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The Spectacle Blog
The president’s little hissy fit yesterday over the tax cuts deal seemed almost perfectly designed to inflame angry feelings among his own base while ensuring he gets no goodwill from the other side. In other words, all the downsides of compromise and none of the benefits (well, almost none — as I’ve argued before, things would be worse for him if taxes actually went up).
Politically, Obama is starting to look like what in sports is known as a frontrunner: someone who plays almost flawlessly while ahead, but can’t play from behind. The obvious counterargument to this is that he ran a great campaign for the Democratic nomination while Hillary was still way ahead in the polls. But Hillary’s lead was based on name recognitition and inertia more than anything else. This time, Obama is playing from behind due to his own faults.
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More Blog Posts by W. James Antle, III
http://spectator.org/blog/2010/12/08/petulant-triangulation
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JP| 12.8.10 @ 12:07PM
I think it is clear what the President's playbook will be for the final 2 years of his term. It will evolve from Blaming Bush to Blaming Boehnner. Boehnner and the House GOP will be attacked and there will be attempts to isolate them. On the other hand, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to see Obama court GOP RINOS like the Maine Twins, Lugar, and perhaps Lindsay Graham. Obama and the MSM will attempt to paint a picture of what a "good" Republican should aspire to (Lugar, Olympia Snowe, perhaps Scott Brown), and a "bad" Republican (Boehnner and company).
However, the economy will roll on (perhaps down), ObamaCare will continue to be implemented, and who knows what will occur overseas. Politics doesn't happen in a vacuum. And the President cannot afford too many more mis-fires. He got himself into this mess. And I don't think he was the skills to get himself out of it. Of course, the GOP does have a history of pulling out defeat from the jaws of victory.
Expel "The Ruling Class"!| 12.8.10 @ 12:58PM
JP, that last sentence in your post should have been typed in all capital letters. That sentence encapsulates why The GOP cannot & should not be trusted & why B.O. may yet survive his own disastrous first term & be re-elected again. Especially if The GOP "leadership" send up another McCain - type RINO against B.O. in two years. Will they learn & re-embrace conservatism instead of RINOism? History says no.
Conservative Bob| 12.8.10 @ 1:41PM
I think much of the dust up with the left is theater.
This back and forth with the house Dem leadership is all stage craft meant to make O look like he is willing to make the tough decisions... they are building an archive of clips showing him willing to take on the base.
When the Lame Duck is over the song will be different, we are in that artificail window when the reality of the elections is masked by the deadmen walking who still comprise a majority in the house and senate.
You think we are seeing thin skinned petulance now, wait until the new congress is seated in January.
Alan Brooks| 12.8.10 @ 4:43PM
The reason you have doubts that the GOP is up to it, is because the unity of the '80s is gone. The Right is segmented into RINOs, libertopians, Tea Partiers...
So is the Left, but why is that any sort of a positive spin on the GOP?:
'we Republicans are clueless, but the pinkos are divided, too'
Such is damning your own selves with faint praise.
Christopher Holland| 12.8.10 @ 8:05PM
Read the biographies of great leaders and invariably they show that the man or woman had to cope with long periods of failure and rejection before they eventually broke through and achieved their objectives. They had to have the character and fortitude and good judgement to stick it out. Obama never had that, and either did George W Bush - they had very easy runs to the Presidency, they were never tested, they never had to show their character and good judgement by overcoming serious opposition over a sustained period of time. Bush was a weak President, he had a lot of flaws and Obama is much, much worse. The failure of Bush was predictable and the Obama train wreck even more so. He simply has none of the qualities that his office requires.