TDPS: Democrats & Obama should not even think of bipartisanship for 2 years...

[celtics23]

Run time: 04:26 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbKpczBNDy4   Posted on YouTube: November 04, 2010 By YouTube Member: MidweekPolitics Views on YouTube: 512   Posted on DU: November 09, 2010 By DU Member: celtics23 Views on DU: 327

 
From: www.davidpakman.com | Subscription: www.davidpakman.com/membership | YouTube: www.youtube.com/midweekpolitics

Announcer: Welcome back to The David Pakman Show.

David: Welcome back to The David Pakman Show. The new website, DavidPakman.com. Bookmark it, that's the new site. The old website, MidweekPolitics.com, is going away. Today on the bonus show, Louis and I are going to have it out. He hasn't told me yet whether he's voted or not. He will reveal that; if he has not voted, it's not going to be pretty. We'll talk about have we found a cure for the common cold, and a lot of other stuff. So make sure to get on DavidPakman.com/membership, especially since Thanksgiving day, we're giving away an iPad, a bunch of different CDs, it's fantastic.

OK. Here is my last thought on this election. The time for bipartisanship is over. One question that the Democrats have to be asked as they think about their plan for the next two years is how did that bipartisanship work out during the first two years? You know, during the first two years of Obama's administration, the Democrats really had no need to be bipartisan, I mean, they controlled both houses and the White House, except for the fact that Republicans simply did nothing, they just stood in the way.

The entire 2008 election was talking about bipartisanship and Obama will work with people, and it didn't help get a single piece of legislation through. In fact, it helped the Republicans, because it was Republicans who were able to rebrand the Democrats as not having done much and it worked, as we know. And it left voters very unclear about what is the argument, what is the case, for reelecting these Democrats or electing new ones? And they didn't, as we saw, Louis, did we not?

Louis: You're right.

David: Now, as we now know, bipartisanship does not win elections. The Republicans very cleverly determined this when Barack Obama took office. So my suggestion is, listen, repealing health care is not going to happen because Barack Obama is not going to sign any laws that would repeal any parts of health care, and then two thirds of a vote would be required, and the Republicans are not going to get a two-thirds vote. So forget about that idea. Forget about bizarre ending the Department of Education, none of the mainstream Republican Party is going to want to do a lot of the things that the Tea Partiers have promised.

So what needs to happen? Democrats need to start passing legislation. Forget about being bipartisan. As we saw, it just doesn't work. There's no upside, especially now, to being bipartisan, that I see. Louis? Is there any reason to do it?

Louis: Not that I can see either.

David: I mean, is there a media, a media-friendly component to it? It didn't work if there is.

Louis: If there is, it's negligible.

David: Yeah, in thinking about the results of the election and the leadup, it actually has now, it has me more behind Barack Obama than I was before. You know I've criticized him a lot, Louis, about a lot of the things he hasn't done.

Louis: Oh, yeah.

David: But the reality is, in thinking about the choices we had for this election, and this may be going on with other progressives as well, the economy is not doing nearly as bad as it was, as it would be had Barack Obama not done what he did. If it were up to the Republicans, we'd be doing much worse. The Dow is at a two-year high. I understand that the jobs are not coming back yet; jobs are always the last thing to come back. Let's wait.

Health care. A lot of good things happened with that health care bill. Terror. No one is talking about it, but Barack Obama has done a good jobs in terms of the scares that we've had. I mean, some criticize him for being slow with the Underwear Bomber response. He took three days to come back to talk about, you know, failed powder in some guy's briefs versus Bush appearing to be comatose after being told about 9/11. We could have that discussion.

Louis: People love to say that President Bush did such a great job, 'Oh, we haven't been attacked since 9/11 thanks to Bush,' but no one says we haven't been attacked thanks to Obama.

David: That's right. That's absolutely right. So those are the things to keep an eye on.

[aliciaabs19]

1. Why did Obama EVER...

...think pushing bipartisanship was a productive idea?

[tins0404]

2. I disagree

If he could have shown that he was the first president to really get people working together, it would have been huge. However, you are right that maybe it was simply unrealistic and left people confused about why to vote for Dems.

[Ozymanithrax]

3. Can we go 2 years without passing any legislation? n/t