First “they came for the socialists. . . .” And they got them . . . and the progressives, and the moderates, and the entire middle and working classes, not to mention the economy itself. They got them all. While Pastor Martin Niemoller’s famous quote referred to the Nazis, it could just as easily be applied to the tea party extremists who rolled President Obama and Democrats in a “deal” that will have dire consequences for a poor, job-hungry city such as Buffalo.
Obama broke a cardinal rule of presidents: Never negotiate with terrorists. But using the word “negotiate” may be giving this White House too much credit.
Afraid that a small band of tea party radicals would blow up the economy, feckless Democrats who have no idea how to craft a message simply caved instead of getting out front in the debate.
Who’ll pay for their timidity? You will, if you need help with your heating bill, want Western New York’s transportation network maintained, or don’t want education on the chopping block.
Buffalo Niagara gets millions in everything from transit aid to block grants for economic development. All such programs face added jeopardy because the president went back on his vow to demand the balanced approach of cuts and revenues that polls show most Americans want.
It’s one thing not to be able to lead people where they don’t want to go. It’s quite another not to be able to lead them in the direction they’re already pointing.
Instead, this deal—composed entirely ofcuts— will hurt older, poorer cities such as Buffalo and slow economic growth even more while doing nothing to create jobs.
In fact, it will cost jobs. The Economic Policy Institute says the plan’s failure to extend emergency unemployment benefits and the payroll tax holiday—the one tax cut that should have been included— will lower the GDP by a combined 1.2 percent and cost 1.5 million jobs next year.
Try telling the 7.7 percent of Western New Yorkers—and 10.2 percent of Buffalonians— who are looking for work that this makes sense.
And now that they’ve tasted blood— yours, if you’re not wealthy—the extremists will be back for more. With plans to stack the new “supercommittee” with members opposed to raising revenue, it’s possible the right wing will even sacrifice defense by triggering the $1.2 trillion in across-the-board cuts that result absent any other deal.
In other words, the damage has only begun as we transition to government by minority rule. At a time when the economy needs to be juiced, Washington will be run by those who drank the Kool-Aid.
And where were Chuck “Press Re-lease a Day” Schumer or other Democratic leaders—including the president —who could counter the right-wing nonsense machine and put so much heat on the non-crazy part of the GOP that the debate never would have come to this?
Obama’s somnolent “let your member of Congress know” had some last-minute effect. But imagine how a real leader—say, a progressive equivalent of Ronald Reagan—would have taken control of this debate upfront.
But the outcome shouldn’t surprise. Obama took single-payer off the table before health care talks even began, and this time, he nixed the 14th Amendment option even quicker. If you’re looking to score on a used-car deal, this is the guy you want to negotiate with.
In the meantime, optimists think we’ll now have a grand debate about the role of government as the rest of the deal is hashed out before the 2012 election. But that would require forceful leadership with the stomach for that debate.
Unfortunately for poor cities such as Buffalo, what we have instead are Obama and Harry Reid.
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Poster Comment:
Ohhhhhhhhhh . . . Tea Partiers are Nazis. How original.
Can you believe this guy writes for a metropolitan daily?
(Yeah, I guess I can.)
