[dc]W[/dc]hat if the president finds it agreeable to guarantee the safety of his programs by installing an apparently moderate Democrat? If Obama steps aside, we Republicans fling ourselves at the wall. Would he be able to transform his own personal unpopularity into yet another weapon for whacking the slow-footed and timid GOP? We need to be prepared for the staged emergence of a moderate Democrat to deflate all our puffed-up rage at the Communist incumbent.
Think it couldn’t happen? Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and President Obama have all demonstrated their willingness to sacrifice much for their progressive goals. Obama has already spokenopenly, several times, of being a one-term president. The way in which he does so is not familiar to me from any previous President. It’s a casual, matter-of-fact proposition for him; just one more thing to be weighed in the balance.
Nancy Pelosi knew she was risking the House in forcing representatives in her party to “walk the plank” for her programs, yet she did so time and again. It was a defining feature of her leadership, which while crude, crass, and dishonest, was quite effective. The congressional leadership sends members to certain defeat at home by forcing their votes on issues critical to the leadership, but loathed by the American people. This drama of democrats balking and being brought to heel was repeated several times in her tenure as Speaker.
[pullquote]the loss of the House was easily foreseen and to Pelosi, an acceptable trade for passing ObamaCare[/pullquote]Despite being blown out of the office in a rush, Pelosi still managed to be re-elected by the remaining Democrat representatives as the minority leader. There is nothing which this batch of senior Democrats will not sacrifice if it insulates their radical progressive agenda, which is currently not faring well with the passage of time. It is fair to say that the loss of the House was easily foreseen and to Pelosi, an acceptable trade for passing ObamaCare and the lame duck package.
Likewise Reid’s Senate. While Pelosi lost the House in a historic, crushing change of power, Reid narrowly hung on in the Senate after a similar trail of plank-walking and mounting losses.
The Supreme Court is likely to hear a case concerning the constitutionality of the individual mandate provisions of ObamaCare somewhat before the next election. If the provision and the law are upheld, the wildly unpopular ObamaCare survives in its current form, and could work against the re-election of President Obama, leaving a Republican President free to sign a bill repealing it in whole. If it is struck down in part or in whole however, it could discharge some of the anti-Obama sentiment and leave the President in position to rescue the thing.
It sounds cut and dried for a law to be struck down by the Supreme Court, but I fear that the mandate could be found unconstitutional, and the administration given a period of time in which to fix up the law. The Supreme Court would be unlikely to hurry the rest of the government along to get it resolved before the election, which the Supremes would try to avoid influencing. The period would extend across the election, as the least of several evils.
This brings us back to the Presidency, as the only hope ObamaCare has to survive is Democrat possession of the White House.
If a Republican wins the White House, ObamaCare is doomed one way or another–even squishy ol’ Romney has pledged to EO the thing to the ashheap on his first day. But if a Democrat wins, ObamaCare is very likely to survive in whole or in part. Nothing short of a veto override could breach that defensive firewall, and it would preclude any Executive Order rescissions. Note that two things do not matter here: first, the composition or possession of the House and Senate (unless the GOP gains a super in both), and second, the name of the Democrat in the White House.
The trap is this: Republicans become so focused on the individual, personal actions and badness of Barack Obama, that we build our case against him, not against his ideas. Sure, he’s a failure, and a cipher, and doesn’t seem to have existed before the 1990s, but that’s irrelevant to winning in 2012. Whether this is a plan or just an extension of the Marxist Democrats’ willingness and ability to use natural obstacles to their advantage, like defending Communism by hurling accusations of racism, we should not discount the very real possibility that Barack Obama will not seek re-election.
[pullquote]There are several Democrats floating around who are far more palatable to the political center than Obama is[/pullquote]If I were planning such a move, I would have a successor in mind, perhaps even worked out with internal opposition (the DLC, ahem!), and then stand for re-election until primary season is over. Allow the Republicans to run against Obama the man, to select their candidate based upon an ability to beat Obama, and then develop a sudden case of “my doctor told me I needed to retire”. There are several Democrats floating around who are far more palatable to the political center than Obama is, and who at any rate, have clean hands when it comes to this Keynesian disaster. It would be the equivalent of Bill Clinton’s amazing talent for “triangulation”, running to the center to deflate the right, but accomplished with a change of costume.
Here’s a nuclear depth charge of center-left acceptability: Mary Landrieu. There are others.
