See? I make a suggestion and the White House races out to do my bidding.
After pledging to send a job-creation package to Congress next month and daring Republicans to block it, President Obama offered few specifics Tuesday about the form the plan might take as he stuck to a broad outline of how to improve the economy…
…And he continued to hammer away at Republicans in Congress, suggesting they stand in the way of economic growth, even as some Democrats expressed discomfort with what they saw as a potentially divisive stance.
Naturally, this will please progressives, since they’ve been clamoring for confrontation for over a year now. I can include myself in that group since this is exactly what I suggested needed to be done.
Also, naturally, there are Democrats who are terrified of confrontation.
Congressional Democrats and former administration officials gave a mixed review of Obama’s declaration. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) welcomed the president’s feistier tone.
“I heard more of that approach yesterday than I’ve heard in a while, and I think it’s very important,” she said in an interview. “He needs to say now, ‘I’ve tried it your way, and now we have to create an aggressive approach to creating jobs.’ “
But one Senate Democrat, who requested anonymity to speak candidly about the White House, was troubled by the president’s gambit.
Voters are tired of the partisan back-and-forth and it would be a mistake for Obama to present Congress with a large-scale, high-stakes jobs bill and challenge them to pass it, the senator said. A more sensible approach would be for Obama to roll out a series of smaller proposals, the senator said, adding that the public “has very little patience for anything that looks like you’re beating up on the other side.”
I would place a lot of money on this “Senate Democrat” being one Benjamin Nelson of Nebraska. But, who knows? It could be Mary Landrieu or Bill Nelson or Mark Pryor or Mark Warner, for all I know. This is what matters:
White House spokesman Jay Carney wouldn’t comment on the shape or the scope of the plan or say whether it would take the form of legislation.
But Carney reiterated the president’s threat that if Congress failed to act, Obama would not hesitate to leverage that failure politically.
“If they don’t do it,” Carney said, “he will take his arguments to the American people.”
Finally, I hope the White House has come around to seeing things Jared Bernstein’s way:
Jared Bernstein, a former economic advisor to Vice President Joe Biden, said it was futile for Obama to try to accommodate Republicans determined to block the White House agenda. “If the president frames his jobs agenda based on what Republicans will accept, I don’t think he’s going to end up with much,” he said. “He has to prescribe what he and his team believes the country needs and fight for it.”
This presents a challenge because polling (and the last election) shows that the people really do not like stimulus spending. It’s counterintuitive that you get out of debt by going further in to debt. To be effective, they’re going to have to argue for specific programs, like an investment bank or a national jobs fair, rather than talking vaguely about stimulus.
There’s a lot that’s not known yet about how the administration is going to approach this. What will be inside the SuperCommittee and what will be outside? They might try to go for much deeper cuts in the SuperCommittee but attach an investment bank and other stimulative ideas to it as compensation. Or, they might keep things on separate tracks, feeling that the SuperCommittee needs to pass something, while the GOP can maintain their obstruction on the outside where he can make the most political hay out of it.
It does appear, however, that the Grand Conciliator is going to stay on vacation for a while while the Great Campaigner gears up for a fight.
Oy. I see a public that eats it up with a large spoon when it’s Republicans beating up on Democrats. I gotta believe some of that public are independents who like a politician who fights. Especially a politician who fights a bully.
You’re confusing the response of GOP partisans and movement conservatives with the general public.
Before President Obama could pull off being in any way confrontational with the R’s, he first had to build his bona fides, especially with the I’s. That’s who will elect or reject him. He doesn’t really have to worry about his “base”. He’s at 80% approval with them now and that will only go up. The I’s, though, have always been sceptical but PBO’s willingness to do what people want, i.e. reach common ground, will prove to be what now let’s him get somewhat heavy handed, though he will be very careful not to overstep.
I trust that he has thought through what he will do, that it will generate much wailing from the R’s and DINOs, but that it will be a program seen as reasonable by most people, especially after the debt debacle in which he came out looking better than anyone else.
Do you have any clue what “independents” want? I doubt it? I bet they like their Social Security and Medicare just fine the way it is. Which would make them DFH’s on at least one issue. I bet they’d like jobs too!!
It’s crucial to bear in mind, as I think you imply, that not all independents are alike. I classify myself as an independent, but let’s just say that I’m no “centrist” or “moderate”. There are some who might be “centrist” (and I suspect they aren’t quite yet willing to kill off the last vestiges of our social safety net), some are far right (I probably could find a few living in compounds not far away from where I currently reside), and still others are far left. These latter independents will never vote for Obama in a million years.
