SF Chronicle Hails 'Obama's Centrist Approach' to Budget
"Obama aims for the middle on taxes and spending."
That's the headline the San Francisco Chronicle gave Washington bureau staffer Carolyn Lochhead's write-up this afternoon following President Obama's "belated embrace of his commission's recommendation to cut $4 trillion in deficits over the next 12 years."
"Even as he reached back to his 2008 campaign lodestar with a reference to Abraham Lincoln, Obama pivoted sharply to a new mantra of 'balance' and 'shared sacrifice,' citing his Democratic predecessor and budget-balancer, former President Bill Clinton," Lochhead gushed.
Two paragraphs later Lochhead noted that "Obama threw down the gauntlet to Republicans, vowing, 'I refuse to renew them again.'"
How exactly is that centrist rhetoric?
Lochhead contrasted the president's vision for taxes and spending with critics from his left in his own party:
Before his speech, Bay Area liberal Democrats Lynn Woolsey of Petaluma, Barbara Lee of Oakland and Mike Honda of San Jose laid out a competing deficit plan that would slash defense spending and sharply raise taxes, while significantly increasing domestic spending. Woolsey and Lee have fasted for a day as part of a protest against GOP budget cuts agreed to by Obama.
Woolsey said she was "encouraged" by Obama's speech and his promise to defend Medicare from GOP plans to turn it into a voucher program.
"Our base Democratic voters are saying to us, 'Why is he moving so far toward the Republicans,' " Woolsey said. "He's beyond centrist at this point" with Friday's agreement on domestic spending, she said, "but his words today were very, very matter-of-fact and most Democrats could support all of it, but the devil is in the details."
But why the dramatic reversal in course from the president? Lochhead noted that Obama had "spurned as recently as February the recommendations by deficit commission chairs Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson in his 2012 budget" but now his "sudden shift acknowledges the stark political and economic realities of soaring U.S. debt."
Between then and now Republicans have unveiled an ambitious budget plan that aims to cut $6.2 trillion over 10 years and lays out specifics about how they plan to do so.
Yet according to Lochhead, Obama has specifically said whom he'd like to soak with more taxes, but has failed to lay out where he plans to cut spending:
On taxes, Obama called for $1 trillion in additional tax revenues that would come not just from rolling back the Bush-era tax cuts on high-income groups but from scaling back spending programs in the tax code as the deficit commission recommended.
But Obama did not identify which spending programs he would accept. The biggest of these are such hot-button tax breaks for the middle class as the mortgage interest deduction and the tax exclusion for employer-provided health care.
- Ken Shepherd's blog
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Comments
Its relative
Submitted by ajkrik on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:12pm.
To the SF Chronicle it seems "centrist".
Biden slept through speech,
Submitted by LAM SON 719 on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:30pm.
Biden slept through speech, was it because he knows it's BS or because he has heard it all before?
Nothing here but obama blaming Bush.
How Can That Be?
Submitted by Comrade Jim on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:57pm.
Only a couple days ago we were told that Obama is the greatest orator in modern times.
True, that was disputed. Some claim that Harry Reid wins that title.
Good everloving grief!!
Submitted by motherbelt on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:40pm.
a competing deficit plan that would slash defense spending and sharply raise taxes, while significantly increasing domestic spending.
This is a recipe to cut deficits???
And we are supposed to take these morons seriously?
Oh, and BTW could we please do away with this "over ten years" B as in B, S as in S?
This whole budget goes right in the toilet a year from now.
Biden had the right idea
Submitted by Tomorama on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:40pm.
So basically he was for the Bush tax cuts remaining until he was against them?
So basically he was against his own debt commision's ideas until he was for them?
So was he for NOT raising the debt ceiling in 2006 before he was for it now?
NOT ONE GUTLESS POS DEMONRAT VOTED IN FAVOR OF THIS IN 2006, the sheep that remain are all uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh it was a mistake or "I was a lot younger" wise ass remarking like that is an "explanation".
Kick it down the road coward and give NO details coward.
the democrats have long been
Submitted by jkwtrading on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:42pm.
the democrats have long been past the ridiculous stage, and now the R's have joined them.. budget cuts which don't occur, spending drops which don't occur, all smoke and mirrors. from both sides to keep their lovely little power over the American people.
Was this a "policy" speech?
Submitted by Blonde on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:43pm.
I don't think so.
It was yet another lecture by the faux professor.
Someone please send money, I need to build a "beer cage" around the plasma monster. Because mummy wants to kill it every time Obama appears (which is daily)....and I can't afford a new one.
Handy Reference Guide to Obama's Gaffes and Goofs ~ Currently Numbering 200 (and Counting)
LOL - I dvr the news {HATE
Submitted by amyshulk on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:49pm.
LOL - I dvr the news {HATE commercials} and I FF through his speeches and laugh at his tennis match watching, lip pursing, arrogant demeanor. Saves the TV!
Ronald Reagan
Paul Ryan was not impressed
Submitted by motherbelt on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 7:58pm.
Paul Ryan was not impressed either.
excessively partisan, dramatically inaccurate, and hopelessly inadequate.
Also (paraphrasing): Not leadership from our Commander-in-Chief, but a political broadside from our Campaigner-in-Chief.
