Of course, there’s no need for Obama to negotiate over the debt ceiling anyway since the president has numerous options for skirting the debt limit (the Constitutional option, the trillion-dollar coin, etc.) The fact that he is at all willing to make cuts to social programs shows where his priorities lie.

The Rice decision cannot fairly be seen as a fold. Rather, Obama was simply exercising good political judgment. The cost was too high and the reward too low.

Good sense should not be equated with weakness.

Obama:

“I think it’s tempting not to negotiate with hostage-takers, unless the hostage gets harmed. Then people will question the wisdom of that strategy. In this case, the hostage was the American people, and I was not willing to see them get harmed.”

Oh, but they already have been harmed. They were harmed by your craven caving and pointless “bipartisanhship”, “bipartisanship” that wasn’t necessary (say, with the stimulus) during your first term, especially the first two years when you had large majorities in Congress.

Doesn’t this man see the similarity to war? In war, innocent people get harmed–by the boatloads. Does that mean that we should have run up the white flag of surrender to Hitler and Tojo because fighting them would harm a lot of people and destroy a lot of assets? Should we have pursued a strategy of MAD against the Soviets, where if it did come to war both countries would have become piles of smoldering rubble and heaps of bodies?

When you’re dealing with an enemy who doesn’t care how much pain or suffering he inflicts as long as he “wins” the only deterrence is to make damn sure that his “win” will cost him so dearly that he will be deterred. President Bipartisanshp hasn’t gotten that yet.

-stewartm

While I think it is true that Obama has little stomach for a fight, I also think he is lacking in core principles. I think that in spite of appearances that Obama gives in to easily, I think his apparent “cave ins” were actually Obama getting exactly what he wanted in the first place.

The Rice decision cannot fairly be seen as a fold.

Ordinarily, your calculus would fit.

But as Jon says, there is this pre-existing pattern of folding, even when it wasn’t necessary.

Moreover, if Rice wasn’t worth the fight, Obama shouldn’t have said “If they have a problem with that (referring to Rice’s handling of the Libyan situation), they have a problem with me” during his first press conference. Even worse than folding is putting on a pretense like you’re going to stand up and not “take it” and then “take it”.

-stewartm

Re: #2

Yes, a stitch in time, and there’s just enough daylight remaining between Rice’s declining prospects and John Kerry. And it’s good O hadn’t gotten around to formally nominating Rice. So Kerry can appear as (almost) the first choice going forward.

So Kerry can appear as (almost) the first choice going forward.

And so Scott Brown can regain a Senate seat for the Rs.

No thankee, I’d sooner Obama pass on Kerry.

-stewartm

The list of supporters that Obama has dumped is nearly endless, isn’t it? He treats them like he treats constituents! Why should he exhibit principal in some cases and not in others. Everybody’s expendable, so long as Obama wins.

Good sense should not be equated with weakness.

That’s correct. It’s the Iron Law Of Institutions — Obama has the “good sense” to look out for #1.
The Iron Law of Institutions is:

The people who control institutions care first and foremost about their power within the institution rather than the power of the institution itself. Thus, they would rather the institution “fail” while they remain in power within the institution than for the institution to “succeed” if that requires them to lose power within the institution.– Jonathan Schwarz

sure looks like a cave after the “angry black man” behavior when McCain and Graham first when after Rice. to see Obama get angry was fascinating. not like i’d ever seen that before or since.

and with the list of people who have been thrown under the bus, if this is how Obama “operates”, 11th dimensional chess BS, well, i wonder just exactly what he wants or wants to appear as.

Obama looks like he folds with a hard push. don’t know much about Rice, but it sure looked like Obama let Rice do her own defending. and now she is “Out.” Maybe Obama lets his “people” do their own surviving on their own. sure looks that way.

and to see the Republicans pushing for Kerrey so they can put Sen Brown back in the Senate. this has all the earmarks of A Republican putsch. a Republican President in all but name.

truly a fascinating “game”. just watching keeps me guessing what will come next. Obama has no “ground”, no left or right “underpinning” in such wild gyrations of actions/behavior. Obama must be getting something out of this, or Obama is really really a pushover. just so wishy washy on the appearance, except for that one “angry black man” stance. maybe Obama can’t “be” an angry black man. sure looks that way.

American politics in the Village for the Village. us peons just pay the bills. and watch out for where the Shiit lands.

How does that have anything to do with Rice?

She was taking on water from the Left and Right. In return, Rice offered damn little political buoyancy.

This poliitically astute decision did not do any institutional damage to the ship of state.

This time, we’re in accord. Susan Rice was most definitely not worth it. The Black Agenda Report refers to her as a “corrupt lobbyist” and from what I read, that seems about right.

Obama is a Republican president in all but name.

If I was on the front lines and Obama was my back-up, I’d be more concerned about that than anything in front of me. Seriously.

