Daschle's Demise

"Let's start with Obama. He has just about everything going for him: popularity, political clout, large majorities in the House and Senate, an adoring press. But since he promised to pursue bipartisanship and thus change the way Washington works, he is eager to gain at least a modicum of Republican support for whatever he proposes, starting with the stimulus. . . . But not one of them -- not even a mushy moderate or two -- voted for the bill in the House.

"Why? They simply hated the bill more than they feared voting against a popular new president. . . .

"When the Obama era began last month, Republicans figured they'd have practically no influence to speak of. They were wrong. The case they made against the stimulus -- that it was bloated with too many special interest goodies and too little actual stimulus -- got surprisingly favorable coverage by the media. They not only got the better of Democrats in debating the bill, they also created a dilemma for Obama."

Atlantic's Marc Ambinder examines the zeitgeist shift:

"Republicans may not be winning the stimulus spin wars -- something's going to get passed eventually -- but they're changing the way the White House will fight future battles. The White House was looking forward to Tuesday's new Gallup poll, hoping that Gallup would focus on the more than 70% of the country in favor of passing a stimulus package. But Gallup broke that category down: 38% want the bill as conceived of by Obama and the Democrats, and just as many want the bill passed with 'major changes.'

"During the past week, two checkpoints seem to have been crossed. One is that, even as the line items of the bill remain a mystery for most Americans, they're beginning to see the bill as a regular bill subject to partisan pressures. For that they can thank (or blame) Democrats who added in (tiny bits of) unnecessary spending, Republicans and Democrats (like Ben and Bill Nelson) who called them out, and the show of Republican unity against the House bill . . .

"There's no evidence that Americans actually object to the Obama-Democratic plan in toto. What they're upset about is the very marginal (in terms of dollars) spending on pet liberal projects. There's no evidence that they buy the GOP spin that the bill isn't stimulative, or that it doesn't contain enough tax cuts, or that it doesn't provide enough spending for infastructure. These are the real debates; the American people seem to be reacting to other things entirely."

Josh Marshall says critics are making mountains out of proverbial molehills:

"Where I've really seen the press dropping the ball is doing some simple arithmetic on the spending items Republicans say constitute the wasteful spending in the bill.

"Now, the tell in my eyes is that almost all the criticisms I've heard are about budget items in the millions. And when you're talking about a bill with over $800 billion in spending, you just have a hard time getting to any substantial percentage of the total spend with such relatively small items.

"Now, here's a representative list from Rep. LoBiondo (R) of New Jersey . . .

"$1.9 billion for high-level physics research; $1.5 billion for universities to improve their biomedical research programs; $600 million for the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to purchase new satellites to improve weather forecasts; $600 million to buy new cars for federal government workers, adding to the existing inventory of 640,000 vehicles; and $335 million for education and prevention programs regarding sexually transmitted diseases.