I will here continue with my response showing his arguments in quotations and my responses in the body.
Before negotiations got a full head of steam he made a public announcement that the 14th Amendment argument was not a winning argument. You say the public would not have supported such a move. The public is interested in results...not the niceties of the literal adherence to arcane provisions in the constitution. A strong argument by him to Boehner that he was prepared to use the 14th Amendment would have gotten him enormous public support and put the fear of god in the Republicans. Compared to the outrages to the constitution by Bush such as the institution of torture as official Government policy and Bush's bill signing declarations, Obama's threatened use of the 14th amendment have had the seriousness of spitting on the sidewalk in a Draconian Penal Code.
It would have been downright stupid for the President to announce in advance that he would rely on the 14th amendment, if the debt ceiling were not raised. That would have let Republicans completely off the hook. Negotiations would have come to a halt. Michelle Bachman would have announced her vindication, proving that she was right all along that failure to raise the debt ceiling would not resulted in default, and the President would have been on the defensive charged with abusing his office by ignoring the will of Congress in order to “continue his spending spree”. Thus a situation where the public was increasingly hostile to Republicans in general and the Tea Party in particular, would have been completely turned around.
Yes, the 14th amendment could have been used with the public's support, if the negotiations had broken down, default had occurred, the stock market had crashed, the economy was in shambles, and the President was acting in an emergency under the 14th amendment. But this was to be avoided at almost all costs, because by that time the economy would have been so damaged as to almost irreparable, something to be avoided at almost all costs.
Obama is a good man but naive in his belief that he could work with the Republicans. If he could make that realization today there might be hope for his Administration. But I fear that he has yet to learn how to play hardball, a skill that the Republicans excel at. Right now we need a nasty, hard-biting, backroom, dirty, skilled politician... not a Constitutional Law Professor. We need a Johnson, a Roosevelt, or a left wing Bush. Instead we have a Woodrow Wilson who couldn't sell ice in the Sahara.
Rah, Rah, --- but the fact is that Obama is a brilliant negotiator, who understands that there is a time for partisan rhetoric and a time to be low key. Yes, I too was disappointed with his inaugural address as Drew Weston complained in the New York Times. But Weston was nit picking almost three years after the fact when it had become fashionable to criticize the President. The President must be judged by results in a political climate unequaled in memory, and as I have pointed out the results would have been impressive even in a less hostile climate. That is what counts.
It should also be noted that in our system of government obstruction is much easier than positive accomplishments.
Lastly, perhaps you can explain why we still do not have relations with Cuba...a largely executive function;
I think Levinson knows why! For the same reason that the hero of the base, (I will be damned if I know why.) John F. Kennedy set this policy in motion. And every President since (I count eight) has continued this policy. Why does Levenson task this President for not doing what nine other Presidents have not done? That shows an unreasoned search for things to criticize.
why we still have troops in Iraq, Afghanistan, South Korea, Japan, and Europe plus Military advisory personnel in virtually every right wing country on Earth. When do we learn that supporting Corrupt Governments fighting populist insurgent uprisings can never be successful? How many Vietnams do we have to go through in one lifetime? Do we really need an active military strength of 1.6 million and 200,000 in Europe, 70,000 in S. Korea and Japan, 475 in Honduras and 988 on Diego Garcia? Who are we afraid of? Distribution of our troops is a presidential function as is the size of our army.
That is a lot of lumping. South Korea, Japan, and Europe are Corrupt Governments fighting populist insurgent uprisings? “The size of our army” is a Presidential function? Not since the last time I read the US Constitution! Section. 8. “ The Congress shall have the Power… Clause 12: To raise and support Armies…”
Even in Afghanistan the Taliban can hardly be called a “populist insurgent uprisings.” And as for the rest, our troops have been spread to many countries since the WW II. Just like that – this President is supposed to magically make everything all right with the world. That is a fairy tale world. That is a world of magic wands that should be waved. It just is not the real world. And why didn’t Levenson raise this Banner when all the other Presidents were in office, counting how many since the end of Vietnam? Lets get real!
Would I rather have a Republican in the White House than Obama? Perhaps, if Abe Lincoln were reincarnated! But that doesn't mean we should stop pushing Obama to see reality.
I think it’s the other way around. Obama is very much in touch with reality. It is his critics, as I have demonstrated at length, who are out of touch with reality.
Nor should he believe that the Left has no place to go. We will always vote for him but we may not work for him with the old passion and enthusiasm so important in a campaign nor contribute our money.
