Always Concede on Principle

(Tom B. has an excellent rant on the inexcusable evil of a spending freeze. He's right, but I think there is one unlikely though possible alternative:)

In one pathetic defeat to the repugs after another, President Obama has certainly blown apart the myth of the Vulcan champion of 12-dimensional chess.

Nevertheless, I am hopeful that in his call for a "spending freeze" in tomorrow night's next week's state of the union speech, he may finally have learned that straightforward attempts at cooperation don't work.

I think President Obama may be playing "Always Concede on Principle." Back in 1988, a pre-Tweety Chris Matthews published the first edition of his book Hardball: How to succeed at politics, by one who knows the game. In the original version, a pre-broadcast-career Matthews sanely and modestly related the political lessons he had learned as a Congressional aide to such Democratic giants as Tip O'Neill.

One of those lessons was "Always Concede on Principle." I don't remember the details of the example Matthews used, but the upshot was this: by first admitting that your opponents are right on principle, you can persuade them to support you on the trivial details.

So on health care reform, Democratic tactics should have sounded something like this: "You Republicans are absolutely right that government-run health care is socialism, naziism, terrorism, and the worst abomination faced by American democracy since unions. Government-run health care is so bad, in fact, that we are going to dismantle Medicare and the VA. But first, we'd like your help on this one bill to stop companies from refusing insurance to people with pre-existing conditions. After all, it really makes the companies look bad. Once that's done, we'll come up with some kind of mandatory purchase plan to cover the cost."

Yes, I was one of the ones screaming from the beginning that we should just cover single payer with giant, poisoned barbs and shove it up the repugs' ass, but that was before we realized Barack Obama really was not the vicious, drug-dealing, baby-raping terrorist Caribou Barbie said he was.

If you've read some of the descriptions of this "freeze," or saw Rachel Maddow rip the concept to shreds last night, you might suspect that the spending freeze the administration is proposing is not exactly the kind of not-another-dime freeze the repugs have in mind.

As Steve Benen wrote:

Now, talk of spending freezes is not new. During the 2008 presidential campaign, it was one of the centerpieces of John McCain's campaign. A year later, it was the official Republican plan to deal with the financial crisis. Now, at least rhetorically, it's President Obama -- you know, the "radical socialist" -- who's waving the banner.

Though, in fairness, it's not quite the same thing. GOP freezes were across-the-board hatchet jobs, while administration officials are insisting the White House is eyeing a "surgical" freeze. Indeed, as part of the proposed freeze, the administration intends to increase some budgets while cutting others, which raises the question of whether this is really a "freeze" at all.

It's a cliche, but "the devil is in the details" certainly applies here. We've been told that the freeze would not only exclude defense and national security, but also economic recovery investment and health care reform (should it happen). The new jobs bill is still moving forward, too.

Indeed, while we wait for additional details -- an administration official said the cuts would target "duplicative," "ineffective," and "inefficient" spending -- I'm tempted to call the freeze idea symbolic, at best. In President Obama's first budget proposed cutting $11.5 billion in spending, and most of the cuts were approved by Congress. This next budget, including the freeze, is eyeing reductions between $10 billion to $15 billion.

Yep, sounds to me like classic conceding on principle while making sure you get what you want in the details.

Benen continues:

So, if the proposal isn't really going to change much, why is this disappointing? Because it fully embraces the conservative narrative, instead of using the power of the bully pulpit to explain why conservatives have it wrong.

It may be even worse as a policy matter -- we just don't have enough details to say -- but that's distressing enough.

Yes, we'd all be much happier if President Obama combined actual liberal policy accomplishment with full-throated, un-apologetic liberal rhetoric.

But since we can only have one of those two, I'm perfectly fine with letting the repugs cavort hysterically with their new nude-centerfold buddy Scott Brown in rhetorical victory while Democrats work behind the scenes to actually improve economic prospects for struggling Americans.

Cross-posted at They Gave Us A Republic.