Our political Quote of the Day comes from Paul Tullis, writing on the Huffington Post, about what President Barack Obama seemingly forgot about change:
This battle over the debt deal was not a matter of who believes in Keynes.
It was a matter of Republicans caring more about power than about governing, and Democrats being unable to wrest that power from Republicans so that they can govern.
The reason Democrats lost (and their constituents will suffer) is the problem with the entire Obama presidency:
He forgot that the corollary to “Change comes to Washington” is that all the people who brought change to Washington — Lincoln, FDR, MLK, whoever — were willing to do what the Republicans just did: risk everything (and in some cases lay down their lives) for what they care about.
What’s pathetic is not that Pres. Obama did what he said he would do, and lost.
He didn’t even try.
He’s the most forceful American orator in two generations, who’s proven capable of killing a wedge issue and shifting the terms of the debate just by standing behind a podium and opening his mouth.
But his version of getting people behind him on the debt deal was a couple of press conferences — where by definition you don’t control the agenda — and a primetime speech from the Oval Office, which was immediately overshadowed by its response.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.