Nicely Done, Mr. President

[babylonsister]

Nicely Done, Mr. President
By Matthew Cooper - February 9, 2009, 9:02PM


Well, there's a reason he's president and not Hillary Clinton or John McCain.

Barack Obama handled himself with great aplomb, using his opening statement to lay out the problem and what his answers are. And with each question--and none of the questions were total boners, so score one for the press--the president managed to show a command of the issues and an analytic mind. Wisely, he kept coming back to the point that doing nothing is not really an answer and that tax cuts alone are not enough.

Of course, the contrast with George W. Bush couldn't have been more striking. Obama was comfortable with the long answer and the long question. There was no bristling over the Biden question but a good-natured response that seemed at once to put his Number Two to stop mouthing off so much but also an explanation of how they're trying to get it right.

I thought the tone towards Republicans was probably just right. Some on the left will probably wish he was a little more Republican bashing but that's not his style and he got his jabs in without becoming overly partisan.

For liberals who thought Obama had lost his way, that he'd conceded too much in the name of bipartisanship, that he'd been outflanked by Mitch McConnell, that he'd lost all the momentum, tonight should have been reassuring, a reminder of the power of the presidency to reset the debate and also to the enduring skills of Barack Obama.

more...

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/02/nicely-done-mr-president.php

[Solomon]

1. Nicely done indeed!

[bdamomma]

2. I thought he was great, very informative, outlined everything.

this man has alot to do, alot of cleaning up to do. One thing bothered me, he was kind of cool to investigating crimes of Bushco. I hope Leahy and possibly Senator Whitehouse look into this.

[depakid]

3. Unfortunately a day late and a dollar short

In order to have affected policy decsions- this ought to have been done a week or more ago.

Rhetoric is one thing- policy making when and where it counts is another.

[babylonsister]

4. Why is your glass always half empty?

It appears the stimulus will pass-seems to me that was the whole point of this exercise, and we should be happy. But not you. What a surprise.

[depakid]

5. Hey- I wan't to see effective policy -not half assed "compromises"

that won't get the job done.

With as much political capital that Obama and the Democrats have (had?) -and considering what's at stake -there was no reason why the legislation couldn't have been sheparded through without cutting many of its most eficacious provisions.

That's done nothing but make the country poorer- and emboldened Republicans in the process. That's not half empty. That's lose/lose.

[babylonsister]

7. Last I looked, nothing is a done deal yet. Don't the

House and Senate now meet to hash out the particulars? You set yourself up for defeat before you even know what the outcome will be. That's too bad. And at this point, anything is better than nothing. As Prez Obama said last night, what won't be included in this package can be addressed down the road, and I have no doubt he'll do so.

[bdamomma]

12. yes, I will be glad when they put those other issues in other bills.

[SidneyCarton]

22. If you don't want compromise, then you don't want democracy.

Imposition of a single will is one of the characteristics of a totalitarian dictatorship.

[Dawgs]

6. Wouldn't have made a difference with legislatures a week ago, two weeks ago, etc...

And, this press conference wasn't for Congress or the Republicans, it was for the American people.

[lunatica]

8. This doesn't apply in politics

By letting them have all the rope they want he's been let them hang themselves. Then he calmly walks in and takes control of the message.

[high density]

9. Chuck Todd, is that you?

"A week too late" was his first thought with Brian Williams after the press conference... I just don't see how giving this presser a week ago would've changed things. Last week Obama was busy talking to the people who really mattered: the senators. He's got the votes now and he can't be blamed for the Republicans playing their obstructionist do nothing card.

[depakid]

11. Republicans owned the message for long enough to seriously damage the bill

And even Chuck Todd could see what was coming.

You cannot let up on ideologues- ever. Obama and the Dems had plenty of time to get their game together and should have hit the ground running. Instead, they were slack- failed (yet again) to frame the issue and define their opponents.

This isn't rocket science- anyone could see what was happening as it went down.

Nate Silver did a simple analysis of one word's frequency to illustrate what h (and others) saw.

