Comments from finance/tech guy turned novelist. Author of best seller Campusland. Follow on Twitter: @SJohnston60.
Wednesday, November 5, 2014
Will Obama Pivot NOW?
No.
Are you kidding? There's not a chance.
When most pundits predicted he would after the 2010 thumping, the Naked Dollar said no way. The man is a committed progressive, and it's just not in his DNA. More to the point, he doesn't understand conservatives because he's never been around any. His entire life, from Hawaii to Columbia, to Harvard, to Chicago, has been spent in a series of left wing echo chambers.
Bill Clinton, by contrast, came up through Arkansas, where little could get done without compromise with Republicans. He famously pivoted after the huge GOP win in 1994, and it saved his presidency.
No such thing will happen now. I will now tell you exactly what's going to happen: Obama will say that he needs to save us from the evil GOP, that they are the problem, and then he will embark on an unprecedented series of executive actions, possibly triggering a Constitutional crisis.
What does he have to lose? He's never running for anything again, and we've already established that he doesn't give a crap about collateral damage to his own party. He will blatantly dare the GOP to do anything about it. Under McConnell's leadership, they likely won't. the wounds from the Clinton impeachment overreach have not entirely healed.
He'll approve Keystone which he's wanted to do all along but has been waiting for political cover. This is it. He will want to negotiate corporate tax reduction but the Dems are worried about him giving away the store so they will resist. He will sell out America with the trade agreements if he has the chance and the Rs will be more than happy to help him but those are running into trouble and he's probably going to get some resistance from both parties on those. Just going to run out the clock and give Hillary a smooth takeoff as the Dems return the favor in 2016.
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