Yuval Levin argues that Obama’s lack of major proposals represents (in part) the “exhaustion of liberalism in our time.” I agree with Levin that Obama’s SOTU was mostly defensive, but I take that as more scary than anything else. I think Obama is betting that, in the medium-term, the defensive favors greater spending, higher taxation and greater centralized resource distribution by the government.
As entitlements remain unreformed and people do not make adjustments, last minute “reforms” will primarily take the forms of tax increases and government administrative health care spending controls. As Obamacare is implemented, premiums rise, people lose their employer-provided health insurance, and the cost of Obamacare’s subsidies are larger than “expected”, Obama is counting on a movement to single-payer comprehensive health insurance to stick it to the greedy insurance companies who are overcharging the American people. None of this will happen right away, and most of it probably won’t happen during Obama’s term as president, but he is preparing the ground (both substantively and rhetorically), for the government to claim a much larger share of people’s earnings and exercise much closer control over the health care sector. Compared to transformational Progressive dreams, this probably looks like “a defensive game of retrenchment and reaction,” but to Obama it probably looks like winning.
Reihan Salam pointed out that the combination of the Obamacare tax increases and the fiscal cliff deal has already pushed current law above the post-WWII average for federal taxes as a percentage of GDP. Obama is probably counting on a series of confrontations and crises where, in fits and starts, taxation and government control over health care spending both gradually increase because we can’t “cut our way to prosperity.” Conservatives have to win positive victories to change the trajectory of government policy and do so with a coalition that is in relative demographic decline. Oh, and he is one slip in the shower away from a liberal Supreme Court majority and who-knows-what fresh horrors.
I actually think that the center-right would be undervalued today if it was a stock. Republicans have gotten a lot wrong to get this far down and there is huge upside (and raising taxes is probably going to get old faster than Obama thinks), but I can see why Obama thinks he can win primarily by playing defense.
February 14th, 2013 | 9:00 am
Wow Pete. Yes, this seems more astute than Yuval’s post…
…and loved the line about “one slip in the shower!” Let us hope there is some secret society of flush conservatives somewhere making sure that Scalia, Alito, and co. get the very best doctors money can buy. Normally I’m of course obliged to be against transhumanism and such, but in this case…
February 14th, 2013 | 9:50 am
This does seem more astute than Yuval’s post. I would have gone with “A Defense That Is Really Offensive.” It’s very possible you attribute more “intentionality” to our president than he really has. But if you’re right, his progressivism isn’t rhetorical (like Wilson wanted) but stealthy.
February 14th, 2013 | 4:12 pm
Carl, Peter, no time today. Actually complementary (Levin and me) interpretations I think. Obama a cautious and slippery transformational president from one perspective (a dated one I would argue, but one that he shares) and a reactionary from another. A little more tomorrow.
February 14th, 2013 | 6:08 pm
I keep hearing from friends on the Right, especially the Tea Party crowd, that the president has a hidden agenda (you call that hidden?) to transform America into a socialist nation. What I find most depressing is that so many Americans seem delighted with the idea. “What’s wrong with socialism?” is a question I keep hearing from the young and it seems only an echo of what we hear from college campuses. “The that was wrong with socialism was the repression!” is what I hear and argue with.
Does that mean that what the Right has gotten wrong is being right when that is an unpopular position?
Here’s a question; have Obama’s policies been popular because they seem good to the American people or because so many of the American people want to like Obama?
February 14th, 2013 | 10:42 pm
[...] In this thread, Peter Lawler wonders if maybe Obama if Obama’s “progressivism isn’t rhetorical (like Wilson wanted) but stealthy.” Now any attempt to abstract a person is going to be of limited utility, but I let’s try this one. Maybe Obama is, on domestic policy, a mostly unreconstructed 1970s upper middle-class left-liberal who after decades of defeat (as he sees it) is more focused on accomplishing his goals than venting his opinions (unless he feels it is advantageous to do so.) I think that many of Obama’s moves to the center are best understood in this context. His long-term policy preferences haven’t changed, but he needs to pretend they have shifted (and he might even need to carry out policies he disagrees with) in order to move policy in his direction at all. [...]
February 15th, 2013 | 10:06 am
I think the GOP should twist this idiotic move for “universal pre-K” (actually, a move to massively expand the influence of the public school system that is already broken for the least among us, and also to hugely enrich the teacher unions, and hence the Democrat Party) to their favor by moving to add something like a $10K/year tax credit for children under 5, instead of (NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT along with) whatever bureaucratic and regulatory nightmare the Dems have in mind. This would go along with eliminating day care FSAs, which would be superfluous, and would probably at least for now go along with eliminating the $1K/year credit for all kids. This would empower parents to do whatever they like with the money, which admittedly may not be what Americans these days actually want. It needs to be seen whether people actually want a personal-responsibility-centered society or not.
Links
Blogs
Find Us
Contact