Entangled Alliances

photo credit: jmtimages

Right now, Obama’s struggle with congressional Republicans feels a bit like a classic movie with the new sheriff. You know, the new friendly Sheriff comes into town, he’s polite, courteous almost to a fault, he tries to be friends, but instead all the powers regard him as a pushover.  They overreach, treat him with contempt, and carry on their old bad habits.

You see, Obama came into Washington after sweeping up the nation with a campaign of hope and a new direction, he promised bipartisanship – dined with conservative pundits, he had a cocktail party with congressional leaders from both sides, he backed this up with more meetings and urged both sides to find some common ground. In return the House Republicans delivered a stunning zero votes, zero, not one house Republican thought the necessity of the stimulus outweighed the cons.

That’s one punch to the face but hey, it might take these guys some time to get used to the new sheriff  and the House is more partisan anyway. The Senate, is the more measured and balance chamber, the wise musings of  men committed to the good of America regardless of party….

But wait, Senate Republicans  bemoan the lack of tax cuts, they want tax cuts to have close to  1:1 ratio in the stimulus.

TAX CUTS! Talk about a broken record.  Still our Sheriff labours on hoping that the Senate can get their act together, probably at this point casting a glance at Minnesota and the devoted public servant that is Norm  Coleman. Who, having no chance of winning has worked tirelessly to ensure the people of Minnesota stay as unrepresented for as long as possible (FiveThirtyEight has the latest here).  Obama labours on, surely they see the danger the US economy is in, surely they must see how a stimulus could work? Heck, even many of their own back it; even devout pork-fighter Palin (couldn’t resist) backs it.

But instead they delay and propose pointless alternatives that need to be cleared. Then, perhaps the final straw, they start pushing around his deputy, Hilda Solis, not once but twice. Nobody, but nobody should pick on the deputy. Oh, and to add insult to injury, guess who’s sniping from the sidelines?

Obama had even given some advance notice – a polite warning shot: ” I won” he noted, as they bemoaned his stimulus. He pointed out his electoral landslide, which in no small part was a vote on the economy,  a landslide that swept many of these Republican Senators states. But they didn’t listen.

Then the fightback begins.  With support from the White House, tired of the delays in Solis’ confirmation hearings, Unions and Hispanic support groups are pushing back. This is followed by the big gun, an open asault on the lunacy of the Republicans, to get the Bill passed.

The Result: This: essentially a minor victory for Republicans who not only trim down spending in areas such as education and science (both vital to the economy and jobs), but get to keep their taxes.

Hopefully our Sheriff has learnt from this experience, as Ed pointed out in an earlier post, there is no point meeting someone half way when their starting point is a terrible idea. They wanted tax cuts, Obama’s Bill actually started with tax cuts, but Republicans then sought to massively expand on the tax cuts, (claiming the whole bill was spending and framing it so by their huge presence in the media). Obama, remember, has also promised not to directly repeal the Bush super tax cuts, in light of the recession.

So despite effectively having had two rounds of tax cuts for free, receiving an electoral hammering and facing a President with exceptional popularity, Republicans defiantly watered down the parts of the stimulus which would actually stimulate the economy and demanded more tax cuts to boot.

He’s got a bloody nose for sure, Nate Silver’s excellent article underlines the cost to Obama of failing to sell his plan (his own punches were too late). But Obama shouldn’t give up on bipartisanship.  He probably got skinned in the first round, but he’s got brilliant media strategists of his own.  Next time he needs to get out early to frame the debate and give Republicans less room for manoeuvre.