In December of 2008, congressional Republicans were in an odd place. Their president was serving out the last days of his failed presidency, but all the important decisions were being made by people like Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke. On January 9th, 2009, the Wall Street Journal reported that 524,000 jobs had been lost in December, 2.6 million jobs had been lost in 2008, and 1.9 million jobs had been lost in just the last four months. The Financial Services sector was in ruins. Detroit was bankrupt. The Dow Jones Industrial average had fallen from the 14,000’s in October 2007 to the 8,000’s. By March it would be in the 6,000’s. People’s homes were being foreclosed on left and right, and lives were being ruined and wealth destroyed at a devastating pace.
John McCain and Sarah Palin had suffered a resounding defeat, as had the Republicans in Congress. Suddenly, for the first time in many years, the Republicans had no real leadership. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader John Boehner were on their own. But, if they were suddenly liberated from the burden of walking Bush and Cheney’s party line, they also were responsible for the chaos they saw all around them. The Congressional Republicans had worked with Bill Clinton to deregulate the banking industry. A Republican administration and a (mostly) Republican-controlled Congress had neglected to provide meaningful oversight of the derivatives markets or the mortgage industry. Republican tax cuts and unfunded wars and new entitlements had depleted the treasury without providing the promised economic growth. Now everything was in ruins.
Their ideology had failed in spectacular fashion, and they had been forced to bite the bullet and vote for an enormous bailout for the banks. A new Democratic president was assembling his team during the transition, trying to figure out how to stop the bleeding and prevent a second Great Depression.
It was in this context that Mitch McConnell, John Boehner, and House Minority Whip Eric Cantor hatched a plan of total obstruction. During meetings in December 2008 and early January 2009, they decided that they would insist that their members provide no cooperation and no votes for anything major that the president wanted to do. It didn’t matter what the president suggested. Substance wasn’t the point.
Here’s an example of what I am talking about:
David Obey, then-chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, met with his GOP counterpart, Jerry Lewis, to explain what Democrats had in mind for the stimulus and ask what Republicans wanted to include. “Jerry’s response was: ‘I’m sorry, but leadership tells us we can’t play,’” Obey told me. “Exact quote: ‘We can’t play.’ What they said right from the get-go was: It doesn’t matter what the hell you do, we ain’t going to help you. We’re going to stand on the sidelines and bitch.”
To give this a little more flavor, let me add the following:
“We were in disarray,” recalls Representative Pete Sessions of Texas. “People were comparing us to cockroaches, saying we weren’t even relevant. We had to change the mind-set.”
“We came in shellshocked,” said Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. “There was sort of a feeling of ‘every man for himself.’ Mitch early on in this session came up with a game plan to make us relevant with 40 people. He said if we didn’t stick together on big things, we wouldn’t be relevant.”
Rather than feeling any shame for what they had done to the country, the Republicans decided to oppose everything the new president tried to do to clean up their mess. It didn’t matter whether they agreed with the policy in the past. They just wanted to be “relevant” and do whatever they could do to undermine Barack Obama.
Republicans recognized that after Obama’s big promises about bipartisanship, they could break those promises by refusing to cooperate. In the words of Congressman Tom Cole, a deputy Republican whip: “We wanted the talking point: ‘The only thing bipartisan was the opposition.’”
When you look back at the president’s 2008 campaign about hope and change, remember how the Republicans decided to strangle hope and change in the crib, just because they could. The president offered his hand and it was slapped away. It’s tragic that the American people never really understood what happened and who was to blame for partisan gridlock. The Republicans were richly rewarded in 2010 for their bad faith and deeply un-American strategy.
We have to tell this story because the more people who understand it, the fewer people will be fooled a second time.
Boo:
I have a question for you. How would you have handled it? Meaning, I think The Turtle was on the record pretty early(like even before Obama took office) saying that his intention was making PBO a one-term president. And did Obey relay what happened in these chats to the WH? Granted, they didn’t need any GOPer votes in the House, but it would have been obvious to me that the GOP in the Senate would be assholes like their House brethren.
That’s a complicated question. There’s a difference between how it should have been handled at the outset and how it should have been handled over time. And then there should have been a major education effort over the summer and fall of 2010 in preparation for the elections. At least initially, Obama had to keep his promise to reach out. At what point did his satisfy his promise? At what point did he fall into their trap? And at what point should he have made the pivot?
Keep in mind that a great deal of Obama’s “reaching out” to Republicans was intended to reassure the right flank of the Democratic coalition, who needed bipartisan cover.
Obama didn’t let Max Baucus keep the health care bill in his committee, negotiating with Republicans, in order to win the votes of Republicans. He did it to win the vote of Max Baucus.
