These numbers from Quinnipiac (via Main Street) contradict what we've been hearing from pundits for months now.
When asked what was more important, reducing unemployment or reducing the federal budget deficit...
80% of Democrats, 67% of Republicans and 68% of Independents said reducing unemployment is more important.
Only 15% of Democrats, 28% of Republicans and 26% of Independents said reducing the federal deficit is more important.
Independent voters often cite the budget deficit as a concern. But this concern is largely a placeholder for general economic anxiety and the feeling of falling behind. Jobs are clearly the issue that matters most to voters, and the deficit fetish that is all too often cheered on by out of touch talking heads prevents Democrats from addressing unemployment.
The main street bipartisanship we're seeing on this issue is also there on progressive elements of health care reform, letting the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy expire, holding Wall Street accountable, and limiting the influence of special interests. But it clashes with the preferred line of cocktail party - centric commentators, so it's usually downplayed or ignored.
Why? I would argue that one of the reasons is that the Beltway Bubble is filled with limousine "centrists." Generally speaking, they line up with Democrats on social issues. But after patting themselves on the back for being decent on reproductive health and LGBT rights, they're much more likely to have a soft spot for thoroughly discredited neoliberalism. They're also bullyable... as long as they're being pushed by the right. Put it all together, and you get limousine centrists. On any issue relating to economic recovery, they are the last people in the world elected Democrats should listen to.
Dealing with this issue is essential policy. It's also very good politics because it puts us in position to get our economic priorities straight, and deliver something our country desperately needs -- infrastructure and the jobs that come with it.
President Obama showed an investment deficit hawk streak in his SOTU speech, and this issue is right in Vice President Biden's wheelhouse. We have the ability to make this a winning contrast. If elected Democrats want a meaningful deficit to be hawkish about right now, here it is. Being an investment deficit hawk is real patriotism in action.
The main obstacle here is the same handful of weak Senate Dems responsible for watering down the recovery package.
What is it they object to?
Investing in America's future?
Basic economic competence?
Democratic majorities in Congress?
They can either make Main Street recovery issue #1, or they'll lose so bad this November that even Jon Stewart will say that they got TURBO DESTROYERIZED (hybrid of destroyed and pulverized).
Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, who has been on a roll lately, shows how it's done in this documentary about our crumbling infrastructure from the History Channel.
We didn't need any further evidence that the Beltway Bubble is where support for elected Democrats goes to die, but last night we got it in the form of a spending freeze.
Yes, Independent voters say that they are very concerned about the deficit. But does this issue actually move many votes? Not really, unless "President Mondale" has somehow been grossly overlooked. Concerns about the deficit will be far more dangerous if they become a proxy for general economic anxiety. That is why putting the budget deficit ahead of jobs is full - blown malpractice, both policy - wise and politically.
If they can't say goodbye to fatally flawed conventional wisdom from1995, the Obama Administration is going to play a key role in recreating 1937.
Jared Bernstein, one of the best people in the Obama Administration and director of its Middle Class Task Force, is on The Rachel Maddow Show defending President Obama's recently announced spending freeze.
It's ironic that Bernstein, who is about as solid of a progressive populist as you can imagine, is in the position of having to do this.
UPDATE: Listening to Bernstein reminded me of something George Packer wrote in a widely - read piece about the future of economic policy in the Democratic Party soon after President Obama was elected.
As stagnant wages and pressing public needs have become the focus of Democratic domestic policy, the old line between deficit hawks and economic liberals has dissolved- last week, the Times published an Op-Ed piece co-written by a leading representative of each group: Rubin and the economist Jared Bernstein, respectively. (They met somewhere around the forty-yard line on Bernstein's half of the field.)
This obviously isn't getting job done. It really is time to turn the page on Team I Love the 90's: Economics Unit.
Much more Bernstein. Much less Rubin.
UPDATE #2: Bernstein was originally booked to highlight the positive but still lacking Middle Class initiatives the Administration announced today. I'll post the clip as soon as it's available.
Some clarity on the details and how committed the president is to this route would really help, though I fail to see how reinforcing the right on this makes any kind of sense whatsoever. This looks like the "Centrist" Score Card Theory in action, precisely when it's at it's most useless.
I thought the president may have been starting to "get it." It looks like I was dead wrong.
UPDATE #3: Two questions.
Isn't this, technically, "good news for John McCain"? It must be, because a giddy Mark Halperin just went all caps.
Does Obama recognize that mediocre one - term president is also a real possibility? At this moment, he's looking much more like Jimmy Carter than FDR.
Economic recovery, the kind of relationship leading Democrats have with Wall Street and other special interests, and whether the health insurance legislation that is passed is defensible will do a lot towards determining who turns out this November, and who persuadable voters support. At this point, trying to downplay the enthusiasm gap, or thinking that it's going to improve without concrete achievements on major issues (the issues the Democratic trifecta was elected to deal with), is borderline delusional.
Here is some weekend reading that drives these points home.
Congress and the White House need to follow up this message with bold action. It definitely won't be easy, but it's necessary. In times like these, there is nothing pragmatic about timidity.
To borrow a phrase from Christina Romer, it would be economic and political suicide for elected Democrats to keep "reaching out" to people who are both diamterically opposed to what needs to be done and entirely consumed by their desire to sabotage recovery for their own political gain.
By all means, if the Democrats want to lose control of Congress, let them make superficial gestures towards deficit reduction a top priority for 2010. Voters only care about the deficit insofar as it is a symbol of their frustration with the fact that there is high unemployment. long-term deficit reduction is and ever shall be a structural problem and short-term deficits won't make a difference if they lead to job growth.
Addressing concerns about the deficit makes sense, but part of that means putting those concerns in context, instead of just hopping on the bandwagon in an attempt to "take the issue away" from Republicans. We can't keep playing by Grover Norquist's rules.
Big deal: The House's approval of sweeping overhaul of the financial regulatory system will have far-reaching repercussions for the 2010 elections. Dems will hit GOPers who opposed it for shilling for their Wall Street masters and refusing to act to stave off future crises, while Republicans will keep hitting Dems for government overreaching on the economy. The argument is joined...
Even if it is, propping up Beltway bipartisanship on an issue as important as recovery has outlived any usefulness it might have once had. Entertaining the illusion that Congressional Republicans might work in good faith to deal with the investment / jobs deficit blurs distinctions that need to be made both for substantive and strategic reasons.
The Obama Administration has a Matt Taibbi problem.
Ryan Grim's report on President Obama's response to a question Robert Kuttner asked at Thursday's White House Jobs Summit is very encouraging.
For a while it looked like the Obama Administration was on the verge of making a huge mistake -- putting the Beltway's deficit fetish ahead of recovery. But the president's answer suggest otherwise.
With unemployment at 10.2%, absolutely nobody is willing to swallow the "back from the brink" narrative. To those 10%, not to mention the long-term unemployed and underemployed, their personal economy is already at the brink. It's extremely hard to prove a negative like that, especially when the country continues to feel like it's in recession.
That line of argument won't succeed. If you want to help people in their economic struggles, you're going to have to do more than talking them into it. You're going to have to give them some tangible help.
Greg Sargent points out that Speaker Pelosi gets it.
