Will he have to change parties to run for a second term?

[Sarah Ibarruri]

But it's his willingness to take on entitlement programs that conjures up memories among some Democrats of the tax deal he negotiated with Republicans with the clock winding down at the end of 2010 that reportedly had House Democrats chanting "Just say no!" in a closed-door meeting before eventually voting for the package.

See the rest at link:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/07/22/democrats.anger.obama/index.html?hpt=hp_bn4

[vi5]

1. "But...but..he doesn't WANT to cut 'entitlements'....."

"He's being forced to."

Yeah, right. Like he was FORCED to put together the Catfood Commission.
And like he was FORCED to stack it with anti social security zealots.

[CoffeeCat]

6. like he was forced to embrace health-insurance goons...

...when he spearheaded the effort to reform our healthcare system.

He allowed health-insurance lobbyists to write the bill and they got
exactly what they wanted--no major reforms with a profit-centric health
care system that enriches health-insurance executives and bankrupts Americans.

We are a complete abomination as a country. WE are the only industrialized
nation in the world without a national healthcare system. Because our politicians
are greedy, corrupt, lazy bastards who have been bought-and-paid-for--we sit
here in a flawed system that makes decisions about our lives--based on their
profit models.

Obama caved--not because he's wimpy or because we all have to compromise, or because
change is such hard work.

Obama worked very hard to ensure that those companies got what they paid for.

People need to stop their magical thinking--the belief that Obama and the rest of the
Dems are spineless or too weak to take on the Republicans. They're perfectly aligned
with their corporate masters and they know exactly what they're doing.

It's sick and disgusting.

[LiberalEsto]

2. We need a 3rd party candidate - a Democrat. nt

[Ken Burch]

3. A THIRD party? Hell, I'd settle for a second one.

Perhaps we just need to hit the barricades now.

[Ikonoklast]

4. House Democrats screwed themselves on the tax deal.

Both Pelosi and Reid punted on taxes until after the mid-terms because they didn't want to be branded as 'tax-raisers' right before the elections...leaving them as a bargaining chip to use against additional funding for unemployment by the Republicans.


The House members need to take a ggod, long look as to who, exactly, set up that scenario.

But, it is waaaaay easier to let Mr. Obama take the heat for any deals made on that subject.

Unrec.

[JoePhilly]

7. That logic is too difficult for some ... that plus ...

If Obama let the tax cuts for the middle class expire, he'd have broken his promise to not raises taxes on the 95% of all Americans who make less than 250k.

That's what the GOP really wanted him to do. Clips of him making that promise would run side by side with clips of Bush #1 saying "read my lips" from then until the election in 2012.

And here on DU, he would have been crucified for raising taxes on the middle class during a fragile recovery, right when they needed that money the most. And, they be screaming because there would have been no extension of unemployment insurance.

Obama comes out evil either way.

[onyourleft]

8. Do I understand this correctly? Letting the tax...

...cuts expire on the date that they are supposed to expire is the same as raising taxes?

[JoePhilly]

10. Don't you watch the liberal media ... ??

In the lead up to that decision, THAT is exactly how it was described, as raising their taxes.

Why ??. .. because bottom line, their taxes would GO UP ... that is ... INCREASE.

And the media was already laying it out as his "read my lips moment".

[onyourleft]

12. Actually, I don't watch...

...the liberal media or any media for that matter. I well understand the talking points. I was just surprised to see that in the post to which I responded.

When these same talking points come to the fore in 2012, an election year, how are they going to be countered then by the Democrats? If there is a counter to this, why was it not used originally? Why is this being carried over to an election year when there are so many other issues that could be debated during campaign season? Do we really want to have a debate during elections on whether or not the Democrats are raising taxes? Why don't we instead have a debate on whether the Republicans are or are not creating jobs as they promised? The latter will surely resonate with more voters than another "read my lips."

[JoePhilly]

13. The problem is this ...

Those 95% didn't want their own taxes to go up to get the taxes for the rich to go up.

Around 80% support raising taxes on the rich, unless you couple it with tax increases for themselves.

As the original poster said, the Dem congress could have separated these issue. They punted.

And again, there would have been no relief for the unemployed.

And the same talking point can't come forward in 2012, there has been no tax increase by Obama. Which means the media can't bludgeon Obama with that because it never happened.

I'd love to see DU focused on the GOP and what they are doing to destroy the nation. Sadly, DU has become a place where attacking Obama is job one, and focusing on the GOP is an non-issue.

[onyourleft]

15. I'm incorrect then, as I thought...

...the Bush tax cuts were set to expire in 2012.

[RaleighNCDUer]

9. Bullshit. If he WANTED to he could have had a deal in which the

middle-class tax cuts would have been extended, but the 2% would not - and had the Republicans crowing about how THEY saved the middle-class tax cuts. Boehner as much as said so. We could have cut the extension for the rich AND extended unemployment in the same package - with the Republicans 'pressuring' the president to extend the tax cuts on the middle class.

The economy would have been far better served by getting rid of the extensions on the rich than by extending the cuts for the middle, in any case, but it did not have to be an either/or.

He added hundreds of billions to the deficit by extending the tax cuts for the wealthy, making the deficit the #1 issue so that the commission HE appointed could cut SS.

Mission fucking accomplished.

[JoePhilly]

11. Nonsense.

The Dem congress was AFRAID to bring an extension of the middle class tax cuts to the floor. That's why it didn't happen.

Didn't happen in the House, or in the Senate.

The Dem congress PUNTED.

They should have brought such a bill to the floor, they didn't.

[truedelphi]

14. Oh please - he gave up without any use of the bully pulpit -

Like many others here have stated, it's not that he doesn't win battles we need won, it's that he concedes long before it is necessary.

And then he states he is forced to.

If he was a leader, and not just good at delivering speeches concerning abstract platitudes like "hope" and "change" (mantras that MArgaret Thatcher used before she busted up Britain's unions,) and if the people that he appointed had policies they would install to HELP and not hurt the American Middle Class, no one here would be a naysayer.

[mmonk]

5. He is the rejected ally just as Clinton was.