A couple of days ago I ran a quote from Thomas Mann wondering when Obama was going to finally figure out that Republicans had declared war on him and had no interest in negotiating over legislation. Greg Sargent went back and followed up with another question: what should Obama actually do? Mann’s answer:
During his first two years in office, Obama had an ambitious legislative agenda to pursue. He had to adapt his strategies to the realities of Congress, most importantly the promiscuous use of the filibuster by Republicans in the Senate and the unreliability of support on many difficult issues of a half dozen or more Democratic senators. Repeated and extended efforts at negotiations with Republicans were essential, if only to deliver all 60 Democrats/Independents once
Franken was elected and Specter switched parties. His campaign rhetoric on a postpartisan politics, however naive or disengenuous, had to be given a try.
The context in the 112th Congress is entirely different. With no expectations of passing important new legislation or of garnering anything from Republicans in Congress but political bait, he should pursue his substantive agenda where he can act on his own and use Congress as a place to submit a genuinely serious set of proposals to deal with the country’s more serious challenges (with no expectation that any will pass) and couple them with high visibility straight talk to the American people about the course he is proposing.
That sounds about right, if only because Obama has no real choice in the matter. The more interesting question is how effective he can be in fighting back against the conservative media machine. He hasn’t shown much talent at that so far.
That still leaves the lame duck session, though, and I’m surprised there hasn’t been more movement there. Obama wants to pass DADT repeal, New START, and raise the debt ceiling. Conservatives want permanent extension of all tax cuts. That sure sounds like fertile ground for a deal to me. I’d be pretty surprised if there weren’t half a dozen Republicans basically willing to make a trade: their votes on the Dem priorities in return for Dems agreeing to hold a vote on permanent extension of the tax cuts. After all, none of the three Dem priorities are real killers for moderate Republicans in safe seats (or seats not coming up for reelection soon). And permanent extension of the tax cuts isn’t that big a deal for Dems. I’d trade it away for those other three things and live to fight another day on taxes.
Maybe there’s just not enough floor time for all those things. I don’t know. But it sure seems as if a deal here is doable.
