Legal Commentary

Then And Now: The Price Of A Lack Of Audacity

By Big Tent Democrat

TPM, February 2009:

A Win is a Win

Longtime reader commenting on the stimulus deal:

Like everyone else, I'm waiting for the details. But from what I've heard so far, this seems to be a remarkable triumph for the new president. A month ago, Obama economists Romer and Bernstein released job-creation projections that "assumed a package just slightly over the $775 billion currently under discussion." Lo and behold, the final bill comes in at $789 billion. It reportedly includes Obama's proposed tax cuts, comprising almost exactly the same proportion of the overall package. For the past month, media attention has focused on all the changes to the package, and on the controversies it has engendered. Obama has been criticized for failing to forge a bipartisan consensus, for not safeguarding his priorities, and for not taking a sufficiently aggressive role in the negotiations on the Hill. So it's worth stepping back to take note of the fact that the final package looks remarkably like what Obama has wanted all along. In fact, it's closer to that original proposal than to either the House or Senate versions of the bill. Remarkable.

FTR, TalkLeft in February 2009. Now, Josh Marshall today:

People grouse a lot about the shortcomings of the Health Care Reform bill or Wall Street Reform. Myself, not so much. But that's because my politics are a little different. From the perspective of someone who believes in single payer, certainly the Reform bill doesn't go far enough. All that said, though, I think we're seeing that the critical misjudgments -- both political and in policy terms were made well, well before. All the way back to the first months of the administration, when Tea Parties were still about tea and the president's approval ratings were still sky high. It was the Stimulus Bill. It just wasn't big enough. Something a whole lot of people said at the time.

[. . . I]t was always clear there was only going to be one real bite at this apple. And it just wasn't enough. Why the White House predicted a max out at 8.5% unemployment I'll never know since that was not only a politically unhelpful number, it was also deeply unrealistic. I suspect a lot of Democrats are going to go down to defeat because of it.

Speaking for me only

Full post as published by TalkLeft on August 06, 2010 (boomark / email).