Then, regarding Social Security and Medicare, they’re conservatives. Like it or not, a lot more Americans self-identify as conservatives than as progressives/liberals. Well, preserving the New Deal is a conservative position. Democrats can rightfully claim to be the real conservatives in the US, while Republicans are radicals.
Say, do you think that “troubled,” conflict-averse Democrats who disagree with Obama’s rhetoric and policy might have some bearing on why the party has a hard time cohering around a single, resonant, progressive message? Nah, that couldn’t be. Probably Obama wants to smother liberalism and shore up the status quo because that’s just the way he is.
If it is Bad Nelson, the faster that SOB gets defeated, the better. Him and HolyJoe. Ungrateful bastards they are.
Got a Nebraska progressive Democrat to replace him with?
That’s the problem with almost all of these people (except DiFi). Progressives do not have strength in the state.
Then how about somebody tat’s somewhere between where Nelson is and a progressive?
Know any state level folks in Nebraska? I don’t.
Fantasy candidate: Maybe Warren Buffett (the Sage of Omaha) will run. 🙂
Scott Kleeb, don’t know what he’s doing since 08
http://www.scottkleeb.com/
It better be bold. If it’s an infrastructure bank and free trade agreements, he’ll lose the argument.
Straightforward infrastructure investment, backfilling state budgets to put state workers back to work, direct federal hiring for programs, and putting the deficit cutting in the backend of the debt package. Those are the things the public will back him on. Along with a financial transfer tax and closing corporate tax loopholes. And letting the Bush tax cuts expire (let that one be a do-nothing).
But he will have to ask for a Congress that he can work with and put the Bens and Marys and the Bills and DiFi’s and Marks on the spot. Change or let a Republican do what you are already doing.
Don’t think he’ll get backing for hiring more public workers. He should do it, but most people are pretty conditioned now to hate government workers. That’s why attacking them has been such a big part of the GOP strategy.
If he’s running against Congress, the only backing he needs is from the grassroots. And ordinary folks understand how infrastructure projects put people back to work.
Polls consistently show that public employees unions are popular.
Look at what’s happening in Wisconsin and Ohio.
I think Walker and Kasich made the same mistake you just made.
I agree completely that it has to be bold. I would add, however, that Obama operates on his own timetable, and almost invariably it lags the pace that most of us feel at the gut level.
Since the deal struck in the wake of the 2010 elections, which felt awful at the time but which has looked more and more crafty ever since, he has moved public sentiment inexorably towards a broad acceptance of the need for raising taxes on the wealthy (with a big assist from the Tea Baggers). His timetable and goal, I think, is to build and build towards election day 2012, so that by this time next year there will be momentum such that he can win with what passes for a mandate. I hope Rick Perry can stick around awhile to help out…..
no offense bill, but riddle me this: if what we accomplished in 2008…a democratic president, house and senate…wasn’t a mandate, what will one in 2012 look like and what will it accomplish?
more hoping for change that never seems to come except for those at the top of the political and financial food chains?
just asking.
In 2008, voters gave Democrats a mandate but the content of it was different for different states. And it wasn’t a clear mandate because Republicans were not shellacked in the Senate. And Joe Lieberman was in the kingbird’s seat. Until the six months that both Franken and Kennedy were in the Senate. And then only because Bernie Sanders could be counted on to vote with the Democratic caucus.
The Republicans responded to that mandate by doing something that has never before been done in the Senate. They opposed everything, fought everything, and only relented when they could make the legislation look unpopular for the President. On healthcare, Democrats passed it on reconciliation (an eventuality that had be prepared for with a resolution in March 2009) with barely over 50 votes.
In 2012, instead of campaigning for “change”, Obama can seek a mandate for a specific set of popular policies that move away from rightwing positions. If he gets a Congress under those circumstances, he can use that as a hammer on them to stay in line. If not, we are in back where we were.
The thing about is that “popular” is subject to manipulation by the corporate media.
TH, can Obama say in his stump speeching something like, “And as long as you’re in that voting booth — give me a congress that is actually going to work with me to put this country back on track … vote for [local name of choice] .
TH, can Obama say in his stump speeching something like, “And as long as you’re in that voting booth — give me a congress that is actually going to work with me to put this country back on track … vote for [local name of choice] .
Let us hope so. And let us hope that he goes after getting upsets from the Republican ranks.
That’s the way it used to be done when parties helped candidates instead of the reverse.
Once upon a time, with let’s say a southern, white Democratic President (i.e. the three Dems prior to Obama), that may have constituted a mandate of sorts, but after Clinton and then Bush for two terms, it will take something more. And the Dems won handily in 2006 and 2008, so the pendulum was due to swing back. Oh, and psst, in case nobody noticed, Obama is BLACK!!!
