Election 2012

[Moose]

Skip the falsehoods, Mr. President, and give us a plan
By Dana Milbank,
Published: June 14 - The Washington Post

I had high hopes for President Obama’s speech on the economy. But instead of going to Ohio on Thursday with a compelling plan for the future, the president gave Americans a falsehood wrapped in a fallacy.

The falsehood is that he has been serious about cutting government spending. The fallacy is that this election will be some sort of referendum that will break the logjam in Washington.

Fallacy first. “Both parties have laid out their policies on the table for all to see,” Obama said. “What’s holding us back is a stalemate in Washington between two fundamentally different views of which direction America should take. And this election is your chance to break that stalemate.”

He’s right about the stalemate. But he’s absolutely wrong that November offers an opportunity to break it. No scenario shows either party with a chance of amassing a solid governing majority of the sort Obama had when he took office. The way to break the stalemate is through compromise, not conquest.

And that leads to the falsehood. Despite his claim that “both parties have laid out their policies on the table,” Obama has made no serious proposal to fix the runaway entitlement programs that threaten to swamp the government’s finances.

“My own deficit plan would strengthen Medicare and Medicaid for the long haul by slowing the growth of health-care costs — not shifting them to seniors and vulnerable families,” Obama said. “And my plan would reduce our yearly domestic spending to its lowest level as a share of the economy in nearly 60 years.”

That’s incorrect. As Politifact has pointed out, Obama’s claim that he would reduce annual domestic spending to a percentage of gross domestic product not seen in 60 years is true only if you don’t count the enormous spending on programs such as Medicare. (Obama presumably means he would cut domestic discretionary spending to a 60-year low, a lesser boast.)

Of more concern is Obama’s nonsensical claim that he has a deficit plan that would strengthen Medicare for the long haul. He has called for doubling Medicare spending over the next 10 years, to nearly $1 trillion in 2022. His cuts in the rate of growth amount to just a few percentage points. As The Post’s Lori Montgomery has reported, the president’s 2013 budget marked “the second year in a row Obama has ignored calls to restructure Social Security and Medicare entitlement programs.”

Nothing in Obama’s speech came close to a proposal to fix the debt problem; he dealt with that only at the end of the speech — largely by complaining about Republicans’ refusal to consider higher taxes on the wealthy.

Obama alleged, correctly, that Republicans’ refusal to countenance tax increases scuttled the Bowles-Simpson plan and the Senate’s Gang of Six plan. He argued, also correctly, that Republicans’ refusal to budge on taxes is “the biggest source of gridlock in Washington today.” He’s on solid ground, too, in saying Republicans would end Medicare as we know it.

But none of that is going to help Obama, because he hasn’t come up with a viable alternative. It isn’t enough to claim that the other guys have a bad plan (though they do). As Democratic strategists Stan Greenberg and James Carville wrote in a memo widely discussed this week, Obama needs a “new narrative” that “focuses on what we will do to make a better future for the middle class.”

Instead, Obama’s speech was a rehash of earlier proposals — such as sending more Americans to community college and spending more on clean energy. Those plans for additional spending would be more credible if he had a plausible plan to reform entitlement spending, the biggest driver of future debt.

Undoubtedly, Obama would take heat from his base if he put forth a serious plan along the lines of Bowles-Simpson, whose recommendations he never quite embraced. Doing so would also blunt his political advantage as the defender of Medicare from Republican marauders.

But taking a stand on concrete fixes for the nation’s fiscal problems would get Obama credit for strong leadership — and he would be able to tell the new economic narrative Americans crave. There’s even the remote chance that taking such a gamble would bring Republicans to the table.

Early in 2010, Obama told ABC’s Diane Sawyer that he’d “rather be a really good one-term president than a mediocre two-term president.” Now he is acting in the opposite manner: hoping to limp to a second term without addressing the looming debt crisis — which, as JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon told Congress this week, has contributed to today’s economic malaise.

Even at this late stage, Obama should take a risk. The election, whatever the result, won’t make things any easier.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinio...y.html?hpid=z5

[Ti-Amie]

Has Willard given the Electorate a plan or ismhe just repeating ALEC talking points - talking loud and saying nothing?

We don't know if the President's plans would work because the Republicans are sticking to their vow of doing nothing while Mr. Obama is in the White House.

Sounds to me Dana has swallowed the ALEC line whole. Guess he wants to go back to the good old days before FDR instituted the New Deal.

[Kirkus]

Has Willard given the Electorate a plan or ismhe just repeating ALEC talking points - talking loud and saying nothing?

We don't know if the President's plans would work because the Republicans are sticking to their vow of doing nothing while Mr. Obama is in the White House.

Sounds to me Dana has swallowed the ALEC line whole. Guess he wants to go back to the good old days before FDR instituted the New Deal.

This.

