REPRESENTATIVE of the entire population. I hate sitting and hearing someone who wasn't been in school since 1960 tell me the problems facing youth in public education. I hate hearing someone from the suburbs tell me the problems in inner cities. Our country has never been led by the people, special interest groups were the same in 1976 as they are today, from cotton to cotton, oil to oil, same shit different day.