http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2012/12/boehners-new-plan-for-abidcation-of-his.html
I just never thought Boehner would be this stupid. Does he imagine he'll get a better deal than what the President offered him last week? Will a January-or March-deal have chained CPI and a $400,000 floor on higher taxes? As John Bernstein says, at the end of the day, it's not if but when we get a deal-a decent deal that we Democrats will like:
"And going back a bit: the other underlying fact is that there will, eventually, be a bill or bills that passes. It's not quite 100% certain, the way it is with government shutdown or debt limit showdowns, but it's awful close to certain. The bill or bills may come before January 1 (very unlikely now), in early January, in late January, in February, even in March...but the odds are overwhelming that sooner or later something passes that will undo the bulk of the fiscal cliff tax increases, take care of the Doc Fix and the AMT fix, and do something about the sequester, among other things."
"Moreover, everyone involved knows it. Well, maybe not Michele Bachmann and Louie Gohmert, but just about everyone."
"So why am I not really cranky? Well, it is possible that a deal will be struck in the Senate that could work; the eventual deal needs the support of Barack Obama and John Boehner, but they don't have to be the ones making the deal (quick reminder: there is a possibility on the table that Republicans in the House could vote present and force Democrats to supply all the votes; that still means Boehner supports a deal, even if the way the support is expressed is by not voting against it). So I'm not ready to completely write off Weisman's article. And I suppose Silver's post is okay as an intellectual exercise; it just doesn't tell us much about how we'll actually get through the fiscal cliff."
True, there's also the fact that the GOP has declared its intention to use the debt ceiling as leverage for more spending cuts. Sure. Lose an election where you run on the Ryan privatize Medicare plan and when you lose just play debt ceiling chicken, subjecting Medicare to a death by a thousand cuts. Heads you win, tails the American people lose.
Obama shows that he gets it by vowing not to negotiate over the debt ceiling at all. He's already taken this basic approach to the fiscal cliff-there were some concessions but not to many. In the end, Neoconservative extraordinaire, Bill Kristol was right in what he said on Fox the week after Romney and company lost. The GOP will have to ha lot more than they think-after all, elections have consequences.
However, there's a lot more good news for Obama than all the headlines have suggested. He's now actually very popular. Gallup now shows him with a 57% approval rating with just 37% disapproving. While he spent 2010 and 2011-and much of early 2012-with a job approval in the mid to low 40s, during the campaign his approval rating slowly rose. In post-election time, it's continued to soar.
His approval rating over his first term till now has followed most closely the trajectory of Reagan and Clinton-not bad company to be in. Both Reagan and Clinton struggled in their respective 2nd and 3rd years-at least approval rating wise-both well under 50%. Reagan actually was under 40% in 1982 and 1983. Both never got over 50% to stay until their 4th years-election year.
All this mirrors President Obama. To be sure Reagan, topped out at about 68% in 1986. After the Iran Contra scandal his approval somewhat waned. Clinton, on the other hand only topped 60%-to stay-after the Moncia Lewinsky scandal broke.
On the other hand much of the economic news is good right now as well. Yesterday we saw home prices-Case-Schiller index-rise again. Today we see unemployment claims drop to the the lowest since 2008-on the basis of the weekly average over the last month.
So there is reason to believe that the next 4 years are going to be so bright we're going to have to wear shades! Or at least they'll be an improvement over the last 4...
I know, over the top optimism is kind of my thing. On the "micro" level I have some good news to report-I got a new lap top so my posts should hopefully become more regular again, It's not it's an ASUS. I can't tell you the withdrawals I get when I have no computer.
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