Over the past two years, Democrats had the opportunity to effect real change and they punted. Paul Krugman says it better than I could:
So, we’re already getting the expected punditry: Obama needs to end his leftist policies, which consist of … well, there weren’t any, but he should stop them anyway.
What actually happened, of course, was that Obama failed to do enough to boost the economy, plus totally failing to tap into populist outrage at Wall Street. And now we’re in the trap I worried about from the beginning: by failing to do enough when he had political capital, he lost that capital, and now we’re stuck.
But he did have help in getting it wrong: at every stage there was a faction of Democrats standing in the way of strong action, demanding that Obama do less, avoid spending money, and so on. In so doing, they shot themselves in the face: half of the Blue Dogs lost their seats.
And what are those who are left demanding? Why, that Obama move to the center.
Sunday came word that Defense Secretary Gates and President Obama want to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell before the end of the year – that is, before the new Congress is seated.
I can’t help but recall my conversation with Rep. Shirley Chisolm back in 1981 after the Republicans gained power, part of which I recounted here. As Brian Kirwin pointed out in our TV appearance this past weekend, the Republicans managed to implement its policies without holding the Senate.
My biggest disappointment is the lack of a public option in the health care bill; without it, there is nothing in the bill to control costs. I understand that the bill helps a lot of people – I just don’t happen to be one of them. I don’t have a pre-existing condition and no kids under 26. What I know is that I pay through the nose for insurance and there is no relief in sight for me.
(And don’t even get me started on the ridiculous 1099 requirements in the bill. All I can hope is that the provision is repealed before its scheduled implementation date.)
I am upset that nothing was done to resolve the tax issues. A lot of campaigning was done in 2008 on the rollback of the Bush tax cuts. Rollback or not, I just wanted the issue resolved. In my business, planning is critical, and I abhor late-in-the-year tax law changes. I brought it up in my conversation with Senator Mark Warner well over a year ago. He wasn’t too concerned about getting it done then, thinking we had time. Well, now we are just about out of time.
Democrats were going to lose seats in the mid-terms regardless of what they did. From where I sit, they should have used their margins to pass the sweeping legislation that they campaigned on. They were going to pay for it, anyway. Might as well have actually done what they were going to be accused of.
This is why I can’t put a lot of energy in national politics. Washington is just too dysfunctional, regardless of who is in charge. Besides, it’s just too disappointing to witness the wasted opportunity of a lifetime.
VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local 
Only Paul Krugman could say that a guy who signed a bill for socialized medicine didn’t have any Leftist policies!
Good visit with Cathy Lewis. Enjoyed watching it while lunching. Brian and you need to do a local Point Counterpoint show. Both are even tempered, knowledgeable and enjoyable to watch.
Not so sure about candidate driven vs party driven comments, but that is from an outsider’s perspective.
Glad you enjoyed the show. As for Brian and me – one of these days…. 😉
Thanks for the comments.
James Young: If only. Health care reform is a modest tweak, about what Bob Dole proposed 10 years ago. I had “socialized” medicine when I was in the military. It was great!
Viv: You, and Krugman, are right. Obama had Roosevelt moment but lacked Roosevelt’s boldness. In his defense, he was greatly hampered by the Blue Dogs, but Roosevelt had conservative Dems to deal with too.
James Young never lets facts get in the way of his opinion.
Boldness – now that’s something I’d like to see.
So that’s the meme to get him reelected, huh, Steve? “He isn’t nearly the socialist you thought he was!”
Probably a pretty good strategy: his first election demonstrates that Americans can be profoundly stupid, and probably fooled twice.
Nobody with any sense ever thought he was any kind of socialist.
As for a plan to get Obama re-elected, that would be pretty simple.
If the unemployment rate is 9.6% on Election Day 2012 he won’t be re-elected — unless the GOP nominates Palin. If it’s measureably better he will.
Tuesday’s election was about the economy.
All that “socialist,” “Muslim” garbage bounces right off sensible voters. They also don’t care about the great ideological war between liberals and conservatives or the size of government. They care about how they and their family are doing.
Two years ago, they thought Republicans were hurting them and their families. This year they thought the same about Dems, or at least that they hadn’t improved the situation enough.
If keeping Obama from being re-elected is really the GOP’s “job one” as Mitch McConnell says, they’ll have to do things to knowingly harm the American economy. I don’t expect that. I expect reason will win out in the end.
If the unemployment rate is 8% or 9%, does he get re-elected? Forecasts don’t paint a happy picture of employment in 2012.
“…they’ll have to do things to knowingly harm the American economy. I don’t expect that. I expect reason will win out in the end.”
Well, their stated intention is to implement contractionary measures during an anemic recovery. I think the people who feel like they got Republicans elected would be pretty hopping mad if Republicans didn’t keep their promise. If nothing gets done, then we are wholly reliant on the Fed. That seems like cold comfort to me at the moment.
Left, Right, and Center doesn’t matter to me. What matters is the corruption in our financial industry. We won’t right the ship until someone in the executive starts prosecuting for fraud and other white collar crime. President Bush and the Republicans didn’t do it, and neither did President Obama and the Democrats. Now we are going to have a stalemated government composed of two political wings, both of which have historically refused to do anything about our corroded banking system.
I for one don’t care much whether the Democrats or Republicans are in power. It’s the same to me either way. What I am more concerned with is whether a member of the executive is going to go after fraud in our financial system and put people away for white collar crimes.
President Bush and the Republican Congress he had was unwilling to prosecute and remove the corruption in the system. President Obama and the Democratic Congress were equally resistant. So now we have a stalemated Congress composed of two wings, both of which will do nothing about the corrosion destroying our economic foundation.
Ours is not a socialist or capitalist system. It is a corporatist system.
The 1099 requirements were to help the IRS close the tax gap. Though I don’t doubt that it will be burdensome for small companies. But take it away and what revenue are you going to replace it with? One year with it should be interesting. I’d like to see how much additional revenue the IRS can collect off of this information.
I’m aware, and some of the reporting I agree with. But as it is designed right now, the IRS is likely to be inundated with them and the revenue won’t be realized. (This and other issues are discussed in this video.)
Just saying that the revenue would need to be replaced somehow. And from a mechanics perspective, I’d still be interested to see what the IRS would do with all the information. The people that this is going to affect the most, sole proprietorships and small businesses generally, are the ones who have the most opportunity to under-report their income. Not to say that business-to-business transactions are going to catch all that.
What about changing it so that it phases in and the IRS has more room to shape the requirement? Make larger companies go first and then let the IRS see how useful the information is. Then they could alter the rule to focus on transactions that have the highest yield. And small businesses would get more time before they had to comply, and by the time they did the information that was needed could be pared down.
Sole proprietors should be getting 1099s now. The real effect will be on the small corporations, who are currently exempt from the reporting (and what is the part I agree with).
Phase in might work but would be hard to police.