Everyone who thinks Barack Obama is Superman – raise your hand!
Oh brother.
CNN opinion writer Gloria Borger wrote this week that President Downgrade has morphed from Clark Kent into Superman.
Via Pundit Press:
Washington (CNN) — What did you do over your summer vacation?
If you’re President Obama, you’ve had a bit of a transformation. That is, from the mild-mannered Clark Kent into, well, Superman.
Or something like that.
When we last left this story, President Obama was trying to be the measured adult in the room, compromising over the debt ceiling to get a deal. In the end, it wasn’t the “grand bargain” that Obama wanted. Liberals argued that it was awful, too — chastising the president for negotiating with himself. And Republicans complained that they needed more spending cuts. And, oh, by the way, they still wanted to repeal health care reform.
In other words, an unsatisfactory experience for all.
So when Obama came back to D.C. this fall, the feeling inside the White House was that something had to change. The bad news: Mr. Adult (aka Mr. Compromise) had sunk to new lows in the ratings. The good news: Congress had sunk even lower. Way lower. Then House Speaker John Boehner gave a speech outlining his demands for the deficit reduction “supercommittee.” Top of the list: no new taxes.
Shocking, I know.
That about did it. The White House figured it had no partner for peace. The man who had almost signed on to the grand bargain — with some tax increases and entitlement cuts — wasn’t about to come back to the table anytime soon.
The next step: play the game.
