On the left, response to the president’s pantsing of House Republicans has been universal relief. Finally, more than one commenter has declared, this is the Obama I voted for. We’ve all been frustrated by the wishy-washy wishfulness of bipartisanship, haven’t we? I mean, come on. Obama’s been holding out an olive branch to the GOP for a year and kept pulling back a bloody stump. Right?
During his SOTU last Wednesday night, he made sure to remind the country that he would be meeting with House Republicans Friday. The same encounter one year ago saw TV cameras turned off after the speech, but this time the White House asked for them to stay on:
We’ve got to close the gap between the rhetoric and the reality. I’m not suggesting that we’re going to agree on everything, whether it’s on health care or energy or what have you, but if the way these issues are being presented by the Republicans is that this is some wild-eyed plot to impose huge government in every aspect of our lives, what happens is you guys then don’t have a lot of room to negotiate with me. I mean, the fact of the matter is, is that many of you, if you voted with the administration on something, are politically vulnerable in your own base, in your own party. You’ve given yourselves very little room to work in a bipartisan fashion because what you’ve been telling your constituents is, this guy is doing all kinds of crazy stuff that’s going to destroy America. (Emphasis mine)
But that’s the exact same Obama. A full year of Republican obstructionism and Wall Street profiteering are the only difference; nothing else has changed. The paragraph above may sound frustrated, but there’s actually a renewed call to bipartisanship amid the presidential smashing of stupid.
The emphasis on Republicans having left themselves no room is yet another example of his brand of consensus politics. The object isn’t to shove Republicans away but to let them choose whether to be a part of the consensus. Which brings me to the Republican National Committee’s meeting in Hawaii that same day:
The Republican National Committee, pressed to find a way to more clearly distinguish itself from Democrats, on Friday adopted a rule that will prod GOP leaders to provide financial support to only those candidates who support the party’s platform.
This was a “compromise” from an earlier proposal to apply a “purity test” on candidates, which says much about their willingness to reach across aisles. But why would the party of no feel pressed to distinguish itself from Democrats? The answer, of course, is that the party’s new astroturf-fueled movement is ideologically rigid, is busy seizing control of the precinct apparatus, and has them completely terrified.
Which brings me back to the “pivot” Obama recently made on Wall Street. The president has staked out the political center and yanked the populism out from under the teabaggers at the very moment their “movement” is cracking up and Sarah Palin, the default GOP candidate for 2012, is disappointing the right by keeping her appointment in Nashville this week. Some Republicans are warning the party that being painted in this corner is bad electoral strategy, but I don’t expect they will listen.
I also don’t think the tea party movement can last — at least, not as a potent political force. Factionalism is ruling the day among the angry right. Obama’s strong move to pin down Wall Street will prove enormously popular and steal much of their legitimate thunder, leaving only birthers, healthers, and other assorted nuts to scream “socialism!” That word didn’t work in 2008, it didn’t work in 2009, and I expect the tea parties will not only descend into self-parody by November 2010, but will very likely exhaust the patience of middle America.
Which brings me back to the president’s emphasis on maneuvering room. Obama’s habit of “formless” positioning is a constant irritant to the left, but it also leaves him political space. Having rejected such nuances for clear, yet extreme positioning, the minority party is giving us a case study in why the president is able to hit their question-time fastballs out of the park: he’s smarter than they are, and his strategies reflect that.
As I said, I doubt they will learn anything except that direct, public confrontation with the president is a bad idea. Most, if not all of them will probably choose to stay painted in a corner. You can see it in their complaints about Obama “lecturing” them Friday. But that is the point: they make the choice. Obama doesn’t have to beat them if they beat themselves.
