Bob Woodward has joined the scrum in pointing out that the White House actually proposed the sequester that President Obama is complaining so much about lately. There’s one more tidbit of information in Mr. Woodward’s WP op-ed: apparently, Jack Lew, now on deck to replace Tim Geithner as Treasury Secretary, was one of the original architects of the sequester:
My extensive reporting for my book “The Price of Politics†shows that the automatic spending cuts were initiated by the White House and were the brainchild of Lew and White House congressional relations chief Rob Nabors — probably the foremost experts on budget issues in the senior ranks of the federal government.
Obama personally approved of the plan for Lew and Nabors to propose the sequester to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.). They did so at 2:30 p.m. July 27, 2011, according to interviews with two senior White House aides who were directly involved.
So, hats off to the White House! They’ve successfully pinned the blame for the sequester on the Republicans when it was the White House’s proposal in the first place. That’s great political maneuvering if you can pull it off and, judging by the recent polls, they have.
I also note that it continues President Obama’s streak: when somebody really screws up royally the right thing to do is make him Secretary of the Treasury.
I also note that it continues President Obama’s streak: when somebody really screws up royally the right thing to do is make him Secretary of the Treasury.
I don’t see how this follows from the preceding paragraph. They’ve managed to create a really horrible strategy that is very unpopular, AND they got to blame the other side for it because the vast majority of the press are actually Democratic operatives. That last makes it a huge win, especially if the country grinds to a halt. Hell, a few airliners fall out of the sky killing a couple of thousand people and this will be the greatest success of the Obama Presidency, because he will get to blame it all on Republicans, while ABC, CNN, CBS and the NBC family of networks give him cover, as well as the NYT, WP and so on.
That’s all that matters. So Lew isn’t the architect of failure, he’s the architect of success. He’s EXACTLY the guy to run Treasury. In fact, I bet he gets to ship another couple of trillion dollars to the banks in the next few years and blame the Republicans for being the party of fat cats, too. Why change a winning formula?
“That’s great political maneuvering if you can pull it off and, judging by the recent polls, they have.”
Which apparently will be applauded by steve and Michael……….meanwhile the people they claim to care for get it up the shoot.
“…..singing songs, and carrying signs……mostly say hooray for our side…”
Everybody look what’s going down indeed. Remember when the left distrusted government? Now they embrace it like a god, because it gives them the power to dictate…..liberty be damned.
These days it’s all about power to truth……
“Remember when the left distrusted government? Now they embrace it like a god, because it gives them the power to dictate…..liberty be damned.”
Heh.
Rick Santelli and his take on ‘counter-factuals,’ in asking What if the Fed did less……would the politicians then have been forced to do more?