Urk. I just gave up on the presidential press conference. When Obama declared that Americans rejected Democrats in part because “We were in such a hurry to get things done that we didn’t change how things got done,” I checked out.
Nobody cares about this stuff — they care about results. Nobody really cares about earmarks; they’re just code for spending less (less on somebody else, of course, not me).
Nobody cares about civility and bipartisanship, which in practice are code for Democrats giving in to Republican demands. Nobody cares about parliamentary maneuvers: we can argue about the role of health reform in the election, but I bet not one voter in 50 knows or cares that it was passed using reconciliation (as were the sacred Bush tax cuts we must, must retain).
If Obama had used fancy footwork and 2 AM sessions to pass a big public works program, and this program had brought unemployment down, Republicans would be screaming about the process — and Democrats would have comfortably held control of Congress. Remember the voter backlash against the way Medicare drug benefits were passed? Neither do I.
Oh, by the way — nobody cares about the deficit, either.
Nobody cares about this stuff until Democrats do it. Look at all the hateful ads Republicans ran (even
Fox), and the huge uproar that met Conway's Aqua Buddha ad and Grayson's Webster ad.
Nobody cares about reconciliation until Dems decided to use it for health care reform, then a lot of people, left and right, were crying foul. Did anyone even hear about Bush's use of reconciliation from the media? During the final weeks before health care passed, even the morning news clips on the Weather Channel were mentioning that Democrats planned to use the process. What about all the polling on reconciliation?
Again, the strength of the policies do not determing the outcome of mid-term elections, and Krugman claiming that somehow "fancy footwork" could have resulted in a significantly larger bill is completely unrealistic.
Does Krugman really believe that unemployment at 1 percent lower would have made a huge difference yesterday? Unemployment had climbed to 10.3 percent and is now at 9.6. Would 9 percent have made a big difference? What about 8.5 percent?
This is a good one: "Remember the voter backlash against the way Medicare drug benefits were passed? Neither do I."
Yet voters seemed to eat up Republican distortions that Obama cut Medicare.
Also, it's really interesting what Krugman takes away from the press conference and what
Greg Sargent takes away.
Dear Paul, it's time to stop pretending the useless sniping at the President makes you more progressive.
On edit: Voters did care about process when Republicans shut down the government.
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