Is The One, really the One and Done?

Ed Morrisey on the President's abdication of policy for politics.  Well, whaddya expect?  He was never qualified to be President, only to run for President.  Affirmative action, thy name is Barack.

Instead of working with Republicans to craft a deficit-reduction plan that could pass Congress, Obama instead filled his with tax hikes that even his own party rejected in 2009 and 2010 in the effort to fund Obama's signature health-care overhaul bill. Our colleague David Frum calls it a "stunt" that would derail economic growth, if it ever had a prayer of passing the House. Democratic strategist Mark Penn wonders at The Huffington Post why Obama would want to turn himself into another Walter Mondale — and also why Obama passed on the opportunity to work on comprehensive tax reform with Republicans rather than get stuck in "the thicket of class warfare." Why not work on co-opting a big Republican issue as Bill Clinton did with welfare reform, Penn asks, and seize the mantle of leadership?

Penn wonders why Obama didn't think to work with House Republicans on deficit reduction, but he might have asked why Obama didn't bother to work with Senate Democrats on the jobs bill, either. The White House apparently forgot to consult with its own allies in the upper chamber when writing the rerun of the 2009 stimulus bill, only to discover to their embarrassment that it won't pass the Senate. At least six Senate Democrats have gone on the record in the media expressing opposition to passing it in its current form, and not just purple-state incumbents up for tough re-election fights (like Joe Manchin and Robert Casey), but also those in relatively safe seats like Tom Carper (Delaware) and Barbara Mikulski (Maryland). Even Dianne Feinstein in solid-blue California talked to the media about her concerns over the cost and effectiveness of Obama's plan.

Obama mailed in both proposals rather than engage in the hard work of governance. If Obama had any interest in actually passing his deficit-reduction plan, he would not have filled it with tax hikes that have floated around the Beltway for years — and which both Republicans and Democrats have rejected in the past. The jobs bill was even less creative than his approach to deficit reduction, cribbed from a failed and costly exercise in central economic control. Obama didn't bother to put much effort into either because he has no intention of doing the hard work needed to accomplish actual deficit reduction or improve the job-creation climate. The president has more than a year to go before the next election, but Obama has stopped governing and has shifted entirely to campaign mode. This is what it looks like when a president quits.