Wtch the whole thing if you didn't see it live.
Could we clone this guy????
"Even as he reached back to
Submitted by motherbelt on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:46pm.
"Even as he reached back to his 2008 campaign lodestar with a reference to Abraham Lincoln
Even his sycophants in the media see through him.
Not that they care. They'll gladly call him a centrist; after all it's campaign season again!
"He's beyond centrist at this point"
Yep, that's our Barack; he's downright conservative and a deficit hawk, to boot!!
<Chris Matthews imitation> HA!!
Again, they are defining what
Submitted by amyshulk on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:50pm.
Again, they are defining what the "middle" is, trying to convince the surface voters it's all good.
Ronald Reagan
Obama is in the Center
Submitted by rogue operator on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:52pm.
Kind of like Stalin was in the center, Trotsky was to the left, and Bukharin was to the right.
Is The Chronicle's Idea of Centrist
Submitted by Comrade Jim on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 6:53pm.
Somewhere between absolute totalitarianism and an ordinary great society type welfare state?
Obama's Domestic Goal is Very Simple: Grow the power and reach of the federal government and shrink the power and independence of citizens.
Laugh at "It"
Submitted by jaywl on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 7:08pm.
After watching Obama purse his lips at what he must believe are strategic moments, I decided he must be trying to emulate the famous Clinton lip biting behavior. Clinton was quite good at it, very subtle. Obama is ridiculous. As he purses the lips his lower jaw thrusts up and outward. I actually tried to do it in front of the mirror, just to see how he does it. I came out looking like Gabby Hayes glaring at Roy Rogers. For you youngsters, Gabby worked without teeth. Well, I guess that's it. Our President's latest BS doesn't have teeth, either. When people start laughing at the quirky, fake crap maybe he'll stop.
I always considered this pose
Submitted by rogue operator on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 11:13pm.
That you described to be quite Mussolini-like.
Another example of governance
Submitted by MightyMouth on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 7:18pm.
Another example of governance by speech... and the SF Chronicle takes the bait! Hahaha! ROFLMAO!!
The Center of the Extreme Left.
Submitted by Avitar on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 7:31pm.
When supporter says that Obama is center it is important to remember who they have also supported in the past. For exampl Sen Chris Dodd was a big supporter of Pol Pot back in 1975. In 1941-1945 Joe Stalin had a lot of fans in the US newpaper circles. SF Chronicle has not shown good judgement and are refering to the center of a region to which nobody has ever managed to live in whent hey refer to Obama as a centerist.
blah blah blah
Submitted by MidAmerica on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 7:42pm.
Sharply tuned rhetoric only works when the electorate is somewhat content. High gas prices and rising food cost causes deafness among the voters. They no longer listen. They only lash out in anger at the party in power.
What is it with Obama and
Submitted by Van Halen on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 7:53pm.
What is it with Obama and Lincoln? He is NOTHING like Lincoln and everything like Marx.
This is why I have always
Submitted by motherbelt on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 8:07pm.
This is why I have always been against a balanced budget amendment.
Obama's tax increase "trigger." Guess what sets it off? Overspending.
And this is why I have always hated the expression "giving back."
In order to "give back" don't you have to have something given to you????
I am with you MB
Submitted by Boudin on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 9:02pm.
Although Ryan's is said to cut spending when spending reaches 18.5% of GDP. But you cant trust a commie with an arraignment like this.
These guys are a despicable joke
This clown is the stereotypical black!
Submitted by Patriot II on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 8:46pm.
Dumb as a freaking rock......Step and fetchit! ......the black plague.......Andy without Amos! Get out dumbo and don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out!!!!
Tone it down, dude.
Submitted by SickofLibs on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 8:50pm.
.
Close...
Submitted by Tenebrous on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 9:54pm.
Obama's out-of-touch, work-avoiding, cluelessness will shore up racial stereotypes of blacks. And he really has himself to blame on this, because he's the one that made such a big deal about his blackness (when he's half-white and some unspecified part Arab).
The left had hoped that Obama would survive long enough to transform America into some kind of command economy where whites would be trodden down in some kind of racist revenge fantasy. What they have succeeded in doing is increasing distrust of liberal and moderate blacks, effectively killing any sequel to Obama. I'm really wondering if they had envisioned Obama as a "one man, one vote, one time" sort of thing.
Visions and Principles blog
They are all liars*
Submitted by cajun2 on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 10:04pm.
A pox on both their houses
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Just keep kicking 'em right in the bag
Submitted by Dave. on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 10:22pm.
Somebody with a ban hammer will notice them eventually.
-Dave
Vote for the American in November
Obama increases spending by
Submitted by big.league.slider on Wed, 04/13/2011 - 11:09pm.
Obama increases spending by almost $600billion per year, then proposes $300billion per year in cuts, and calls it a "spending reduction". That's the magic of Obamanomics.
And where's Wasserman-Schultz after announcing these cuts? If $38billion in cuts will result in thousands of geezers dropping dead, $300billion in Obama cuts will easily wipe-out almost ten times as many of those geezers.
Well from their point of
Submitted by MichaelPaladin on Thu, 04/14/2011 - 6:56am.
Well from their point of view...........
Obama is a centrist, its just he is in middle of the Far Left and the Extreme Left.