That said there was a time to play hardball with the Conservadems. About August the Obama team should have said the bill we eventually got was the best that we were going to get, added the sweeteners to buy the conservadem votes in the Senate, and got that thing passed in September.
I know he isn’t popular but I actually think that losing Daschle as Secretary of HHS was the turning point on healthcare. The content of the final bill wouldn’t have changed much but the process would have been a lot smoother. Daschle knows the Senate like the back of his hand and if he was the one heading the effort I think he would have kept the Senate process from lingering like it did. That in turn could have stemmed some of the August town halls we saw
Or, conversely, at what point did they fall into his trap? If he had stopped trying to reach out to soon, even knowing it wouldn’t matter, than all the blame for failure would have fallen on him. In fact, the Republicans at many time mentioned that he was breaking his promise for bipartisanship.
I think his plan was to show to the country just how obstructionist the GOP was being. He was able to wedge through the stimulus because of Specter anhd Snowe and Collins. And that was before the latter two realized what happened to a Republican that went off message.
His plan might have worked in 2010 except for three things.
Heck, in all his addresses before Congress he always pointed out how many of his suggestions had been basic GOP ideas and how they were being turned down. He was also always walking the thin line to avoid any suggestion of being “the angry black man” that the right has always tried to paint him as, so it limited his ability to call them out in stronger language.
I think he has always been thinking in terms of a second term when he can drop some of the imagery he has had to project.
That’s just the thing. I get that PBO had to play nice, even if I don’t agree 100% with it. But what about sending surrogates to the different talks shows to talk about The Turtle’s obstruction? Or whatever to let people know that the GOP is putting party over country. I guess the overall point is that the President put too much faith in the GOP being willing to work together and also too much carrot and not enough stick was used with people like Mad Max and HolyJoe(which I’m sure plenty disagree with me on).
Have worked on Lieberman. If he was stripped of committee chairs we would have lost his vote on some important legislation like DADT. This goes back to what I said above though losing Daschle as Secretary of HHS was a huge blow because I think he could have wrangled in Baucus.
Really? Personally I think HolyJoe’s threat was an empty one. Where was he gonna go? Defect to the GOP and be in the minority? Thankfully, he’ll no longer be in the Senate as of January.
Why not? He endorsed McCain, after all. He’d have just as much power there for anything important, and he’s on the way out anyway. I actually supported Obama keeping his chairs. Lieberman had the leverage, not Obama; they both knew it.
That’s just tactical game theory. But it lacked vision. They didn’t expand their electoral base, they just soured (white) people on their government. It was only successful in the short term (as 2012 is shaping up to demonstrate).
The GOP is both unpatriotic and ineffective in their ability to obstruct progressive policy over the next few congresses. I’d be more infuriated if they had actually succeeded in stopping the stimulus or the PPACA or the DADT repeal. They couldn’t even create the conditions for a double dip recession. It turns out they really do suck at everything, even sabotage.
You must know having done canvassing, people’s decision is based on emotion, not reasoning. Politics is about perception, that’s why ads are less important than the experience people take with them over the years. You can’t undo the developments of Obama’s first term.
Obama’s political mission was change in Washington. His great speeches elevated the expectation by people sky high, no one could have succeeded to meet that level. His enthusiasme carried him away in his speech in Cairo, the Obama administration failed also in foreign policy. Ask Netanyahu and Arabs in the street of Tunis, Tripoli, Cairo, Amman or Jerusalem.
In politics, you have failed when you try to convey that your message was lacking and the policy was ok. People have made up their minds who to vote for as it is always a vote of giving confidence. Obama has to hammer out what made it extremely difficult the first four years. All you can hope for is a break in the economy and some positive news on the jobs market.
Thank G.d the Republicans came up with Mitt Romney and a Libertarian economic policy of Koch Industries. Continue to define the persons Romney and Ryan and who they stand for. Don’t look back, look forward especially for the youth who have reached the age for their first vote. The future is theirs. The elderly (my generation) mainly are comfortable for politicians to make clear promises and keep our pensions intact.
Surprisingly, Romney is still getting lots of support from voters 55+ and the white males. Talking about a divided nation!
Yes, let’s ask Arabs on the streets of Tripoli what they think about Obama:
http://i1191.photobucket.com/albums/z472/silverspring230/libya5.png
How about that Fantastic Four?
http://s1191.photobucket.com/albums/z472/silverspring230/?action=view¤t=libya7.png
The thank you note was undoubtedly for Gaddafi’s millions.