So I would argue that yes, there was a mandate of sorts: a large majority agreed that Bush sucked by the time 2008 rolled around, this after a majority of Americans had realized already in 2004 that Bush sucked but still managed to produce a close enough re-electon for him to steal it again. But 2008 wasn’t actually a mandate for the kind of transformational change that so many progressives projected onto their fantasy version of Obama. The fact is, the country as a whole wasn’t there at that point, and I credit Obama for realizing that. He has put points on the board during his first term in an incremental way, while building and maintaining a lot of good will in the country at large.
The inability of so many on the left to see this reality as he did (with notable exceptions such as Booman and Al Giordano), or for that matter to accept that Ben Nelson is Ben Nelson, Joe Lieberfuck is Joe Lieberfuck, etc.–is part of Obama’s burden on top of the ungodly mess Bush left behind. He knew in advance that he’d be taking loads of criticism from the left while adopting a longer term strategy.
I’ve said this here before on a number of occasions, that “change” to Obama is what he could accomplish in two terms, not one. Part of the strategy is to move as many things forward as possible with the least amount of fanfare. So just as I thought, the seemingly glacial pace of progress on gay rights has actually amounted to quite a bit of progress, much of it incremental and under the radar, without a lot of rancor from the right. The stimulus had a lot of green measures, for which he gets no credit; the military is quietly transitioning to biofuels; auto companies have now quietly agreed to 56 mpg on all vehicles by 2025, etc. I expect him to unwind the damned wars if re-elected. I expect a range of things to be pushed for that we all want, but the timing is his and not what we want, when we want it. In other words, I think he knows what he’s doing.
After the crash that directly preceded his election, few things were going to be harder politically than setting the wreck of a country back on sound footing economically. Bringing the country around to a consensus on raising taxes on the wealthy has been a much harder proposition than meets the eye because it is such an easy issue for the Republicans to demagogue since the populace has been brainwashed by 30 years of relentless propaganda. Those who look at polls that now consistently show a majority favoring raising taxes on the wealthy fail to realize, I think, just how difficult it has been to bring about this change in a truly meaningful, actionable way. Last fall was NOT the time to have the tax fight because the country was still susceptible to the right wing’s counterarguments. So I think his plan has been to build good will among a significant majority towards a re-election that will be very much about some of the progressive change those of us here hunger for–in other words, a mandate of the sort that didn’t really exist in 2008.
It’s interesting that so many here keep bringing up Giordano. He hasn’t commented much in the last year or so, but from what I can tell, his position on the Obama as President is probably a bit different from his thoughts on Obama as candidate and Obama as ideal after the continued events in Mexico, Egypt and Afghanistan.
It will be interesting to hear from him as 2012 draws nearer.
” if what we accomplished in 2008″
…led to the passage of the most ambitious legislative agenda of any President since LBJ, if not FDR.
[OT] When I read “DiFi” it looks like a contraction of “Die in a fire.”
The irrational hatred of stimulus spending knows no bounds. There’s a lady at my office who drives on a particular freeway every day, and was complaining a a while back about the new flexible median safety barriers being installed on that accident-prone road as part of a stimulus project.
She positively dripped disdain when she said “It’s a stimulus project” as if it was some rare form of cancer.
And she still drives that road, every day. Without getting killed.
Got to give the GOP credit, I don’t know how they got that mentality to take hold, but there are many, many people who just hate any kind of government spending, even if it benefits them directly.
No, madam, it’s a highway project.
Were you expecting to get stimulated?
I’ve started to read suggestions about using Fannie and Freddie to help people screwed by the housing market. This has been presented as something the administration can do WITHOUT relying on Congress and it will improve the economy. I’m looking into it, it would be a shame if it could work and isn’t tried.
Also, Greenwald is pissed as usual.
My suspicion of the One. Senate. Democrat.
Katfood Kommission Kent
go for it, Mr. President.
and to the Senate Democrats….
GROW A PAIR
Maybe if they were primaried more often, they’d get more used to it. Just sayin’.
The irony plus moment will be when he lays the Plan out (please let him insert full copy of the Progressive Caucus Plan) and the American majority blinks a couple of times and then races to embrace it. It will be like feeding a starving nation meat and potatoes.
Halftime is over and there are just another 20 minutes until the end of the game. Forget the field goals, we have to be clever and daring if we want to win this M**F** game!
Here is the situation. The House of Representatives is locked up and will not be a part of anything Obama. So in order for our game plan to have a chance, we have to GO AROUND them! This is critical point #1 of the framework structure for Obama’s new JOBS PLAN. The plan must skip any involvement of the HOUSE, period. Never mind wasting valuable time by proposing infrastructure projects in Republican districts just to dare the Republicans to vote against them. Fuck that! This tactic is just a stupid waste of time. Remember we only have 20 minutes until the end of the game, and the American people are keenly watching the clock and the scoreboard.
