In the comments on Birth Control Mandate 1 I suggested that Obama did this "as a base rousing action. A chance to change the topic of conversation from money to culture wars issues."
Bruce suggested that this was cynical. I think that raises a good pair of questions:
A. Is it cynical to think that Obama did this thing as a political ploy? Consider Clinton's Sister Souljah moment in 1992 which was a similar gambit. No, I don't think that it is cynical that I believe that politicians try to manipulate our emotions in order to get our votes. I think that it just means that I watch these guys.
B. Would it be cynical of Obama if he did this thing as a political gambit*? Well by doing this he has firmed up an important part of his base and thrown a monkey wrench into the Republican nomination race. Notice how much the Rs have dwelt on it and that Santorum, the quintessential R social issues guy, is now at the front of the pack. This is a great issue for Santorum in the primaries, but a disaster for the Rs in the general.
With a bit of luck Obama may have induced the Republicans to nominate Santorum!!
I don't think it is cynical of Obama, I think it is clever.
* The word "gambit" is particularly appropriate here because, in chess, a gambit is the giving up of something - usually a pawn - in the expectation of getting a lot more back later. In the political case you take some temporary heat for some bigger gain later.
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Saturday, February 18, 2012
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When we as Americans can only define the motives of our representative's actions, in the execution of their duties, as election strategies, then it seems to me that is the definiton of cynical. Doesn't mean that we would be incorrect in that assumption. But I still don't think that it is too much to ask that our leaders actually take the "common good" into consideration every once in awhile. But, I could very well just be naive in this belief.
ReplyDeleteWhen Obama made the decision to include church owned businesses in the birth control mandate, it made perfect sense to me as a place to draw the line on that issue as. clearly, one had to be drwan somewhere. And when the fire storm erupted it ocurred to me to question the motives of the Republicans and their 1st amendment objections. I thought "since when do Republicans team up with Catholics to do anything?" Most of the Republicans I have known (and I say this as a born and bred Republican up until these last few years) were of a more fundamentalist bent and in fact considered the Catholic Church to be the Anti-Christ...literally. So, my thought was, given that the economic news has been of a more positive nature recently, this would be an excellent issue to get people's attention off of the apparently improving economy and onto another area in which the President has been vulnerable...religion.
So, I say cycnicism abounds. It has been well earned. But despite my own admitted cynicism I'm still troubled that we must look beyond the actual issues of the day to our leaders' self interest to try to find why what's happening to us is happening to us.
See definition of cynicism, particularly with regard to self interest.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cynical
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ReplyDeleteI'm not sure whether you are saying that it is inappropriate or inaccurate to be suspicious of their motivations.
You say: "But I still don't think that it is too much to ask that our leaders actually take the "common good" into consideration every once in awhile." I agree and I think that they do just that and just then - every once in a while. But that is a pretty low bar we've set. I think we are wise to have set it so low. It prevents constant disappointment. For example, in their role as overseers of the regulation of business, Congress and the President frequently come into the possession of "insider info" of the kind that has long been illegal for insiders in business to use in their own market trading. It is only now - 220+ years into the life of the republic - that they are passing legislation making it illegal for congress to use that info in their own trading.
What would you say about someone who knew that fact and was not cynical?
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Another post on this blog “the payroll tax cut” points out that the PRESS seems not to have noticed that the payroll cut forces us (US) to borrow from the SS fund which is already distressed.
ReplyDeleteThis is, of course, payroll tax cut extension part deux. In December the Rs opposed the short term extension of the cuts without paying for them. And they got a huge black eye. I mean really huge.
So here we are again with “the payroll tax cut”.
1. The Rs are mostly silent on the issue – Are they being cynical or did they simply learn from the December experience?
2. The Administration has a win-win issue with a huge block of voters on this one (just as they did with “free” birth control). The statesman thing to do would be to clearly state that, yes a payroll tax is nice, but the down side is ….. Is the White house being cynical (or worse) by not making this clear?
3. The PRESS is clearly not doing their job and the likely reason is that it does not further their agenda. Cynical on their part?
Now, I think that all 3 groups I have mentioned above understand the good and bad things associated with ”the payroll tax cut”. I also think all 3 groups have acted in their own best interest. I would not have expected otherwise. Perhaps that is cynical on my part or perhaps on their part.
There once was an expression “Boys will be Boys” which got discarded in the seventies because it was incorrectly interpreted as giving men a pass for bad behavior simply because they were men.
The expression actually means, rightly or wrongly, that Boys will in fact be Boys and you can ignore that fact at your own peril.
Tom, my recollection of what happened in the December debacle is slightly different from yours in that the President started out saying that we needed to extend the payroll tax cut, already in effect for 2011, for another year through 2012 because the economic recovery is still fragile, etc. etc. etc. The Republicans, in their never ending drive to wrest the White House away from Obama, came out against it. This has generally been the set up of all the arguments since the Republicans won the House. Then, the Republicans, recognizing that this was a very important issue to the President tried their gambit (did I use it correctly?) which was to add approval of the Keystone XL pipeline to the bill. This gambit has worked for them repeatedly. But this time the President said that he would not go for it. He said let's just do a short term deal for a couple of months since we're running out of time here and give ourselves more time to work out a deal. The Republicans, holding onto what they thought was a winning hand as far as the Pipeline was concerned were not really willing to walk away from it that easily. So they went to the press and said that the "President wants to raise taxes on the middle class after February. He only wants to extend the Payroll Tax cut for 2 months. We, in our in our undying love for middle class America, are trying to do a cut for the whole year. We don't know what is wrong with him." Brilliant. Now they have gotten themselves into the good guy middle class protector position that the President had carved out for himself in the very beginning of this argument. Bravo Republicans. I was and still am impressed. If they can shame the President into signing this bill (payroll tax cut for the full year)they will get the Keystone Pipeline PLUS the undying love of middle class America. But much to their chagrin the President's base was getting more than a little bit tired of him giving in to these types of gambits. They pointed out rightly that he had begun caving to them almost as soon as he walked into the White House. He didn't even try for universal health care. He tried to put together a bi-partisan health care reorg that everyone could kind of live with. But he even failed at that and ended up with a piece of crap that Democrats, who mostly wanted something entirely different, are left trying to defend. It did help me so I defend it, but it is still an amalgamation of this and that and the other. It's like an elephant with the head of a chicken and the legs of a girrafe. Sure there's some good stuff there but...
ReplyDeleteAnyway, it's gettting too close to election time to to anger his base too much so I;n guessing that to please them he said that he would do the 2 month deal now, or the one year deal without the pipeline. So the Republicans agree to the 2 month extension but with a kicker that said the President must make a yes or no decision on the pipeline by February whatever. So, he said OK and that's how the 2 month deal went down to the best of my memory. Shortly after that the Pres said OK if I have to decide this quickly then I have to say "NO". Oops. I think the gambit failed. To them (Republicans) the whole thing was about the pipeline. They wanted so badly to brag about how many jobs this was going to create etc etc.
That story is still filled with all kinds of cynicism. So while we may not remember it the same we agree that boys will be boys. I never argued any differently. Cynicism does not feel good to me. Did anybody involved really care about the payroll tax cut and whether it in reality helped anyone? And did anyone involved really care about the pipeline and whether it would really create any jobs worth having or what damage this Canadian tar sands crude oil could potentially do to our underground drinking water sources or other parts of our environment? Did any of the players really care if the USA was ever going to get any of that oil anyway? I don't know.