Unfortunately, Mark McKinnon is right:
Republicans also are gaming how conservative Democrats like [Sen. Jim] Webb [D-VA] will figure into the new calculus. “The big buzz in D.C. is whether Obama tacks to the left to appease his base or moves toward the center to appeal to moderates,” says Republican strategist Mark McKinnon. “The reality is he doesn’t have a choice. Not if he wants to actually get anything done in the next two years. There is a bloc of 11 [Democratic] senators who will be up for reelection from conservative states, and they are likely to establish a formidable group that will block any progressive legislation that is high on the liberal agenda.”
This actually understates the case. How is anything high on the liberal agenda going to pass through John Boehner’s House to even be given consideration in the Senate? It’s important to get some progressive victories in the lame-duck because we’ll be playing defense for the next two years. And, no, it won’t be the White House’s preference.
Also of interest are pages three and four of the Rolling Stone post-election interview with Democratic pollster Peter Hart, David Gergen, and Matt Taibbi. For example, when Peter Hart was asked what the administration and the Democrats must do now, he responded by saying that they must focus on jobs.
Hart: First, get the economy working. Job one is the only job, and that’s getting people back to work.
There’s only one problem. The House Republicans don’t believe that the government should spend any money to create jobs. And, even if they did, the Senate Republicans have veto-power (through the filibuster rule) over most appropriations and all non-budgetary legislation.
Obviously, there are things that the president can do unilaterally that will be pleasing to the progressive base. And he doesn’t have to follow Clinton’s 1995-96 strategy too closely, although he does have to position himself as the champion of all the popular things the government does that the GOP wants to gut or privatize. He can’t avoid a fight, so he’ll need to adopt a populist tone and leave all that “Change We Can Believe In” by the wayside.
It’s going to be an ugly, depressing two years.
We can figure 8 years under Bush was a walk in the park compared to the next two years.
It’s really gonna suck big time. And it shouldn’t considering we still have the senate and a democratic president.
Why is that anyway? Spineless comes to mind and worrying about how they’ll get re elected in 2012 if they appear–GASP- too librul.
God help us.
you know, this spine vs. spinelessness thing is way overdone.
The truth is that it is very hard to pass anything through Congress. It’s designed that way. In our system, we have a very strong president as far as our foreign policy is concerned, but a very weak one when it comes to enacting laws. And, because we’re the party that is interested in passing laws, we’re always at a disadvantage.
Obama could have shouted from the rooftops and stomped his feet and pounded his lectern and screamed holy hell about banksters and really gone after Wall Street with full-throated fury, and it wouldn’t have made a lick of difference to Mitch McConnell. It might have saved us some seats and maybe even control of the House. It might have been better politics. But we’d probably not have passed any stimulus at all. We’d probably not have passed a health care bill or any Wall Street reform. But, even if we did, we’d still not have squeezed more out of the lemon. Congress works by math. And the Republicans had no fear because they had no endangered members left to be fearful.
That is still true in the Senate, where Scott Brown is the only Republican member up for reelection in 2012 who has more to fear from his left than from his right.
Spine doesn’t work against the invulnerable.
I am simply talking about some good old fashioned deal making. Arm twisting. Tit for tat. Quid pro quo. I agree that obama going out screaming and yelling about stuff is not the answer. How about not caving in before even getting started? How about Reid calling for up and down votes for stuff and let the rethugs not pass it? how about someone standing up for the unemployed? For the molestation of Americans at our airports? I get it that it may be impossible to get a thing done. I am just asking that someone try without folding like a cheap tent before even getting going.
A new DNC chair, a new press secretary and a few progressive advisors in the WH wouldn’t hurt either. And the dems need to stand together, come up with a real plan, get their messaging straight, put on their big boy pants and do something. Hold that veto pen over their heads. Then we may be able to get some stuff passed that isn’t totally conservative and would help the majority of Americans. The base, the donors and even the indies are sick of this caving in on every single thing. Deals can be made on the tax cuts, the debt ceiling and unemployment extension. Problem is, no one seems to want to present any good deals.
Okay, you make a deal with Mitch McConnell. You figure out a way to twist Tom Coburn’s arm. You tell me how to get Rand Paul to lift his holds. You explain to John Boehner why he has to pass more stimulus to help ease unemployment.
Or, if you want to look backwards, you pass a health care bill without cutting a deal with PhRMA. You tell me how to get Joe Lieberman to agree to lower the Medicare eligibility age or to get Blanche Lincoln to vote for a public option on the Finance Committee.
I don’t want to sound defeatist, but we have only the illusion of power. Until people have more to fear from opposing progressive ideas than in supporting them, we’re stuck in the middle.
“You tell me how to get Rand Paul to lift his holds. “
You change the Senate rules. If Nebraska will go along.
I agree with you for the most part over this, but Obama still sucks at making a deal. Didn’t you read the New Yorker piece about how the climate bill fell? While I expected any football to be removed before Obama went to kick it, Huckleberry complained that because Obama gave away the entire store before the negotiations started, before his party was even told, that he had nothing to come to the table with.