The next framework structure item for the JOBS PLAN is to have our coach (coach Obama) call timeout and get the team off the field so that he can give them the new strategy for the game. It is important that the coach tell the team EXACTLY WHAT TO DO IN DETAIL and not rely on moralistic goals and generalities culled from other writers and incorporated into his sideline speech. The value of the coach’s own personal pep talk is that not only will all of the team players be on the same playbook page, but the coach himself will better understand the new strategy. Therefore #2 is to make the President the CREATOR-In-CHIEF of any JOBS PLAN coming out of the White House.
The third part of the framework structuring President Obama’s new JOBS PLAN is to tap American academia for new revolutionary ideas for creating real employment in the current environment, both economic and political. The best most innovative minds are not sitting around on the beltway, but are walking the halls of American colleges and universities. To accomplish this the President should form a panel composed of select presidents of universities whom in turn will design the schedules and structure for a national competition among institutions of higher learning requesting proposals for a plan that will quickly increase the employment in America.
The fourth part of the framework for structuring the President’s JOBS PLAN is a supervisory management department to provide constant accurate monitoring of schedules and fiscal accounting for all agencies participating in the President’s JOBS PLAN. This one department will require the greatest amount of human and machine resources in respect to the entire program. It will be responsibility of this group to monitor, interface and track the activities of all local entities participating in the President’s Jobs Plan using PERT and CPA programs.
Obviously it will be difficult to secure the huge amount of funds needed to perorm the highway and bridge infrastructure upgrade work needed in America without the permission of the House of Representatives. BUT there is sure as hell a lot the President can do to secure the necessary materials and pay many local salaries on a host of smaller more diverse projects.
For example the President could ask for corporations to list their surplus materials for donation to be used in government projects. He could also ask the same of local governments across the nation. A data bank catalog listing these respective donations could be cross referenced, and requisitioned by participatory local governments. Once the request is approved, the materials could then be dropshipped to the participatory communities to be used in their local building or rehab projects.
Once the materials are available at the local site, the government would only have to pay the lowest bid contractor to do the work. This type of program would be ideally suited for a number of local school rehab projects, including upgrading schools for Internet access by students.
This suggestion may not be the golden Cadillac that traditional federal government likes to roll in when facilitating large scale infrastructure projects. But we have to start somewhere and start quickly. Believe me, just a few hundred successful projects using this approach will quickly bring the entire nation on board n a hurry, including a majority of Republicans. Forget the 87 newly elected House Libertarian Republicans, they will NEVER vote for anything perceived of assistance to the American federal government. My mantra to these Republicans was spoken with passion many years ago by H. Rap Brown who yelled, “Move on over, or we will move on over you!”.
Peace…..
It is so much easier than that.
The first step is to travel around the country and talk to people and see what their ideas are. The speech stuff is bait for the news media.
The second step is to frame a plan that does not require delays through over-supervision but has a pretty good chance of funds neither being defrauded or wasted.
That plan is pretty straightforward:
The funds then go to 3080 counties, hundreds of thousands of other government entities, and backstop local nonprofits working on community projects and national and state park maintenance.
The consequences are better infrastructure, energy savings, and workers who have learned job skills as well as some technical skills.
This is common sense.
Then go over the heads of Congress to the people and ask them to pressure the Congress to enact this jobs plan. Get Republican governors who’ve been cutting budgets to say out loud, “No, we don’t want federal money to backfill our budgets.” Let the voters who voted for them know where these governors stand. (And let most of the funds, except those used by the state itself, bypass governors and go directly to the local level.)
Then, get a CBO projection of the tax revenue that result from this short-term stimulus. Because this will bring that $3T or so cash that corporations are holding into actual investment in jobs.
It’s not that hard, and it doesn’t take more academic welfare. Fifty years of academic studies show clearly what works.
The response on the front page of Daily Kos is…wait for it…to attack Obama for also saying we should cut the long-term deficit. Ohnoes, what kind of Democrat thinks we shouldn’t run huge deficits when we’re no longer in a recession? I told you he wasn’t a Keynesian.
Quick, erase the a line I just drew! I only put it there because I was sure there was no way he’d cross it!
If the Democrats actually acted like some progressives think they should, they the Republican caricature of tax & spend Democrats would be true.
What’s the opposite of never raising taxes under any circumstances?
How about never cutting spending under any circumstances?
Fortunately, the Democrats actually have a good record of fiscal responsibility. It would be even better if the Republicans weren’t so difficult to deal with.