If they say it long enough, "The President doesn't have a plan", people start believing it. It's a tactic the Right has been using for decades.

Unfortunately he isn't King. He needs congress to cooperate. But Speaker Boehner is a hostage of the minority Tea-Baggers in The House, and in the Senate, with the new super-majority rules that Republicans have instituted by record filibustering, the President is lucky he's allowed to use the restroom. Let alone do anything substantial.

[Ti-Amie]

This.

If they say it long enough, "The President doesn't have a plan", people start believing it. It's a tactic the Right has been using for decades.

Unfortunately he isn't King. He needs congress to cooperate. But Speaker Boehner is a hostage of the minority Tea-Baggers in The House, and in the Senate, with the new super-majority rules that Republicans have instituted by record filibustering, the President is lucky he's allowed to use the restroom. Let alone do anything substantial.

Say it again.

[Ti-Amie]

"Reporter" from Tucker Carlson's shop, interrupts the POTUS during his immigration speech and gets put in his place. Why does the right feel they can do this?

http://mediacast.realgravity.com/sha...13b01b22c.html

Hope the link works.

[Kirkus]

"Reporter" from Tucker Carlson's shop, interrupts the POTUS during his immigration speech and gets put in his place. Why does the right feel they can do this?

http://mediacast.realgravity.com/sha...13b01b22c.html

Hope the link works.

I despise people like that. Not Republicans, or Indpendents, or Democrats like that. People like that.

Alternate post: He needs to eat a piece of fruit.

[craighickman]

There Dana goes again.

He's a trip.

[Moose]

There Dana goes again.

He's a trip.

Dana is probably one of the few things that D's and R's agree on in Washington. They both dislike him intensely.

Personally, I find him to be among a mere handful of journalists worth taking the time to read. Most are in someone's pocket, or so slanted, their words start to reek by the second paragraph.

[ponchi101]

This.

If they say it long enough, "The President doesn't have a plan", people start believing it. It's a tactic the Right has been using for decades.

Unfortunately he isn't King. He needs congress to cooperate. But Speaker Boehner is a hostage of the minority Tea-Baggers in The House, and in the Senate, with the new super-majority rules that Republicans have instituted by record filibustering, the President is lucky he's allowed to use the restroom. Let alone do anything substantial.

Sorry. Disagree. Boehner is a 100% accomplice. He knows his job. He is there to stop Obama from accomplishing anything at all.
The GOP policy for the last four years has been clear: Anything Obama is for, we are against. Everything he is against, we are for.
Doesn't matter if it is good for the nation. And the elephant in the room: the man had the skin of Bill Clinton, and the country is in a totally different position.

[Ti-Amie]

Sorry. Disagree. Boehner is a 100% accomplice. He knows his job. He is there to stop Obama from accomplishing anything at all.
The GOP policy for the last four years has been clear: Anything Obama is for, we are against. Everything he is against, we are for.
Doesn't matter if it is good for the nation. And the elephant in the room: the man had the skin of Bill Clinton, and the country is in a totally different position.

Yep.

[dryrunguy]

You're both right. There have been a few instances when Boehner tried to be cooperative. There was a time when he appeared to be ready to cave on the tax increases for the uber-wealthy. The President and Boehner nearly had a deal. But when he went back to House Republicans (not just Tea Party Republicans), they went nuts. He didn't have the votes behind the deal.

So he hasn't been particularly cooperative since. I mean, why bother? He can't muster enough votes to get cooperative legislation through. At least not until the President wants to ban abortion pre-conception, sentence all homosexuals to capital punishment, have ALEC rewrite the U.S. Constitution, and put the Koch brothers in charge of the U.S. Treasury.

[suliso]

Romney seems to have a decent shot of winning now, but if he does the far right will be screwed yet again. The wealthy will get their tax cuts, big business more favorable (for them) regulatory environment but social conservatives will get nothing. Just my two cents...

[dryrunguy]

Romney seems to have a decent shot of winning now, but if he does the far right will be screwed yet again. The wealthy will get their tax cuts, big business more favorable (for them) regulatory environment but social conservatives will get nothing. Just my two cents...

That's the one saving grace with Mitt Romney. There is zero reason to believe that he would actually do any of the things he's been saying to appease the right.

[Kirkus]

Hell, the rich might get their tax cut extension if Obama wins.

[owendonovan]

It seems to me that people have to narrow their scope of what they want their candidate to do best for them; economy, guns, social programs, military, abortion, heath, women's rights, marriage rights, environment, business etc. I don't think any candidate will ever fill the needs/wants of me. I'm lucky if they can fill half. The whole process has to be simplified. Part of the reason this government is so gridlocked is that they have to campaign more than any other part of their job. All this nonsense name calling, reinterpretations, misrepresentations, MSM and the biggest wrench, citizens united has just bastardized the entire process for me personally. They should at least be able to swear at each other.