In 2009, right at the start of his term, Obama didn't propose the kind of stimulus bill that his supporters were calling for. Instead, he proposed a stimulus that was much smaller (about one-third the size of what progressive economists said was needed) and had a significant component of tax cuts (even though those have less stimulative impact per dollar of increased deficit). What I heard was that, at the initial meeting at which he presented the plan to Congressional leaders, the Republicans were pleasantly surprised at the size of the tax-cut component in the bill.
Then almost all of them voted against it anyway. (In the House, it got zero Republican votes. In the Senate, it was supported by Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, and Arlen Specter, but no other Republicans.)
So, this episode showed that Obama was serious about bipartisan compromise, while the Republicans were simply against anything he was for. The result was that, in 2010, the American electorate, fed up with this hyperpartisan obstructionism by the Republicans, punished them by voting many of them out of office and handing the Democrats huge gains... right?
Oh, wait, that's not what happened in the 2010 midterms?
But wait... Obama did the same thing with PPACA, making no effort to get single payer, initially insisting on a robust public option but then dropping it, and including deals that protected the profits of the likes of Big Pharma. So, by being so willing to compromise, he got a lot of Republican support for the bill, right? Uh, no, he got none. Nor, of course, did this obstructionism cost the Republicans in 2010.
Now he's playing the same game. Well, maybe he'll solidify his legacy as a herald of post-partisanship and an eminently reasonable man. And maybe he'll also set up 2014 as a repeat of 2010, torpedoing our chances of taking the House and possibly costing us the Senate as well.
Just maybe he should have tried a different approach. Suppose he had sent up a budget that didn't embody compromise-in-advance-while-getting-nothing-for-it, but instead was based on a clear statement of Democratic principles. Then, if the Republicans insisted on Social Security cuts, he could have compromised with obvious and well-publicized reluctance. The result would be an issue that we could flay the Republicans with in 2014.
As it is, I foresee the same problem in 2014 that we had in 2010 -- too many people just don't see the Democrats as fighting for them and aren't motivated to go out and vote. As of right now I'm predicting Republican control of both chambers.
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