Why Obama Likes His Odds

Why Obama Likes His Odds
By E.J. Dionne Jr.Monday, July 20, 2009
It was not the soaring rhetoric that is Barack Obama's signature, but he recently offered the sound bite that may define his presidency: "Don't bet against us."

There are reasons to believe that his confident words -- they were about health-care reform but have broader application -- were not the bombast of a bluffer exaggerating the strength of his hand. They reflect the high cards that Obama holds and has only now started to play.

Of course, no one ever thought passing a health-care bill would be easy, and the effort hit some bumps last week over costs and how to cover them.

But Obama doesn't quite see things the way his more nervous Democratic allies do because he missed the years in Washington during which his party was beaten down. Many Democrats had their perceptions of political reality shaped by the failure of Bill Clinton's health proposal, the 1994 Republican revolution and the GOP's triumphalism during President Bush's first term.

That world, however, turned upside down in 2005 -- the year Obama arrived in Washington. Bush's power dissolved in the failure of his Social Security privatization proposal, the Hurricane Katrina backlash and rising disillusionment with the Iraq war. By the end of 2006, less than two years after Obama's arrival, Democrats had seized control of both houses of Congress.

The paradox is that Obama's limited experience under Republican sway makes him more comfortable than many of his allies are with wielding the power that comes from large Democratic majorities.

And it's real power. Nothing made that clearer than the trajectory of Judge Sonia Sotomayor's Supreme Court nomination battle -- or non-battle.

It has often been said that Republicans have not put up much of a fight against her, but the reason for their pacifism is rarely mentioned: Republicans were severely constrained simply because they lack numerical clout.

Had the Senate been more closely divided, the GOP might have mounted a more aggressive campaign that, if nothing else, could have raised the cost for moderate Democrats of supporting Sotomayor. But knowing they'd never get the votes to stop her, Republicans decided to wait for a more opportune moment to pick a real fight.

The numbers work Obama's way on other issues. Much was made of the 44 House Democrats who defected from the president's position by opposing the cap-and-trade bill last month. The more important fact is that Democrats have such a big majority that they could lose all those votes and still prevail, even if narrowly. The same numbers give Speaker Nancy Pelosi significant room to maneuver in selling the House health-care bill.

And with 60 votes in the Senate, Democrats can, in principle, work their will on health care without any Republican support. Obama is bound to make compromises, partly to bring along moderate Democrats. But the size of the Democrats' Senate majority means they won't be able to blame the Republicans if health reform dies. This increases the pressure on moderate Democrats to get something done.

There is thus an irony to the game Obama must play. He will continue to speak in bipartisan terms to keep open the possibility of picking off Republicans if they're needed -- Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) already seems inclined to work with him -- and because such an approach appeals to moderate Democrats whose sensibilities he must soothe.

The open-to-the-other-side style also helps him hold support from political independents around the country. He needs them to preserve his good approval ratings, which are themselves a form of political capital.

But Obama must simultaneously convince Democrats that they are not living in the Republican congressional eras of 1995 or 2003 -- that if it's necessary, they have the strength on their own to win. This was the implicit message Obama conveyed to Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) to push him to conclude his frustratingly protracted health-care negotiations with Republicans in the Senate Finance Committee.

Getting Baucus to move this week is essential to maintaining momentum. If Obama seems likely to win, interest groups will be more forthcoming, his own party will be more likely to hold together and more Republicans will be inclined to cut a deal.

And that, finally, is why Obama wants to make sure his party bets with him, not against him. His core message to fellow Democrats is that the only things they have to fear are the fears and insecurities bred into them when they were a battered minority. Obama is free of those doubts because he never knew them.

ejdionne@washpost.com

SOURCE: www.washingtonpost.com

Reagan's Net Approval and Unemployment Rate 81-88

SOURCE: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/horseraceblog/2009/06/reagan_obama_and_presidential_1.html

Pentagon Pulls Question That Called Protests a Form of Terrorism

Pentagon Pulls Question That Called Protests a Form of Terrorism

Thursday, June 18, 2009

By James Osborne

The Pentagon has removed a controversial question from its anti-terrorism training exam that labeled “protests” a form of “low-level terrorism,” calling the question “poorly worded.”

A Pentagon spokesman said the question failed to make clear the difference between illegal violent demonstrations and constitutionally protected peaceful protests.

Civil libertarians and activist groups, interviewed by FOXNews.com for a story that appeared on Wednesday, had objected strongly to the exam question, which a Department of Defense employee had printed and given to the American Civil Liberties Union.

The question asked:

“Which of the following is an example of low-level terrorism?”

— Attacking the Pentagon

— IEDs

— Hate crimes against racial groups

— Protests

The correct answer, according to the exam, was "Protests."

“They should have made it clearer there’s a clear difference between illegal violent demonstrations and peaceful, constitutionally protected protests,” Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Les Melnyk said on Thursday.

Asked when a protest becomes an “illegal, violent demonstration,” Melnyk said, “I’m not a lawyer. I couldn’t get into the specifics of when you cross the line.”

“If you’re doing physical damage to people or property, that could fall into that,” he said.

The ACLU had written a letter to the Pentagon last week asking it to remove the question from the exam, which is a part of defense employees' routine training.

The Pentagon will not try to identify the employee who printed out the question and gave it to the ACLU, Melnyk said.

“Sharing that with the ACLU wouldn’t be any sort of misconduct,” he said.

Of the Defense Department’s 3 million employees, 1,546 took the exam, Melnyk said. All will be sent e-mails “explaining the error and the distinction between lawful protests and unlawful violent protests,” he wrote in an e-mail.

He added that many Defense employees work in countries where violent demonstrations are regular occurrences.

“In those situations, that anti-Americanism might be taken out on an American in the crowd,” Melnyk said.

George Martin, national co-chairman of United for Peace and Justice, an anti-war group, said he was satisfied with the decision to remove the question.

"There is a distinction between legal, non-violent action and violent demonstrations. That’s where the mainstream peace movement comes from," Martin said.

"I'm glad to see that question was removed. How the government directs its employees to deal with its citizens is critical."

Ann Brick, an attorney with the ACLU, said "I'd like to talk to them about what steps they're going to take to make sure mistakes like this don’t happen in the future.

"There's a need for some education, not just for the people taking the course, but for the people designing these tests. They need some education in fundamental constitutional principles."

Earlier this week, Brick called the question “part of a pattern of equating dissent and protest with terrorism.”

"It undermines the core constitutional values the Department of Defense is supposed to be defending,” Brick said, referring to the First Amendment right to peaceably assemble.

The language of the question raised flags across the political spectrum, with both anti-war demonstrators and tea party participants interpreting it as an indication of the Pentagon’s indifference to citizens’ civil liberties.

“To equate that in any degree with citizens being able to express themselves seems to me to be headed down a road where all dissent is suspect and questionable,” Bill Wilson, president of the Americans for Limited Government, said on Wednesday.