Andrew Sullivan is hyperventilating over the budget. (He has lotsa company, via Reuters.)
...the reason we are in perceived 'fiscal calamityville' now is because of the GOP's fiscal failure for years and years and their current rhetorical need to regain their brand. It's far less to do with Obama.
I'm surprised he thought that "The Moment" for Obama to capture the momentum on long-term fiscal imbalances was during the annual budget week for 2011, just seconds after employment is barely stabilizing at horribly low levels, measured in economic time.Everyone shares the sentiment that our house should be in order more often than not, but the time to have put his marker in the sand was last year, during the fight over tax-cut extensions for the wealthiest among us. (For those of us who thought so, it appears the political calculation is that it was decided it would be an election year issue, i.e. 'not today'. And the short-term dynamic would, of course, be some complex Washington political match - how else could it be?)
As for the rest, why not focus on the Senate Democrats? Obama did push for fiscal sanity. He was rebuffed by eight or nine bought-and-paid Senators, right? I mean, he even got the vote, which means he and the Senate leadership was willing to put them up to public scrutiny on the issue. That's hardly, "screw you, suckers", is it?
Meanwhile, I suggest that Andrew (or Patrick, because I like Patrick) go to the CBO website, get the budget outlook and look very, very, very carefully at tables C-1 and C-2.
Why? Because they show a different picture. It is accurate? Yes-ish.
But, what is more important to understand, in terms of political analysis, is that the reason we are in perceived 'fiscal calamityville' now is because of the GOP's fiscal failure for years and years and their current rhetorical need to regain their brand. It's far less to do with Obama. Or this budget, which is pure theater, albeit necessary theater, because the GOP have little or no intension of working with the President and control the power of the purse. Think of it more like a gambit, than anything else.
