David Brooks complains:

Obama enthusiastically perpetuates the myth that the American people can have everything they want without a dose of shared sacrifice. They can have health care, education reform, even a cure for cancer, and 98 percent of them need pay nothing. The burdens of progress will be borne by the rich while everyone else can enjoy their tax cuts and go shopping.

Brooks comes to this conclusion by looking at Obama’s submitted budget outline. He doesn’t have the best reading comprehension because there is no line-item in the outline for ‘curing cancer’ but his overall point is salient, if misleading. Obama raises taxes on the top 2% of income earners while generally lowering taxes on the rest of America. The normal Republican response to progressive taxation of this kind is to attempt to convince more than 50% of the population that their taxes have actually gone up. Brooks violates the spirit of this argument by stipulating up front that Obama has in fact raised taxes on only two percent of taxpayers. That’s a good start, but Bobo finds this fact troubling. Where is the shared sacrifice? It’s an ironic question to ask after eight years of a Bush administration that fought wars on our children’s dime (with interest). As for the other 98%, it’s not really true that they won’t have to make any sacrifices, it’s just that it will seem like a bargain to see some elements of the federal budget slashed when they get affordable health care, better schools, and a sensible energy policy in return.

Brooks’ real problem, though, is that the administration is not repeating the same mistakes the Clintons made on health care. By outlining principles that they want included in any health care reform and then deferring to Congress to work out the details, the Obama administration hopes to avoid seeing their bill rejected by Congress. But Brooks thinks the only responsible way to do a health care bill is the way the Clintons did it.

The bigger problem is health care. This is an issue where everybody wants benefits they don’t pay for, where perverse incentives have created an expensive system that doesn’t deliver results. This is an area where aggressive presidential leadership is mandatory…

…The balance of power will be clear. The White House will have no dominating figure to ride herd day to day now that Tom Daschle is out of the picture. Instead, the same old chairmen habituated by the same old interest groups will dominate everything…

…there will be a wide array of committee chairmen in the House and Senate scrambling for influence, maneuvering with and against each other through a Machiavellian process of secret negotiations and back-room deals…

Even though the budget is not all one would have hoped, I’d trust the folks in the Obama administration to craft a decent health care plan before I’d trust the Congressional Old Bulls.

I might better trust the Obama administration, too, but the important thing is to pass the bill. All the good intentions and sensible policy in the world doesn’t add up to a hill of beans if it is never translated into law. There may be a degree of backroom negotiation in the crafting of the bill, but there will also be many hearings in both the House and Senate. It will much less secretive than Hillary’s task force. Maybe Brooks is upset that Obama’s approach is going to work this time. One thing I’d agree with Brooks about is this:

If you watched Obama’s magnificent speech Tuesday night, you got the impression that he bestrides Washington like a colossus. He imposes his authority in ways large and small, purging old habits.

That was, indeed, the impression. Reality is a bit messier, and that’s precisely why Obama is deferring to Congress in the crafting of the health care bill. Obama isn’t a colossus of will, he’s a colussus of brains. Unlike, say, John Boehner.