And they fell for it...
Union leaders: Deal reached on taxing 'Cadillac' health care plans.
And by "deal" they mean "cut us a break on this or you lose monolithic union support in elections." So, now our "transparent," "post-racial," "post-partisan" President who promised not to bow to special interests overtly shows us who is special interest groups really are.
The latest poll numbers show the President in precisely the situation I expected him to end up in: after making it through the primaries on the support of the far-left wing of his party, he'll be unable to govern from the far-left and inevitably have to deal with problems on both the left and the right. I've got a liberal friend who predictably disagrees with my notion that you can't govern from the far-left, but it looks like I'm right. The President won't ever win over the right and now he's losing points with the left-wing base that put him into power in the first place because they're pointing to all the promises made during the campaign that he hasn't delivered on.
I'm not surprised there's a President who has been elected and not lived up to campaign promises. You may deduce I am okay with that, in large measure, with the current administration. What still seems to mystify me, however, is the number of people who completely expected him to. Maybe this is their first rodeo, and they haven't seen this scenario play out before. Perhaps they simply wanted to believe.
I think that's part of the problem. During the campaign I commented frequently to friends that the beauty of then-Senator Obama was that he was a completely blank slate: Obama Rasa. With no record, history (or baggage) and preaching broad platitudes, people could ascribe their idiosyncratic vision of "hope" on this charismatic, intelligent, "articulate and clean" rising political star. Ultimately, that's what's going to do him in. Because, as the saying goes, "you can't please all of the people all of the time."
And by "deal" they mean "cut us a break on this or you lose monolithic union support in elections." So, now our "transparent," "post-racial," "post-partisan" President who promised not to bow to special interests overtly shows us who is special interest groups really are.
The latest poll numbers show the President in precisely the situation I expected him to end up in: after making it through the primaries on the support of the far-left wing of his party, he'll be unable to govern from the far-left and inevitably have to deal with problems on both the left and the right. I've got a liberal friend who predictably disagrees with my notion that you can't govern from the far-left, but it looks like I'm right. The President won't ever win over the right and now he's losing points with the left-wing base that put him into power in the first place because they're pointing to all the promises made during the campaign that he hasn't delivered on.
I'm not surprised there's a President who has been elected and not lived up to campaign promises. You may deduce I am okay with that, in large measure, with the current administration. What still seems to mystify me, however, is the number of people who completely expected him to. Maybe this is their first rodeo, and they haven't seen this scenario play out before. Perhaps they simply wanted to believe.
I think that's part of the problem. During the campaign I commented frequently to friends that the beauty of then-Senator Obama was that he was a completely blank slate: Obama Rasa. With no record, history (or baggage) and preaching broad platitudes, people could ascribe their idiosyncratic vision of "hope" on this charismatic, intelligent, "articulate and clean" rising political star. Ultimately, that's what's going to do him in. Because, as the saying goes, "you can't please all of the people all of the time."