Obama the Sphinx

Obama and the GOP

Janet Hook and Peter Nicholas write in the Los Angeles Times: "President Obama travels to the Capitol today to meet with House and Senate Republicans, the latest in a series of high-profile efforts to reach across the aisle and make good on his campaign promise to swim against the partisan tide that has flooded Washington for decades.

"So far, his gestures have shown few signs of success, as Republicans have continued to snipe at his signature initiative -- legislation to stimulate the economy -- and even to question the sincerity of his efforts. In the stimulus bill's first two tests last week, it passed two committees without a single Republican vote.

"But whether or not he picks up support from Republican lawmakers, Obama has already accomplished one important aim: He is winning over more Republican voters than he did on election day. If that continues, the president's hand could get stronger on Capitol Hill.

"'You don't calculate the impact of his effort in terms of the number of votes he gets on the stimulus bill,' said Bill McInturff, a GOP pollster who worked for Obama's campaign rival, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). 'You calculate it based on how he is perceived by Republicans around the country, and it looks to be substantially more positive.'"

Molly K. Hooper and Jared Allen write for The Hill: "Republicans are expected to press the president strongly on the stimulus bill, and if the meeting becomes tense, it would quickly remind voters that partisanship in the nation's capital -- despite Obama's vow to reduce it -- is alive and well.

"There are risks for Republicans as well. If they are highly critical of the popular president, Democrats could portray them as 'childish' -- a pointed word used by Obama in his Inaugural address to denigrate political gamesmanship."

I wrote yesterday about the possibility that GOP intransigence will stymie Obama's attempts to get his massive economic stimulus bill passed in a bipartisan fashion. Indeed, it was notable that Obama had to remind GOP leaders on Friday that he won the election. They aren't really acting like they lost at all.

Slate's John Dickerson wonders, now that some Republicans have said they intend to vote against the plan: "How will Obama respond? In the face of increased opposition, how much will Obama work for bipartisanship as an end in itself? Will he agree to GOP modifications to buy votes, or will he accept puny GOP support because he knows that, in the end, voters are more interested in action than whether he lived up to some standard of bipartisanship that he set for himself?"

New York Times opinion columnist Bob Herbert has some very different questions: "What's up with the Republicans? Have they no sense that their policies have sent the country hurtling down the road to ruin? Are they so divorced from reality that in their delusionary state they honestly believe we need more of their tax cuts for the rich and their other forms of plutocratic irresponsibility, the very things that got us to this deplorable state? . . .

"The question that I would like answered is why anyone listens to this crowd anymore. G.O.P. policies have been an absolute backbreaker for the middle class. (Forget the poor. Nobody talks about them anymore, not even the Democrats.) The G.O.P. has successfully engineered a wholesale redistribution of wealth to those already at the top of the income ladder and then, in a remarkable display of chutzpah, dared anyone to talk about class warfare. . . .

"When the G.O.P. talks, nobody should listen. Republicans have argued, with the collaboration of much of the media, that they could radically cut taxes while simultaneously balancing the federal budget, when, in fact, big income-tax cuts inevitably lead to big budget deficits. We listened to the G.O.P. and what do we have now? A trillion-dollar-plus deficit and an economy in shambles. . . .

"Why is anyone still listening?"

Looking Backward

Gary Kamiya writes for Salon that in banning torture and ordering the closure of Guantanamo last week, "Obama emphatically rejected Bush's warped vision of America, and announced the return of the confident, principled country we all believed in, and too cavalierly took for granted. With a few strokes of the pen, he began to erase the ugly ethos that dishonored us for eight years, and called upon us to stand for a braver, better America. An America that will not abandon its moral principles at the first setback. An America that knows its real power lies not in its mighty army but in its mightier ideals.

"The miasma of repressed fear that has hung over America for so long will not dissipate overnight. Right-wing pundits are shrieking that we must keep torturing to keep America safe, and claiming that if Guantánamo detainees are moved into ordinary prisons, America's cities will be the targets of terrorist attacks. These boogeymen have been effective for years, and they will not instantly disappear. But since Obama's repudiation of Bush's hide-under-the-bed-and-shoot ethos, the country already feels more like the home of the brave and less like a land of furtive torturers. . . .

"Bush confronted evil with evil. He tortured, lied and flouted the law. By so doing, he deserted posts more vital than any front-line position: He abandoned the Constitution, he fled from the moral law. And we all, collectively, let him do it."

