Nancy Pelosi

Signals that Obama is doubling down

Nope.

As Mikey Kaus says, “There won’t be any wise men coming in. No David Gergen either.

David Plouffe is back. He sent for one of the architects of his campaign. Obama does do campaigns, but his return is not good news for those who want a change in direction. Plouffe’s WaPo piece shows that there will be no moderation in the Obama agenda. In fact, Plouffe is clearly advocating more of the same….except maybe this time with more, um, feeling.

On the health care bill:

It’s a good plan that’s become a demonized caricature. But politically speaking, if we do not pass it, the GOP will continue attacking the plan as if we did anyway, and voters will have no ability to measure its upside.

I guess that going back to Olympia Snowe option is out. Be that as it may, Plouffe shows that Obama is still tone deaf as even nancy Pelosi is saying that the votes are not there.

On job creation:

There are some terrific ideas that we can implement, from tax credits for small businesses to more incentives for green jobs, but full recovery will happen only when the private sector begins hiring in earnest. That’s why Democrats must create a strong foundation for long-term growth by addressing health care, energy and education reform.

This is pretty much like the boilerplate talking points already coming out of the WH. Temporary

tax credits for small businesses can never work with the presence of the type of health care mandates Dems are proposing in either House or Senate bill. Energy? You mean that cap and trade hidden tax thing? Puhleeze. Green jobs? Those are a myth. No change here.

On the stimulus package:

If GOP challengers want to run ads criticizing the recovery act as wasteful, Democratic candidates should lift up the police officers, teachers and construction workers in their state or district, those who are protecting our communities, teaching our children and repairing our roads thanks to the Democrats’ leadership.

Really now? None are private sector jobs. At some point local communities will have to fund these on their own. The shovel ready jobs were another myth. If there was a real rise in construction jobs, unemployment levels would not be rising.

On overall spending:

The GOP took us from a $236 billion surplus when President Bush took office to a $1.3 trillion deficit, with unpaid-for tax cuts for the wealthy, two wars and the Medicare prescription drug program. Republicans’ fiscal irresponsibility has never been matched in our country’s history. We have potent talking points on health care, honest budgeting and cuts in previously sacrosanct programs. Republicans will try to win disingenuously by running as outsiders. We must make them own their record of disastrous economic policies, exploding deficits, and a failure to even attempt to solve our health care and energy challenges.

Plouffe prefaced that with saying to not take lectures from Republicans. They don’t have to. The voters already have. Obama and the Democrat congress have tripled the deficit in a year. Think tea parties, Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts.

Obama’s call to Plouffe indicates a weakness in character that troubled observers on the right before he was ever elected. It appears that he only will surround himself with people who will only tell him what he wants to hear to justify his own reality. Only sycophants need apply in his White House.

Plouffe’s message is nothing more than a repackaging of the Obama’s disasterous first year. More blaming of Bush. More outdated populism that appeals only to the true believers.

Unless leaks from the WH change in the run up to Wednesday’s State of the Union address, the Obami are telling us that nothing is going to change. Voices for moderation and real pivots from his own party will go ignored.

Little of this is good news. Not for Democrats concerned about the future of their own party. Not for a nation needing economic stability and promise. Only the GOP stands to benefit from the continued blind persuit of a president’s agenda that he kept hidden from a nation that put him in office.