nothin Happy Birthday—& Man The Lifeboats! | New Haven Independent

Happy Birthday — &
Man The Lifeboats!

Thomas MacMillan Photo

Teale Caliendo and her bespoke birthday fascinator.

As they feted Obama’s 50th with a custom cake and one fancy fascinator,” presidential supporters shrugged off an unwelcome birthday present — the tanking stock market that erased all of this year’s gains in one day.

Thursday saw a one-day drop of over 4 percent in the Dow Jones industrial average and other market indexes, the worst day on Wall Street in two years. The plummeting of stocks happened to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the birth of Barack Obama, whose reelection may depend on winning voter confidence despite a struggling economy.

The market drop was the latest development in a rough week for the president. Although he signed a deal to raise the debt ceiling before the Tuesday deadline-for-catastrophe, he may have lost the support of some of his liberal base in doing so. Many on the left complained that he caved to the Republican party by agreeing to a cuts-only deficit reduction plan that could shatter the safety net or prevent the country from staving off a renewed recession by creating jobs.

But the dozen die-hard Democrats who showed up for a birthday party in his honor at Fort Nathan Hale on Woodward Avenue Thursday evening had a sunnier outlook — and plan to work to see that Obama is reelected to a second term next year. The party was one of many held across the country by chapters of Organizing for America, the netroots-built organization that grew out of Obama’s 2008 campaign.

Under a wooden pavilion at the East Shore Park, past and future Obama volunteers gathered at picnic tables by a homemade banner wishing the president a happy birthday. The event was put together by Eric Herbst, a musician and part-time volunteer for Organizing For America.

Herbst called the party an opportunity to celebrate the president and line up volunteers for the upcoming campaign to get him reelected. As party-goers munched on hummus and crudite, he worked on getting a charcoal grill going.

Herbst adjusted the candidate’s position.

The president needs more time,” Herbst said. The country was headed the wrong direction for years, he said; it will take a while to get it back on track. Especially if the Republicans do nothing but say no,” Herbst added.

That sentiment was echoed by Teal Caliendo, a retired news reporter and PR rep. I just want to see Obama reelected,” she said. The Republicans don’t care if America fails.”

She said the president was forced to give in somewhat to the teabaggers” on the debt ceiling mess.

He is too much of a conciliator,” she said of Obama. He’s a good man, and the Republicans take advantage of him.”

The debt ceiling showdown was a manufactured crisis by the Republicans,” she said.

And they’re the reason the stock market tanked, said Holly White, who’s in customer service for Honeywell. Without the crisis created by the Republicans, the fear and the stress wouldn’t have been there,” she said. The stock market crashed because of the fear and stress created by the teabaggers.”

Caliendo predicted a tight race for president. What we don’t need is another Ralph Nader,” she said. She mused ruefully about all the trouble that could have been avoided had Al Gore won in 2000. I still haven’t forgiven Ralph Nader” for running as a third-party candidate and siphoning off left-leaning votes. (But Nader was good for car safety in his day, she conceded.)

Caliendo called her headgear (pictured at the top of the story) a fascinator,” like those seen at the recent royal wedding. Festooned with red, white, and blue, It included a teddy bear holding Obama’s head. Caliendo said she made it herself to match the patriotic theme of the evening’s party, and to reclaim the symbolic power of the stars and stripes from the Republicans. We’re patriotic,” she said. We just care about the common man.”

Steve White, cardboard Obama, and Holly White, Steve’s daughter.

Caliendo wasn’t the only one to have crafted something special for the birthday. Steve White, a retired executive at engine company Textron Lycoming, made the huge blue banner that greeted partygoers and passersby. He also made a blue birthday cake featuring the famous Obama O” from the 2008 campaign.

White said he’s not worried about the plunging stock market’s political implications. It’s the economy that’s the problem,” he said. The stock market’s really not a good indicator of the economy.” And the state of the economy becomes a serious issue starting onlly next spring, he said. That’s when voters will start to gauge how they’re doing economically and reflecting on the president accordingly, White said.

As far as the political implications of the debt ceiling battle, Obama came out looking like the only adult in the room,” White said.

He’s trying to be a consensus builder,” White said. The problem is both sides in Washington are so entrenched” and polarized, he said.

Obama didn’t cave, he said. He had to make a deal. He didn’t give away anything he didn’t want to give away.”

Below the banner, contributed by White, a President Obama himself made an appearance, in the form of a cardboard cut out contributed by Lensley Gay. She said she saved it from the 2008 election, when she worked on the first Obama campaign.

She also said she was unworried by day’s dreary financial news. That’s the stock market. It goes up and down,” she said. Everything is going to bounce back.”

Gay, who coordinates the family resource center at the Katherine Brennan School, said she’s ready to roll up her sleeves” and get to work on a second Obama campaign.

He’ll be able to unite” the country a second time, she said. He has to; there are no other worthwhile candidates, she said.

I’m very confident,” Gay said.

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