Why I was so rude about the whole bipartisanship thing

[lwcon]

John Amato (from the great Crooks and Liars website):

Obama was elected to bring change to the economy, not to debate the merits of tax cuts all over again. We had that discussion for 18 months and Obama won. Tax cuts lost. Why is the media ignoring that fact?

The problem is, we didn't have that conversation.

I surely wish we did, but we simply didn't.

We had a completely fictitious conversation about how the problems in DC are a partisan "food fight."

A conversation about how Ronald Reagan was a transformative figure who "spoke to the failures of liberal government," which "did seem to value rights and entitlements over duties and responsibilities."

A conversation about how Republicans have better ideas than Democrats in "a whole host of areas," including deregulation and environmental rules.

A conversation about how liberals quaff chablis and lattes.

Now, I'm not flipping the Bozo bit on the Obama presidency. We have one president at a time, and the new one's barely started.

But Obama's vaunted rhetoric always reeked of warmed-over triangulation in a time that demanded much more and was ready for much more.

Lack of pride in — and framing advances for — the progressive alternative is what Obama, and his uncritical supporters sowed, and to some or other degree, it's what's for dinner for some time to come, until and unless he conjures up a very different recipe.

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Originally posted here. See also, "Sorry About Bipartisanship."