Here are some stats of the decline in Obama’s popularity:
Lebanon 48% -7
Egypt 19% -8
Turkey 15% +1
Jordan 12% -13
Pakistan 12% -4
European nations, Russia, Brazil and Mexico score >50% and in Japan Obama is at 72% and a whopping 22% higher than Bush in 2008.
Except for an increase in Russia, Obama’s popularity has decreased in most nations since his high favorability poll in 2009.
When, exactly, did the millions Gadhaffi stole from the Libya people become “his?” You have a bizarre sense of morality. I’m supposed to think worse about the Libyan people because their stolen wealth was returned?
Good job shitting on people celebrating the overthrow of a dictator. They must all just be greedy. They can’t actually be celebrating their new democracy, the end of a terrorist police state, and the rebirth of freedom in their country. Naw, you have to find some way to insult them, because they don’t seem too terribly willing to go along with your privileged, romantic, stale so-called-anti-imperialism. Classy comment, Oui. Way to stand with the little guy.
“The Congressional Republicans had worked with Bill Clinton to deregulate the banking industry.”
Thank you for reminding people of how the seeds of the destruction of the economy where planted by then President Clinton. It is unfortunate that President Obama has done nothing of substance to roll back the influence of the financial institutions of the USA.
If it took an act of Congress to undo it, then it would take an act of Congress to fix it. There was little the President on his own could do about it. We did get the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform bill passed which included the CFPB. If I remember correctly even that only passed by 1 vote. We need a better Congress to get better regulations.
It is unfortunate that President Obama has done nothing of substance to roll back the influence of the financial institutions of the USA.
The financial institutions of the USA disagree with you: http://www.slate.com/blogs/trending/2012/06/13/romney_crushing_obama_in_donations_from_wall_street.h
tml&sa=U&ei=TrE3UPufGs_M6QHp9oF4&ved=0CB4QFjAD&usg=AFQjCNFkntTFOLu3tZPn3CIzM-JAO2LY8
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The lesson of this post isn’t just that the Republicans chose a course of total obstructionism – it’s that they chose a course of total obstructionism when inaction risked collapsing the global economy. And, of course, it’s about three years too late to get that message out in any way that will be meaningful for the American public.
There really is no crime against humanity too large for these self-absorbed psychopaths to commit: unprovoked wars, global economic collapse, environmental catastrophe.
That’s what really scares people who are paying attention. That’s the sort of message Democrats, if not BHO himself, ought to be shouting from the rooftops. But they won’t, and our obsequious media won’t, because that would be, you know, partisan and disrespectful. Too bad it’s objective fact.
I’m tired of folks dancing around the issue. This country was about to careen off an economic cliff the likes we hadn’t seen since the Great Depression.
the CHOICE of the Republicans WAS NOT to help this country.
their CHOICE was that they were going to defeat the PRESIDENT
by what means?
by committing ECONOMIC TREASON AGAINST THIS COUNTRY.
Take away the 600,000 public sector people who have been fired by GOP Governors.
Add in the 2-2.5 million more Americans that would have been employed by the American Jobs Act.
what would our unemployment rate be right now.
it was E-C-O-N-O-M-I-C T-R-E-A-S-O-N
Can I remind everyone that Barack Obama, who apparently needs all of our advice about how to pass legislation, succeeding in passing the most extensive legislative agenda of any President in the past 45 years? Including successfully passing a comprehensive health care bill, something every other President who ever tried failed at?
Monday-morning quarterbacking is one thing, but these conversations are more like watching Roger Marris break the all-time record of home runs in a season, and listening to somebody at the end of the bar – somebody who hasn’t played baseball since Little League – hold forth on how Roger could have hit 70 home runs if he’d only fixed his batting stance.
The conversation we should be having, in terms of Obama’s performance at legislating in his first two years, is how he accumulated such a historic record of success, and what lessons we can take from his performance.
Wrong!!!
Small, limited Government ideology did not “fail”..your statist, crony capitalism failed…you use the coercive power of Government to pick winners and losers…then blame free enterprise when it doesn’t work out…
LFA calls Bullshit!!
You’re cheap money, Keynesian ideology created this fucking mess…and you try to blame Bush!!!
What a joke!!!
Are we not supposed to know that this is GW1776?
What, did Boo finally ban him?
GW1776, Liberty for All, Arturo Gilroy–he’s said so plainly in numerous threads, plenty of times. He hasn’t tried to hide it, just says he keeps getting banned.
The MassDem hing is mildly amusing, though.
Yeah, almost as good as ChappaquiddickSixFiveThousand. Or I guess that’s where he’s going with it, but who knows…