Tax Cut Deal

I would dearly have loved to see Obama give a big, fat "fuck you" (politely, of course) to the Republicans by refusing to budge on the tax bill--insisting on a bill which extended the Bush tax cuts for the "middle class" (however defined) and refusing to extend them for higher income brackets.  Of course, such a bill was not going to pass, since Republicans in the Senate would have blocked it.  He could have gone out with the strong message that the Republicans were solely responsible for (1) increasing taxes on the middle class, (2) the failure to extend unemployment benefits to the out of work, and (3) the failure to even have a vote on the Start treaty (thereby putting partisan politics ahead of national security), and that the Republicans held all of this hostage in return for tax cuts for the wealthy.  The arrogance of the Republicans in Congress make them vulnerable in this respect.

That would be a strong message, although I have doubts on the Democrats' ability to be heard over the obscene and disgusting noise machine that is Fox News, talk radio, the WSJ editorial page etc. 

Yes, I would have found it emotionally satisfying to see Obama go to war with these assholes.  I suspect Obama has been burning with rage internally over the last several months, if not the last 2 years; most everyone on the left that I know feels that way.

However, the responsible, adult side of me says that he did the right thing by working out a deal, unpleasant as it is.  And we want our Presidents to act responsibly and in an adult-like manner, with the intention of doing what seems best for the country.  I would have liked to have seen him negotiate a better deal here--perhaps also securing agreement from the Republicans to allow an up-or-down vote on DADT repeal and on the Start treaty, perhaps securing agreement to get up-or-down votes on a number of long-pending judicial and other executive nominations, maybe even getting a slightly lower thresshold on the reinstated inheritance tax.  But, of course, I don't know what went into the negotiations here, and I don't know the full amount of leverage each side had, so it's not appropriate for me to Monday morning quarterback the deal.

The President did get relief for the unemployed and some addtiional stimulus-like goodies, but I don't think anyone really believes that this is an adequate substitute for a real, significant additional spending bill.

There is a lot of anger on the left aimed at Obama, but I don't know if these people really appreciate the difficulty here.  The real history of this episode remains to be written, but for the time being, I have some degrree of confidence that the President made a difficult choice, but probably the responsible choice.  It may weaken his and the Democrats' chances in 2012, but I think he took that into account as well. 

Virtually every decision the Bush Administration made was politically motivated (that is, after all, why Karl Rove was, until near the end, the head of domestic policy in the White House), rather than policy-motivated.  And look what the result of that was.  Finally, we get a President who is smart, understands how to seek and deal with advice, hard-working, policy-oriented, and determined to do the right thing.  Unfortunately, in this ugly era, and given the current partisanship-on-steroids, warlike Republican Party, that's not exactly a recipe for electoral success.