President Barack Obama's top adviser suggested to The Huffington Post late Wednesday that the administration is ready to accept an across-the-board continuation of steep Bush-era tax cuts, including those for the wealthiest taxpayers.
That appears to be the only way, said David Axelrod, that middle-class taxpayers can keep their tax cuts, given the legislative and political realities facing Obama in the aftermath of last week's electoral defeat.
"We have to deal with the world as we find it," Axelrod said during an unusually candid and reflective 90-minute interview in his office, steps away from the Oval Office. "The world of what it takes to get this done."
Breathtaking in its defeatist posture. Well almost breathtaking, if I hadn't seen it so many times before. Meanwhile, the Catfood Commission recommends Social Securtiy cutbacks:
The plan would gradually increase the retirement age for full Social Security benefits -- to 69 by 2075 -- and current recipients would receive smaller-than-anticipated annual increases. Equally controversial, it would eliminate the current tax deduction that homeowners receive for the interest they pay on their mortgages.
It would be so much more fun to be cracking wise at Rick Perry and George Bush's hapless dueling book tours, or even the Texas House Speaker shenanigans -- "Quien es mas conservador?" -- but these developments are more critical.
Obama seems to be folding his tent, and along with it the future of his political party.
Is there anyone willing to fight out there for this man?
Update: Not so fast, says Axelrod. And if that is accurate, then the White House has once again screwed up their message, or their 'triangulation', or whatever the fuck it is they're trying to do.
