Following Tuesday's Massachusetts election, a former senior Carter Administration appointee I know -- a life-long Democrat who is black -- pronounced Obama "a failed Presidency." Surely, this is premature--his term has three years left. Yet there are disturbing signs.
Last year was wasted; Obamacare is dead; cap-and-trade (thank god) still-born. The President's speechwriter likely had to bin his first 42 drafts of the State of the Union speech, which is now being re-written to talk about what the President's gonna do, as opposed to what he's accomplished. Obama still has the Executive branch, plus overwhelming (if not veto-proof) support in Congress. But where to go from here?
In one sense, the answer is obvious: triangulate. That is, move toward the center, and push policies in concert with Republicans that are likely to command broad majority support. Bill Clinton did this, successfully, after losing House and Senate in the 1994 off-year election. But Clinton lived through the experience of losing an election (an early 1980s re-election try as Arkansas governor). By contrast, the Obamessiah has been the golden boy, laying the hurt on Hillary without pause, cheered-on by the media gallery. He's never had to re-think his strategy because he's never had a set-back.
With true failure as an alternative, can Obama grow-up, quickly, this year? So far, he's never had to.
7 comments:
I once thought that growing up was indeed the key issue. I do continue to think that remains the issue for many of his supporters. But for Obama himself, I think he's as old as he's gonna get. The narcissism angle is more of an obstacle to his improvement.
> By contrast, the Obamessiah has been the golden boy, laying the hurt on Hillary without pause, cheered-on by the media gallery.
I believe it's also the rigidity of the professional liberal hampering him. He seems incapable of grasping that people who oppose him aren't stupid and evil, and it shows. That inability to see things from the other side makes such triangulation, indeed, any sort of real compromise at all, impossible.
And the liberal inability to learn from mistakes is going to prevent him from ever understanding how and why It All Went To Shit. He's going to go down in flames.
^^^^^^^^^^
SPAM, Carl
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Thanks, OBH.
I agree, he is going to go down in flames.
ObamaCare however, may yet NOT be dead.
There's credible reports that the Obama administration strategy is to ask democrats in the House to vote for the Senate version unchanged, with the promise that Reid will use reconciliation (51 votes needed) in the Senate to pass 'corrections' later to address the concerns of some House members with the Senate version.
That's political suicide, they would be passing into law a bill which subsidizes abortion with Federal dollars, making us all pay for other people's abortions. The blowback will be unbelievable.
Obama will then try to move on to cap and trade which the business community will fight to the death.
Utility companies will be warning seniors that their electric bills may triple.
It's going to get ugly and the public's rage will be palpable. Their won't be hundreds at townhall meetings this summer, there will be thousands...
The left is committing political seppuku while charging over the cliff edge.
I think Brown delivered. While there are some professional idiots in the Dem party, there are enough -- Bayh being the obvious visible example, who grasp that if they do vote for ObamaCare, they ARE toast, even in districts that are solidly Dem.
The question then becomes what proportion of the Dems are professional idiots?
That will be the key matter for this that gets it passed or not passed.
GB:
I thought Pelosi admitted last week that she didn't have the votes to pass the Senate bill?
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