No kidding. Compare his positions, programs, and actions to any GOP President from Eisenhower forward and he lies farther right than all of them.

Her record of war advocacy and close ties to tyrants is notably missing from the debate over whether she should be Secretary of State.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/11/susan-rice-benghazi-secretary-state

Re: #7

I don’t think so.

Rather, one of two things will happen here in MA. Either the MA legislature will (yet again) change the succession law, and have Gov Patrick appoint a Dem who’ll stay until Kerry’s term is up, and presumably get re-elected. Or the Dems here will arrange for a straw “Independent” to also run and absorb enough votes to defeat Brown in a special election in the nearer term.

A straw, Tim Cahill, also-ran when Charlie Baker ran against Deval Patrick. I think Patrick would have won handily anyway even without Cahill.

Whatever the method I think heaven and earth will move to keep Brown out, and keep Kerry’s seat in the Dem column if Kerry goes to State.

“Obama has little stomach for a fight”

Oh he’s perfectly willing to fight for what he really values. He fought to get the bank bailouts passed back when he was a senator, he fought for the reappointment of Ben “Do Nothing” Bernanke when that was in trouble, he fought for his precious Simpson-Bowles commission, he fights for his right to conduct every matter of office in absolute secrecy…he’s a fighter alright, just not for what most Americans believe in.

The Obama Doctrine: surrender and then begin the negotiations

And he certainly is fighting for the least-transparent adminstration ever, plus the right to assassinate/indefinitely detain US citizens, not to mention the rest of the world. My HERO, the Constitutional SCHOLAR.

Obama is a fighter. His gift as a result of being a community organizer is to recognize a power center. He nevern fights a power center (military, Republicans, Wall Street, Banksters, etc.). When Bill McKibben surrounded the white house, Obama recognized the best way to handle the environmental poweer center was to wait it out. So he did.

The only way we win this negotiation is to have the bodies on the line. Without it, the Republican power centers will chip away all of the progressive reforms.

I agree . This is the best summuray of his politics I’e seen. He should never have been elected President. He would have mafe a great chief of staff in the Executive Building. He has no core values apart from protecting and advNcing his familt. I can’t believe Michelle sticks with him. Oh well.

He has no core values

Coming from someone who just said:

This massacre as legs, because it happened in hedge fund exurbia. I doubt any hedgie kids were killed, but that part of CT is infested with prep schools where they send their kids, and it could happen to them as easily as it did to the hoi polloi. We used to think it matters only if it happens on teevee; the truth is it only matters if you’re rich. This one matters. Columbine was for the plebs. Who gives a shit?

Fuck.you.Knut.

Yeah, I disagree that Obama should have put up a fight for this nomination. He has “bigger fish to fry” on a lot of issues and shouldn’t put his strong electoral mandate in jeopardy over something like this (as well qualified as Ms. Rice might be). This is a distraction from more important things to come, and I don’t think progressives should get overly worked up.

I was replying to beleck at #10. Obama, for my money, is for and about Obama, not any political party: Democrat was what got him onto the elevator in Chicago. I carry no brief for Palin, but her experiential “resume” was at least as good as his. Oh, the irony.

Do you expect putative liberals to be any less partisan, and witless about it, than conservatives? I know, you don’t.

Agree. He’ll trample anybody to get what he wants.

Knut’s been here a long time. I think you’re mistaking his intended tone.

This is just kabuki, and minor kabuki at that. Upon just a little bit of reflection after reading the article and the comments, I think Obama acted tough at first in order to give the appearance of defending a black person and a woman: See, black people and women, I fight for you!

Then Obama throws Rice under the bus. Did he not do much the same thing with his former pastor back in 2008? Not that either individual was really worth expending much political capital on. (Aside: political capital–my, look how capitalism dominates the way we even discuss politics, which is disgusting in itself, but that’s worth a whole diary entry in itself.)

I agree with Oscar Leroy. When Obama REALLY wants something, he’ll fight for it, and he’ll try to do it in a way that keeps up the illusion that he is a progressive, or at least a liberal. I think we’ll see that move again in the budget talks: Obama will put up a great show appearing to defend things like Medicare and Social Security, accomplish what he REALLY wants to do(which is to cut them), and then turn his supporters lose to blame the Big Bad Republicans and tell us that things would have been worse under Romney.

Obama’s so predictably corporatist it’s sickening.

I’m just not sure we should be arguing Obama’s backbone in connection with a person of politics and personal morality as repugnant as Susan Rice.

Sorry, this is one of those occasions where I just feel that FDL invests far too much legitimacy in a bankrupt system, sniffing its poo for the little signs. . .

You know what? I went to high school half an hour away from Newtown, CT. The area is not, as Knut claims, ‘infested with prep schools’. I recognize the last names of 3 of the murdered because I had classes with kids with the same last names, in a township half an hour away. Odds are those are relatives of my former classmates. So fuck Knut because Knut is an asshole.