Although the results of this November’s Congressional midterm elections may already be sealed (“The cake is baked,”is how Fox News analyst Brit Hume described it last night), at least President Obama isn’t moping inside the West Wing about the fate of his party and the dismal looking polls.
For the second time in three days yesterday, Obama showed real fire in delivering a speech on the economy, this time from suburban Cleveland. In the Ohio speech he laid down his philosophy on how and where he wants to lead the country:
See, Ive never believed that government has all the answers to our problems. Ive never believed that governments role is to create jobs or prosperity. I believe its the drive and the ingenuity of our entrepreneurs, our small businesses; the skill and dedication of our workers — (applause) — thats made us the wealthiest nation on Earth. (Applause.) I believe its the private sector that must be the main engine for our recovery.I believe government should be lean; government should be efficient. I believe government should leave people free to make the choices they think are best for themselves and their families, so long as those choices dont hurt others.
But in the words of the first Republican President, Abraham Lincoln, I also believe that government should do for the people what they cannot do better for themselves. (Applause.) And that means making the long-term investments in this countrys future that individuals and corporations can’t make on their own: investments in education and clean energy, in basic research and technology and infrastructure.
This is a President Obama that Democrats have been yearning to hear from over the past year. In terms of policy, he did lay out three proposals: $50 billion in infrastructure spending; expanding and making permanent the research tax credit for business; and a measure that would allow businesses to write 100% of their investment costs off their taxes through the end of next year.
But whether the Congress will act on any of those measures in the next month before they stop working and go back to campaigning is dubious. And, according to the Wall Street Journal, many Democrats were caught rather flatfooted about the proposals anyway:
Ohio Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher, the Democrats’ candidate for an open Ohio Senate seat, said he wanted a job-creation tax credit. “I also wish we had seen all these proposals much sooner,” he said. And Sen. Michael Bennet (D, Colo.), who is locked in a difficult campaign, said Wednesday, “I will not support additional spending in a second stimulus package.”
“The rollout has not been good,” said one Democratic congressional campaign aide, who noted there was little coordination between the White House and congressional leaders on the proposals.
In terms of analysis, conservatives predictably lambasted the speech, with some accusing the President of the old standby of “class warfare.” But in terms of rallying the base, which is the only main strategy Democrats have at this point, there is no doubt that among those who saw or heard either speech this week, they are feeling more enthusiastic about the man and what he’s trying to accomplish than they have in a long time.
Perhaps the most interesting analysis comes from Matt Bai, political reporter for the New York Times. Bai chides Obama for merging the idea that both “stimulating the economy today and reordering it for decades to come are basically the same thing.”
Bai writes that this has had the effect of confusing voters by failing the explain the difference in stimulating the economy to get it charged back again and out of recession, and then doing long time infrastructure projects that activist Democrats have wanted to do for decades, and how they are different.
Some are calling the President’s plans a “second stimulus.” Actually, the White House certainly isn’t, since “stimulus” has now taken on the toxic taint of “liberal,” as the $862 billion dollar plan has been rendered a failure, though there is much to argue against that theory.
This article appears in Sep 9-15, 2010.