According to a new Rasmussen survey, "44% of Democratic voters believe President Bush and senior members of his administration are guilty of war crimes. Only 28% of the nation's Democrats disagree. . . .

"Overall, among all voters, 25% believe war crimes were committed while 54% disagree."

Ross K. Baker, writing in a USA Today opinion piece, says people should let it go: "In this season of reconciliation and hope that we can rise above the corrosive polarization of recent years, a chorus of angry voices has pressed aggressively for criminal charges to be brought against former president George W. Bush, former vice president Dick Cheney and members of the intelligence community thought guilty of constitutional violations or of practicing or sanctioning torture.

"A few lonely politicians, some television talking heads and the vitriolic chorus of the blogosphere seek revenge against an administration with which they did not happen to agree on much of anything. This 'movement,' if one could call it that, makes a mockery of the spirit of generosity and compassion to which President Obama is dedicated."

Washington Post opinion columnist Richard Cohen cites "the very different country called Sept. 11, 2001" and writes that "certain people are demanding that the torturers and their enablers be dragged across the time border and brought to justice."

He argues, however, that "we have to be respectful of those who were in that Sept. 11 frame of mind, who thought they were saving lives -- and maybe were -- and who, in any case, were doing what the nation and its leaders wanted."

He endorses a proposal by David Cole of Georgetown Law School: "Writing in the Jan. 15 New York Review of Books, he proposed that either the president or Congress appoint a blue-ribbon commission, arm it with subpoena power, and turn it loose to find out what went wrong, what (if anything) went right and to report not only to Congress but to us."

Loose Ends

The fact remains that some former Bush officials still owe us some answers.

Carrie Johnson writes in The Washington Post: "House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) issued a new subpoena yesterday to former Bush White House aide Karl Rove, months after Rove deflected an earlier effort to compel his testimony about the firing of nine U.S. attorneys and other political disputes that swirled around the Justice Department.

"Conyers's committee subpoenaed Rove on May 22, calling on him to testify about his contacts with department officials in the Bush era. But Rove rebuffed the summons, saying he was barred from testifying because of executive privilege.

"Yesterday's subpoena may test the limits of that power for the first time since George W. Bush left office, legal experts said. Some Democratic lawyers have suggested that an executive order issued by President Obama last week governing presidential records could make it easier for citizens and lawmakers to gather information about Bush administration controversies.

"'Change has come to Washington, and I hope Karl Rove is ready for it,' Conyers said. 'After two years of stonewalling, it's time for him to talk.'"

Meanwhile, NPR's Liz Halloran reports on former attorney general Alberto Gonzales's interview with Michel Martin.

"'I deeply regret some of the decisions made by my staff,' he said, referring directly to former Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty, who resigned over the controversy after telling a Senate committee that the attorney firings were performance-related. . . .

"'Sometimes people identify someone to target. That's what happened to me,' said Gonzales, who served as President Bush's White House counsel before becoming attorney general in 2005, replacing John Ashcroft.

"'I'm not whining,' he said. 'It comes with the job.'"

Mark Silva blogs for Tribune with more from that interview, including Gonzales's expression of confidence that neither he nor others will be prosecuted for the administration's interrogation practices.

Quick Takes

* Michael D. Shear writes in The Washington Post about the White House's unfortunate e-mail outage yesterday. (It's over now.)

* Ben Pershing blogs for washingtonpost.com that it's not at all clear what Vice President Biden be doing at the White House.

* Via Huffingtonpost.com, author Bob Woodward tells NBC's Chris Matthews -- without any supporting evidence -- "I don't think the nanny or household tax problems and so forth are over for the Obama administration."

* Owen Thomas blogs for Valleywag: "The official residence of the vice president, obscured until Dick Cheney's last days in office and residence, now shines in satellite sunlight." It's no longer intentionally obscured on Google Maps.

* Charles Herman and Jake Tapper report for ABC News: "The high-flying execs at Citigroup caved under pressure from President Obama and decided today to abandon plans for a luxurious new $50 million corporate jet from France."

Live Online

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Cartoon Watch

Ed Stein on closing Guantanamo, Pat Oliphant, Tony Auth, and David Horsey on Obama and the GOP, John Sherffius on Obama's standards, and Matt Davies on a responsible withdrawal.