validity.
I do not feel I need to be constrained by the submissions of the Obama administration as mr. kessler seems to be in evaluating the statement by Obama that his jobs bill has features that have been supported by Republicans and Democrats "in the past". Did Mr. Kessler really feel "in the past" was limited to the past two years?
The administration officials seem to be as limited as Obama when it comes to seeing the current crowd of Republicans as the standard for that party. It seems to be abhorrent to Obama to come out and say what everybody else can see and many have commented on: that the current Republican party membership is extreme in it's policies and there are few to no moderates left in the party. So why would Mr. Kessler believe he must only consider the Repulbicans of the last few years as a measure of REpublican political inclinations?
I would have referred Mr. Kessler to Peter Beinart's excellent article in Time magazine
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1966451,00.html">Why Washington is tied up in Knots (which he apparently missed).
...In the Clinton years, Senate Republicans began a kind of permanent filibuster. "Whereas the filibusters of the past were mainly the weapon of last resort," scholars Catherine Fisk and Erwin Chemerinsky noted in 1997, "now filibusters are a part of daily life." For a while, the remaining GOP moderates cried foul and joined with Democrats to break filibusters on things like campaign finance and voter registration. But in doing so, the moderates helped doom themselves. After moderates broke a 1993 filibuster on campaign finance, GOP conservatives publicly accused them of "stabbing us in the back." Their pictures were taken off the wall at the offices of the Republican Senate campaign committee. "What do these so-called moderates have in common?" conservative bigwig Grover Norquist would later declare. "They're 70 years old. They're not running again. They're gonna be dead soon. So while they're annoying, within the Republican Party our problems are dying."
(See the top 10 unfortunate political one-liners.)
In Clinton's first two years in office, the Gingrich Republicans learned that the vicious circle works. While filibusters were occasionally broken, they also brought much of Clinton's agenda to a halt, and they made Washington look pathetic. In one case, GOP Senators successfully filibustered changes to a 122-year-old mining act, thus forcing the government to sell roughly $10 billion worth of gold rights to a Canadian company for less than $10,000. In another, Republicans filibustered legislation that would have applied employment laws to members of Congress — a reform they had loudly demanded.
With these acts of legislative sabotage, Republicans tapped into a deep truth about the American people: they hate political squabbling, and they take out their anger on whoever is in charge. So when the Gingrich Republicans carried out a virtual sit-down strike during Clinton's first two years, the public mood turned nasty. By 1994, trust in government was at an all-time low, which suited the Republicans fine, since their major line of attack against Clinton's health care plan was that it would empower government. Clintoncare collapsed, Democrats lost Congress, and Republicans learned the secrets of vicious-circle politics: When the parties are polarized, it's easy to keep anything from getting done. When nothing gets done, people turn against government. When you're the party out of power and the party that reviles government, you win.
(See 10 GOP congressional contenders.)
The Endless Filibuster
All this, it turns out, was a mere warm-up for the Obama years. On the surface, it appeared that Obama took office in a stronger position than Clinton had, since Democrats boasted more seats in the Senate. But in their jubilation, Democrats forgot something crucial: vicious-circle politics thrives on polarization. As the GOP caucus in the Senate shrank, it also hardened. Early on, the White House managed to persuade three Republicans to break a filibuster of its stimulus plan. But one of those Republicans, Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter — under assault for his vote and facing a right-wing primary challenge — switched parties. That meant that of the six Senate Republicans with the most moderate voting records in 2007, only two were still in the Senate, and in the party, by '09. The Wednesday lunch club had ceased to exist. And the fewer Republican moderates there were, the more dangerous it was for any of them to cut deals across the aisle.
(more)
Others have commented on the extremism of the Republican party of the last several years (one in fact is Ezra Klein of the Washington Post). After Obama's election, Republicans declared a "scorched Earth" campaign would be waged against Obama - such was their tolerance for the will of the people. After all, Obama was actually an ELECTED president, unlike George Bush.
Kessler takes issue with the administration's citing of Republican support for excising tax 'expenditures'....
"the administration official sent us quotes from a Bipartisan Policy Center deficit-reduction report that was endorsed by former Republican lawmakers calling for the elimination of itemized deductions (and the standard deduction) and replacing it with credits for mortgage interest expenses and charitable contributions.
This is a very different concept than the president’s plan — and we are not sure if “former” officials really count as evidence of bipartisan support. ... the Republicans
have said they support the idea of reducing tax expenditures. The administration is pointing out that the GOPers have said they support reducing tax 'expenditures' - Mr. Kessler's statement that "This is a very different concept than the president’s plan" ... only asserts what hypocritical GOPers contend - it is different as far as the GOPers are concerned because they are happy to discuss CONCEPTS. It's just when it comes to actually acting upon them (as in reducing tax expenditures) that they consistently demonstrate their hypocrisy - in particular when protecting those better off who could afford a bit less Government largesse (even when helping the nation is called for and when those who didn't need them, enjoyed tax cuts thanks to the Bush administration. These tax cuts contributed significantly to the current deficit we are burdened with as well as the Trickle Down Disaster which the Democrats have been trying rebuild the economy from.).
Does REpublican hypocrisy make Obama's assertions a lie ? - Republicans have claimed to be supportive of reducing tax 'expenditures'. All Obama is saying he's taking them at their word - and asking them to apply the concept of reducing tax expenditures to those who are in a better position to can get along without the Government subsidies.
Mr. Kessler says:
" Is everything in his $447 billion proposal paid for?
Seriously, if you really believe any of that, we have the Brooklyn Bridge to sell you."
Really, is this supposed to be a reasoned analysis of Obama's assertion that he has built in legislative means to pay for the jobs bill??? If you believe that then I have a bit by Abbott and Costello articulating "who's on First" to offer as professional journalism.
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