Salon's Washington correspondent Mike Madden on "taking credit" in the Obama Administration

[Amerigo Vespucci]

I'll have to go back through Salon's archives and see if Mr. Madden was as harshly critical of the Bush Administration.

:eyes:

Obama's winning ugly, but he's winning

The White House is making policy in public, and it's messy.

By Mike Madden

Feb. 12, 2009 | WASHINGTON -- By the time Congress had all but finished haggling over a $789 billion economic stimulus bill that Barack Obama once wanted on his desk, ready to be signed into law, on Jan. 20 the White House was firmly in "declare victory and go home" mode. Even if it was a few weeks later than planned.

"The White House believes we're taking steps to make good progress toward a final solution on this recovery plan that will have a positive impact on our economy," press secretary Robert Gibbs said, just as members of the Senate were holding what turned out to be a premature news conference announcing that a deal had been reached to push the stimulus through to passage. The House hadn't even signed off on the deal the Senate had cut, but Gibbs spoke with all the self-assurance of someone who knew the White House would back whatever the lawmakers agreed on -- and who knew they'd agree on something soon. "We're certainly hopeful, as we have been throughout this process, to get it done quickly. I don't know whether that announcement is today, or soon, but we're certainly hopeful. It appears as if we've got, again, we've got Democrats and Republicans working together to get an agreement moved forward."

Never mind if the plan wasn't exactly what anyone wanted, including Obama; whenever it passes, and whatever's in it, Obama's administration plans to take credit for it. Now the White House seems to be in the same mode when it comes to the administration's plan to stabilize Wall Street, despite resounding criticism of the plan, or at least Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner's description of it Tuesday. From Republicans, who said the rescue plan would add even more money to the deficit, to liberal Democrats like Rep. Barney Frank, who wondered why the administration wasn't doing more about home foreclosures, carping about the presentation was about the only thing in town that was truly bipartisan this week. Just don't tell Gibbs that. "I hesitate to judge the breadth of this and the comprehensiveness of this based on one day's reaction," he said Wednesday, defending the plan, resolutely, in a press briefing. "I don't think that's how we judge the health of the financial system, and I don't think it should be how one judges this plan."

But once again, the White House may be setting itself up for the same kind of grief it got before Obama stepped up the pressure on the stimulus package. They've put out the broad outlines of a plan, then left some of the details to be filled in later. Some of them may be filled in by Congress, which means they'll drift out of the control of Obama (even if proxies like his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, will be shepherding them). But the administration doesn't seem to be worrying about how the debate goes from a policy's introduction to a final victory. Instead of unveiling a completely finished proposal and pushing it along with a concerted P.R. effort, the White House is letting its policies evolve in public, even if that causes a few days of bad news cycles when critics inevitably weigh in.

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2009/02/12/stimulus_battle/

[Cha]

1. Mike Madden sounds like a whining

jackal.

[rvablue]

2. I call BS on Mr. Madden simply based on the inclusion of this one line:

"Even if it was a few weeks later than planned."


Uh, he's been President for one month.

Insinuating, basically, that we are suppposed to doubt his efficacy because he didn't get a major peice of legislation passed in one week.

Uh, Ok.....:eyes:





ed: clar.

[high density]

3. And Bush didn't "make policy in public" to ram his shit through?

See $1.3 trillion in tax cuts, Iraq war, No Child Left Behind, etc. It's called American politics. Welcome. I'm really getting tired of these commentators and reporters that bring up stuff which has been standard operating procedure for decades and then blame Obama when he does the same thing as if it's abnormal or somehow dishonest.

[Thrill]

4. Another pissed reporter is whining because the media's influence

is falling everyday