Surprising outcome? Say what? Draconian deficit-reduction was the whole idea of this sword of Damocles.
Anyway, looks like we're gonna get double-dip. Conventional wisdom -- and Mitt's strategy, I'm sure -- will be that this shit lands on Obama's shoes. Is there anything he can do to reverse this? I don't mean anything substantive -- it's far too late for that. I mean something political. Can he sell the idea that the GOP drove us into recession with their ideological refusal to tax the rich? Can he sell anything at all?
Update: Lest "surprising outcome" look cryptic, that was how the story was headlined last night. Some editor clearly thought better of it.
Monday, November 21, 2011
It'll be our fault -- in fact, it already is
One of the stranger logical pathologies of the Obama phenomenon is the way in which his acolytes reconfigure the known universe around his blankness, emptiness and passivity. There's no questioning of his own agency in what happens to him, or to us. He is the still point in a changing world, and it is the responsibility of that world to ensure that his actions (or, rather, non-actions) come out (or are seen to come out) right.
Case in point, this post by Earl Ofari Hutchinson. He ticks off a damning bill of attainder as if it were a litany of silly personal objections by self-unaware dilletantes. A more reasonable reading of that list would be that the needs of this moment in history were pretty clear, and Obama flunked in responding to them -- most centrally on the economy, not because he didn't kiss the right historical icons, but because he failed to step up to what this present situation demanded.
Ford didn't lose to Carter because of Reagan; he lost because of Watergate. Carter didn't lose to Reagan because of Kennedy; he lost because of recession and Iran. If Obama loses in 2012, it won't be because liberals fail to fake an orgasm -- it'll be because he flunked. It's a bizarro kind of tautology to insist that whole populations reorient their perceptions and attitudes to make cause not equal effect.
Case in point, this post by Earl Ofari Hutchinson. He ticks off a damning bill of attainder as if it were a litany of silly personal objections by self-unaware dilletantes. A more reasonable reading of that list would be that the needs of this moment in history were pretty clear, and Obama flunked in responding to them -- most centrally on the economy, not because he didn't kiss the right historical icons, but because he failed to step up to what this present situation demanded.
Ford didn't lose to Carter because of Reagan; he lost because of Watergate. Carter didn't lose to Reagan because of Kennedy; he lost because of recession and Iran. If Obama loses in 2012, it won't be because liberals fail to fake an orgasm -- it'll be because he flunked. It's a bizarro kind of tautology to insist that whole populations reorient their perceptions and attitudes to make cause not equal effect.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)