Big Mistake
by digby
You’ve probably heard by now that Social Security is back on the table in the debt talks. Oh, they’re calling it an accounting adjustment or some such nonsense, but it’s there. It comes in the form of the “Chained CPI” an unconsciously illustrative term that ends up in benefits cuts for the oldest and most infirm, particularly the women who will have the misfortune to live longer in Ayn Rand’s Thunderdome.
RJ Eskow has the whole story if you’d care to fill yourself in on the details:
Do you hear a noise like power saws cutting away at your Social Security benefits? That’s the sound of the politicians working on the “Chain Gang.”They’re promoting the “chained CPI [1],” Washington’s latest gimmick for tricking voters and cutting their hard-earned benefits to protect the wealthy. That may sound like inflammatory rhetoric, but the numbers don’t allow for any other conclusion. People retiring today could lose more than $18,000 in benefits [2] over their lifetimes – and people who are already retired will feel the pain too.What’s wrong with this idea?1) It’s an underhanded way to cut Social Security benefits (its true intent).
2) It’s unnecessary.
3) It’s unfair to women, the poor, minorities, and the very elderly.
4) It reflects a un-American political culture of pessimism and lost faith in the future.Any politician who signs onto a “chained CPI” approach to Social Security will feel the wrath of the voters – and deserves to.
I certainly hope so. But if it’s part of “Doing Big Things” it’s a fully bipartisan endeavor, so people will have a very broad target. I think we can count on the Koch brothers and Karl Rove’s Crossroads group to ensure that Democrats get their fair share of the blame but I’m also fairly sure that the Democrats will tie themselves up in pretzels trying to explain themselves and end up looking like the smarmy turncoats they are.
The Village consensus seems to be that this is all totally awesome for the president. Because it’s Big. And when it comes to president Obama, he’s totally awesome because he always goes “big” and that’s what the people want. At least the people who count: “Independents and people in the middle of the political spectrum.”
Chris Cilizza helpfully fleshes out the total awesomeness of The Bigness:
“[N]ow is not the time for small plans,” he declared in that speech, deriding his Republican opponents for trying to make a big election about small things.
The bumps in the first two years of Obamas presidency came, largely, when he went small.
The best example is the protracted fight over health care reform. Obamas initial instinct to let the bill be crafted and hashed out by Democratic leaders in Congress was a move toward bigness, staying out of the sausage-making that voters tend to view unfavorably.
But when that process broke down, Obama found himself waist-deep in a process argument in which he, inevitably, was dragged down into a debate over minute details. It was the essence of smallness in government and likely cost Obama Democratic control of the House in the 2010 election.[huh??? — ed]
Recoiling from the 2010 results, Obama went big again cutting a compromise deal in early April to keep the government operating rather than forcing a shutdown; today, Americans of different beliefs came together, Obama said at the time. We protected the investments we need to win the future.
Obamas bet on bigness will face its toughest test yet over the weeks between now and the Aug. 2 deadline for the U.S. to raise the current $14.3 trillion debt ceiling.
The Obamas team belief appears to be that he is at his best when regarded as the adult in the room hence the comparisons of Republican congressional leaders to his tween-age daughters in a confrontational press conference last week.
While the image of Obama as compromiser-in-chief doesn’t sit well with many liberals, its the independents and people in the middle of the political spectrum that the presidents political aides have their eye on in 2012.
And those voters react very positively to the image of Obama as the one person in Washington willing to rise above partisan concerns and do whats right for the country.
Of course, the downside of Obama urging Congress to go big on a debt deal is that if one doesnt happen, it undermines his brand as someone uniquely positioned to bring fundamental change to Washington.
Isn’t that fascinating? “Bigness” has absolutely nothing to do with policy. Or even the scale of the policy. (Most people would consider health care reform “big”, after all.) No, “bigness” is all about the image of Obama being “the one person in Washington willing to rise above partisan concerns and do what’s right for the country.” And clearly, everyone who’s anyone knows that “what’s right for the country” is cutting spending on an epic scale in the middle of an economic nightmare.
I will say this, I think there may be quite a few Independents and “people in the middle of the political spectrum” who might see things in more parochial personal terms and could conclude that the president has indeed Gone Big — on unemployment, home foreclosures, anemic growth and a general belief that the country has gone to hell in a handbasket. (And after the Koch Brothers weigh in, they will likely conclude that he went Very Big on cutting Medicare and Social Security too.) But according to the Village, those are irrelevant details. All that matters is that the president is seen as a “grown-up” who gets credit for making a deal. Any deal. As long as it’s Big.
If the president is listening to these people he’s making a Big Mistake.
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