What Is The Problem That Obama’s Bad Advisors Are Responsible For?

[babylonsister]

http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2010/02/what-is-the-problem-that-obamas-bad-advisors-are-responsible-for.php

What Is The Problem That Obama’s Bad Advisors Are Responsible For?
Matthew Yglesias


Edward Luce’s FT piece on how Rahm Emannuel and a tight Chicago-based cabal are ruining the Obama administration is the talk of DC. What I remember from when Rahm used to disagree about things with Nancy Pelosi when they were both in the House, Pelosi was always right so it’s fine by me if people criticize him. But what I don’t understand is what the thing is that’s supposed to be the fault of Obama’s political team. I think any serious look at the situation would have to conclude that Obama’s political advisors are doing a great job.

It’s true that David Axelrod hasn’t successfully hypnotized the congressional Republicans and forced them to vote for Obama’s bills. But nobody can do that. What the White House political team can do is try to create a situation in which people think Obama’s ideas are better than the ideas of those who are voting against his ideas. Look at the latest Post poll and you can see that Team Obama is succeeding at this. Look at the latest poll:



Similarly, asked which party they trust, people picked the Democrats over the Republicans 43 to 37. Or to look at it broadly, unemployment is over 10 percent and consistently more people approve of Obama’s job performance than disapprove. Considering the objective situation, other words, Obama’s political position is incredibly strong.

[DrDan]

1. so his advisors are nothing more than a PR staff

wonder if that's the way they see themselves. Wonder if that's the way Obama thinks of them.

Seems results ought to be a part of their job description to me.

[babylonsister]

2. I agree with you; also seems we should take into consideration rethug

obstructionism on EVERYTHING, and that's something too many people don't even want to consider when hurling criticisms.

[vegiegals]

3. So, the advisors have convinced people Dems have better ideas-Now for==

some ACTION!!

[Clio the Leo]

4. They're supposed to microwave American's problems...

.... put the problem in a box, push a button or two, walk away and do something for five minutes and then, BAM! all fixed!

[LaydeeBug]

5. "We need sixty seats" or being more inclined toward 'what to say' as opposed to 'what to DO'

PR staff upthread might be accurate.

[Armstead]

6. Depends on what the goals are

If the goal is a fairly narrow one of tinkering to fix the worst of the Bush/GOP F-ups, and tread water against the GOP right-wing attacks, then I guess they're maybe doing okay.

But if the goal is to actually roll up the sleeves and lay the groundwork for real reform to make the economy more equitable, to alter healthcare to release the grip that private insurers have, and to actually rein in the grip of Crony Capitalism and Wall St., then they're not really doing much.

We need something more than a return of 90's style Clintonism.

[Milo_Bloom]

7. The small %'s Obama wins buy are evidence of their failure

After 8 years of complete failure, the fact that over 40% of the population still trusts republics is an indication of how poorly they are preforming their function.

Needless compromise and endless caving in has watered down to the point of uselessness anything good Obama was trying to do.

Credit card reform turned into a joke.
The Stimulus bill did more for big banks than anyone else.
Do we even want to talk about the Health Insurance Recovery Act of 2010?

The reason 40% of the country still trusts the republicans (up significantly from when Obama took office) is because nothing Obama has done has impacted them in any significant way and unfortunately, won't. Most people don't both the follow the WHY things aren't working.. they don't know that the republicans they trust are the ones fucking it all up.. they just know "Democrats had a super majority and nothing changed for them".

It is a shame poor advisers destroyed the best opportunity we had for change in the last 40 years.