Will he or won’t he? That’s what I was thinking this morning (I do my thinking in the shower, of course) — “will Obama choose the nuclear option of a December executive-order amnesty?”
And the discussion around this centers around a couple angles: Does Obama care that he’d be poisoning the well, or does he figure that he’s not going to do any constructive bipartisan work over the next two years anyway, so the most he can do is position his party for 2016? Does he really want amnesty as a personal legacy, or was he just playing the Latino voting block? (By the way, when did the term move from Hispanic to Latino anyway?) What can the Republicans do to punish him, and how much would this become a game of chicken come January? And do Obama’s delusions favor him in that game of chicken, both inspiring him to play it, and convincing him he’d win it, and, by his determination to achieve a personal victory vs. concern for the greater good, actually have an edge?
And the bigger picture question is “will Obama work with the Republicans?” The answer that I’m seeing from the Left (e.g., Slate and The Nation and their commenters) is a big no — not because Obama is a bad person, but because the Republicans are. In their minds, Obama has bent over backwards to accommodate them (somewhat delusionally believing that he incorporated their wishes into Obamacare, I guess because it’s not single-payer, for instance), to no avail, and the GOP agenda is so fundamentally wrong (all about making billionaires into multi-billionaires, and enslaving women and minorities, I guess) as to be almost morally wrong to even talk to them. Is that reflective of what Obama thinks? Probably not, but that does mean that, from his base, even if not from moderate Democrats reeling from the shellacking, he’ll get plenty of support for an imagined cause of standing firm.
But the game has changed.
When the Republicans controlled only the House, Obama’s role was to work with them to find ways of reaching shared goals that were acceptable to both parties. But really, in many ways, he was a bystander, as Reid (most recently by just plain inaction) and previously Pelosi as well, ran the show.
At this point, there are a number of possible bills that have enough support that Republicans could pass them — that is, bills that they should be able to find a sufficient number of Democratic votes to break presumed filibusters. The pundits, in fact, keep mentioning bills that the House has already passed that Reid won’t even bring up for consideration because he doesn’t want members of his party to be required to have a vote on the record, which is bound to alienate either the base or independents. Keystone, for instance — others aren’t mentioned, or I’d list these, but I find it believable. But I can think of others. It seems to me that Obama via executive order waived No Child Left Behind into nonexistence, but it still exists on the books, so it seems like this ought to be ripe for a fix. The multitude of provisions of Obamacare that Obama has executive-ordered away. My pet pension-pooling legislation. Start with the easy things, then move into more difficult issues, again continuing to bring in moderate Democrats who are willing to cross the metaphorical picket line. And repeatedly — keep a pace going, ambitiously, one per week. Lots of smaller bills. Individual topics, wherever possible, but build up to bigger issues, and add a few pieces that’d rile up Obama and his base individually (e.g., removing the abortion requirements in Obamacare), but are presented as part of a must-pass bill. I’ve seen it suggested elsewhere that instead of one big monstrosity, the 2015 budget should be passed piecemeal, to prevent horse-trading and take away Obama’s veto power and the risk of a showdown. (What’s he going to do? Refuse to sign a DoD appropriation by complaining that the Department of Education isn’t being funded at the same time?)
And pair this with a campaign over the airwaves. “Tell President Obama to sign the Keystone bill. Time is ticking.” “We’ve reformed Obamacare. Tell the president to do his job and sign the bill.”
In fact, Obama likes to say that Congress isn’t “doing their job” when they don’t pass legislation that meets his specifications, so, heck, the GOP could turn that right back and say, “Obama has one job — to get his pen out and sign the bill.”
Yes, at this point it looks like the GOP will have 54 seats, so it’ll require various permutations of 6 moderate Democrats voting with them, or at least declining to filibuster. That why I say, “start small.”
And this still doesn’t answer the executive-order amnesty question. Truth is, based on what I’ve seen so far, including his bizarre press conference (Ann Althouse has the transcript) in which he indicated his willingness to work with the GOP – as long as they endorse his priorities, like government-paid preschool, the answer is “will.”
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