It is all the same. Anything less than the most vigorous support of our President would risk turning the country over, not just to Republicans as we used to know them, but to the most extreme, radical and irresponsible bunch that have ever, (or at least since the Great Depression) threatened the welfare of our people. That threat alone should bring more vigor than ever before, This bunch makes G.W. Bush look like a responsible statesman. I contend that we have a President we should be enthusiastic about and one who has under the most difficult circumstances, compiled a record that other Democratic Presidents would have envied, but the threat of Tea party dominance should be enough to sound the bugle.
Since publishing my first installment of The Trojan Horse – Comments II I heard from Levenson again. He wrote:
Thank you for sharing your views with me with regard to Obama. You cannot be serious when you say that my views "represent a closing of one's eyes to facts which contradict preconceived ideas....” I had no greater political desire than to have Obama succeed. I contributed more money and work to his campaign than any other presidential campaign I worked on....including the Nixon McCarthy debacle. My views evolved after 2 1/2 years and evolved very reluctantly.
I will not respond to all of your comments other than to say that my vote (1 time) for Reagan is not a very powerful argument against the validity of my criticism of Obama. Additionally, I do not deny that Obama has been responsible for many worthwhile accomplishments such as the Health Care bill. But even the Health Care Bill must be looked at realistically. For example, most of its important provisions do not take effect until 2014 which make it vulnerable to repeal before its virtues can be shown to the public.
Let me conclude by suggesting that all those that criticize Obama are not his enemies but are merely trying to push from the Left so that he realizes that there is a constituency there that requires his attention.
To which my response was:
First, I probably owe you an apology for referring to your vote for Reagan. That was a cheap shot.
When you say that I can't be serious when I say that your views, (and more importantly the views of the pundits and the many who share your views) "represent a closing of one's eyes to facts which contradict preconceived ideas...." I refer to preconceived ideas of what Obama could be expected to accomplish and how. What I refer to as expecting that he had a magic wand. This is not at all at variance with your having been very enthusiastic about Obama and having worked your tail off for him. It fits right in with it.
What I am saying is that having worked so hard you had totally unrealistic expectations of what he could do, and when those expectations were dashed you became angry. Again I am speaking less about you individually, but rather the many for whom you speak.
On the Health Care law there is no chance of it being repealed even if Obama were to lose since any attempt at repeal would be subject to a filibuster. I can't answer why many of its effects were delayed until 2014 without spending more time than I am prepared to do, but I am sure that its authors felt that it was vital that other aspects had to be in place before others could go into effect. There has to be a modicum of trust that the people who made these decisions knew what they were doing. The greatest danger to the bill is the US Supreme Court, but that is something that no one can avoid.
The base, and you are part of that base, basically wanted Obama to take on the Right and not compromise. Maybe that would have been satisfying, but nothing would have been accomplished, and I mean nothing. Not the stimulus, not health care and very few of the many accomplishments I list.
You say: "I do not deny that Obama has been responsible for many worthwhile accomplishments" but that is exactly what you did in your last presentation to which I was responding.
Tell me, if you can, why are his Left wing critics so anxious to besmirch him that they are even resorting to outright lies about the compromise on the budget, which I think was a very favorable one if one looks at the details.
And I received a very satisfactory reply:
No apology is necessary for your reminding me of my Reagan vote. In fact, I found it funny. Of all the ad hominem attacks you could have used against me, the worst was "he voted for Reagan.” Words like "corrupt,” "stupid,” "racist" or "bigot" would not have hurt as much as saying that I voted for a Republican.
You may have a point when you suggest that my anger at Obama is really disappointment at the lack of progress that I hoped for. Perhaps no Democrat could have made any substantial progress against the know nothing Republicans. I think I would have preferred a battle royale (even a losing one) than accepting a weakened Health care Bill, an inadequate deficit reduction bill and the many other compromises, which Obama probably was forced to make.
Before I close I need to take cognizance of one other attack. It came from Herb Reiner of Clifton, NJ, but more important it was repeated in the New Yorker in an article by John Cassidy where he wrote: “In retrospect, the White House erred last December in not demanding a raise in the debt ceiling as the price of extending the Bush tax cuts.“ Well, in retrospect, like hindsight is always 20/20. So why pile on another criticism. But let us examine it. What good would it have done? These things always go to the deadline. Asking sooner would either have produced an extension too short or no extension until default was imminent. But what makes it even more ridiculous is that the Administration in fact did ask for an increase, not in December, but in January (Close enough). See here for Tim Geithner's letter to Harry Reid.
Why don’t these pundits at least check their facts before spilling ink on paper and ranting about things they don’t begin to understand? It does not serve the cause they pretend to serve and it does not even serve them when people finally begin to understand how much nonsense they have subjected them to.
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