This is the percentage of articles in Yahoo! News that when containing the word "stimulus", also contain the word "pork", broken down for each of the 16 days since Barack Obama took office:



The unflattering term "pork" is now being used about four times more commonly in connection with the stimulus as it was two weeks ago -- even though the underlying package has not substantially changed. This is what it means to lose control of a debate. Back during the halcyon days of the campaign , Barack Obama had the good fortune to go against two opponents in John McCain and Hillary Clinton who had, respectively, no media strategy at all, and a completely incompetent one.

The Congressional Republicans, on the other hand, are fairly good at making lemons out of lemonade. As Paul Krugman notes, the Obama communications team belatedly seems to have realized this, so call it a "teachable moment" if you like. But as difficult as a two-year campaign was, governance is going to be much, much tougher.


Posted here- to few responses:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=8170562

[Solomon]

13. You miss the bigger point. They were trying to tank his presidency

over this. He didn't let them do that. That's one of the biggest things about this victory.

Why can't you see that? I can only imagine what you would be saying right now if they had succeeded.

[depakid]

14. The only thing that will tank his presidency is failing to get the economy under control

and the lunatic Republicans will do everything in their power to ensure that doesn't happen. All he needs is a couple of the "saner" ones in the Senate- and yet, he tried to pander to the loons.

And as is always the case- got nothing except a much weaker bill. Maybe his nascent administration has learned from this, but that'll have to be seen down the line....

[high density]

23. The economy is going to suck for at least another year

This is not going to be an instant fix for our problems. In six months I think we'll probably be going back and spending another $750 billion.

I agree the Republicans win every time at framing the debate, but that didn't matter in this round. The tilt of the bill isn't perfect. That is standard operating procedure but it's vastly better than nothing or 100% tax cuts.

[Brazenly Liberal]

15. These "word search" analyses are worse than useless - they're deceptive

This is the percentage of articles in Yahoo! News that when containing the word "stimulus", also contain the word "pork", broken down for each of the 16 days since Barack Obama took office:

All of the following sentences (and an unlimited number of other conformations) could appear in a news story and fit your criteria while completely contradicting your conclusion:

"This stimulus bill contains no pork."

"The administration was successful at keeping pork out of the stimulus bill."

"While Republicans - and a few doom-mongering Democrats - fretted about pork in the stimulus bill, this bill is, in fact, pork-free to an extent never imagined the past 8 years."

I could go on, but I believe the point is made. Doing a search on "stimulus" and "pork" gives you a meaningless number of articles that can be put into a meaningless graph and still be meaningless - until you misuse the results and make it downright deceptive.

[depakid]

16. It's simply one example in a process

Fact is that Democrats lost control of the debate- by failing to frame the issue (think about Childrens health care- same deal. SCHIP means nothing to most folks) -and by failing to define the Republican opposition (which he belatedly did in his news conference).

Trouble is, once people get these perceptions in their heads- it's far more difficult to change them than it would have been to form them for yourself in the first place.

[Brazenly Liberal]

18. No, it's not. One example of what?

I defy you to explain exactly what this is an "example" of. Other than an example of how to gather useless statistics and then misapply them in an effort to make a point that is, apparently, not one you can make using real true information.

Trouble is, once people get these perceptions in their heads- it's far more difficult to change them than it would have been to form them for yourself in the first place.

A fine piece of self-analysis that does a thorough job of negating the doomsaying in your other posts in this thread. I'm glad you got the point.

[Laelth]

17. Seems to me that you're proving the point.

If the word "pork" appears in the same sentence, Republicans are controlling the debate. If Republicans were not controlling the debate, the word "pork" wouldn't show up at all. There would be no need to talk about pork or to defend the bill from accusations that it contains pork.

:shrug:

-Laelth

[Brazenly Liberal]

19. Nonsense.

It's ludicrous to say statements like those in my post concede anything to the GOP.

The unreasonable amount of reverence and fear some people here display for them does give them some control, but only over those of you so willing for them to have it.

Edited to add: When you've just finished with 8 years of a corrupt administration, it is both reasonable and somewhat necessary for the new guys to point out where they differ. So no, merely mentioning pork does not in any way concede anything.

[Laelth]

20. O.K. n/t

:dem:

-Laelth

[firedupdem]

10. Fine Job Mr. President...

He knocked it out of the park.

[spanone]

21. an intelligent president.....a brilliant concept