That’s why I got so pissed during the campaign when he said he was open to off shore oil drilling. Some of my friends who were employed by the campaign — I knew a few people in charge of offices around the country, a few in PA, Las Vegas, and Richmond, VA — told me how he was “taking the wind out of their sails.” I adamantly asserted that, no, he did not, and he was leaving himself no room to negotiate.
He sure does suck at making deals, except with the insurance companies, big pharma, the banks and Wall St. Then it appears he’s a real deal maker.
Just not for regular Americans. Some one said the other day that they think Obama was actually PUT into office by the corporations to carry their water. I never ever would have believed the Manchurian theory until lately. I mean he is like Jeykll and Hyde, On the stump he’s railing against the rethugs, standing up for us. Then when the election is over, it’s back to capitulation, not using his bully pulpit.
It’s getting a little weird. I loved the guy. Worked on his campaign tirelessly and cried on election night.
Now? Not so much.
Always seems the Rep figure that just by printing that bumper sticker that jobs will come. And, I did enjoy Taibbi in that article taking Gergen & Hart both to task. Gergen was so busy taking a page out of Peggy Noonan’s script he forgot who he was in the room with.
Exactly. Gergen isn’t that bright, but he seems to forget that Taibbi isn’t very impressed by Gergen. If he read any of Taibbi’s writing, he’s know that. My guess is that Gergen has only read Taibbi’s RS work(not any of his books), if that.
Move to the center? By doing what? Re-doing HAMP to make it work in favor of the person that might lose his house? Most would consider that the position of the “center.” But it’s also a position of the left. At any rate, McKinnon is full of crap. That mythical “center” crap only exists in their minds and at the cocktail hours they go to at bigot Sally Quinn’s house. Besides, what McKinnon forgets is: Webb needs those Northern VA liberals to turn out if he has any shot at winning, so Webb can’t turn too far to the right(see Creigh Deeds). The only way tacking to the right works is if George Allen goes for a rematch, and even then I am not so sure. But if they want to play with fire …..
I see no reason why Webb would tack to the right after all the complaining he’s done about there being no such thing as white privilege and running to Real Clear Politics to complain about the Democrats not being the party of FDR anymore.
Rumor is, Webb may not run and Tim Kaine might. Probably against George macaca Allan.
I don’t know what I think about that.
No to Tim Kaine. If he runs, progressives need to get Tom Perriello to primary.
Kaine’s a good guy; I did shots with him at a tailgate. But after seeing him head the DNC and such, I’d rather he retire from politics. Besides, his type of Democrat is not the way I want to go, and Perriello can win.
yup. Kaine is too much like centrist Warner. Although I don’t know if Tom could beat Allan. He’s pretty popular still with the nutjobs here who put Hurt in.
But it would be one hell of a campaign. Kaine needs to go be a lawyer somewhere or a DA prosecutor. He needs to get out of politics. I like Kaine, met him several times, very charming but not progressive at all.
Can we stop with the doom and gloom? I don’t get it. In the big scheme of things the next two years and the electoral fates of 11 senators are not a big deal. They just aren’t. What’s going to happen, not enough done to turn the economy around? That was already happening. Shameful coddling of the oligarchs of finance? That would change what? Nothing done to address catastrophic climate change? Endless blather about deficits? That was the situation the last two years. Endless wars in southern asia? We’re already there.
What’s important is that we promote candidates who have a clear vision of the future, who speak the truth, who speak for real values that we can all share, and who mobilize the massive bloc of potential voters who are out there waiting for real leadership. I think the tea-party thing is bogus but they did something the democratic party should be doing already: putting exciting candidates out there and not morosely playing defense.
More like ‘….running a purity slate and getting clocked, losing seats that otherwise could have been won’.
So you’re saying having integrity is the same thing as being a wacko? That’s why that handful of candidates lost. It’s like you’re saying that because being a benighted crank=having integrity on the right, then having integrity must equal being a crank on the left, which is beltway level up-is-downism.
Run a hundred Kuciniches, win 30 seats, feel real good.
Helluva strategy.
Yeah, no. Not what I’m talking about, which is actually just “the left wing of the possible” dude. 70 million voted for Obama. I’m not an expert but I don’t think we get those people to the polls by letting lukewarm defenders of the status quo define the party. And if Obama turns out to be that person, we have to accept the situation like adults and look for other legitimate voices and not waste all our energy excoriating the president.
The President is one guy.
Control of Congress goes to a coalition, and every coalition is going to have a right wing. And in America, the right wing of a mildly-left wing party is going to be pretty right wing.
We’re electing all the Pete DeFazios and Bernie Sanders we can, already. The growth has to come from the other margin.
Been there, done that. Tom Perriello lost big time here in VA. What I see more and more is the good, electable folks don’t want to run. Too much money to raise, years of campaigning, very invasive of one’s family, the media circus etc.
“The big buzz in D.C. is whether Obama tacks to the left to appease his base or moves toward the center to appeal to moderates,”
how can Obama move to the Center without moving to the left?
considering the mod/con nature of his behavior in years 1 & 2