Is President Obama irrelevant?
It is quickly becoming apparent that the Democrat strategy for victory in 2012 is to demagogue Republicans on Medicare and push the program ever-closer to default through neglect. Don’t believe me? Well, certainly you can trust Bill Clinton—at least when it’s an admission against interest.
The big news today was that 40 senate Republicans voted for the Ryan budget plan which includes reforming Medicare (for those under the age of 55). The Democrat alternative, is of course, non-existent—and won’t be coming this year or next.
As part of this political kabuki in the Senate, there was also a vote on the budget offered earlier this year by President Obama. Of course, you might not know that if all you saw were the headlines:
CNN:
Fox News:
The New York Times:
The Wall Street Journal:
The Washington Post:
The Los Angeles Times:
CBS News:
MSNBC/NBC News:
There was only one news organization that even mentioned the Obama budget in the headline, ABC News:
Paul Ryan’s plan got 40 votes. President Obama’s plan got ZERO. ZILCH. NADA. 97-0 against. Yet, Ryan’s plan alone was the focus of all the media stories.
Maybe some big media types with access to Congressional databases or Lexis/Nexis can help me out here: When was the last time the President’s budget got not a single vote?
I’m trying to figure out why that isn’t part of the political discussion tonight. It was certainly a foregone conclusion that none of these proposed budgets would pass the Senate (ones by Sens. Pat Toomey and Rand Paul were also voted down), but all of the focus is on Ryan’s plan and how that might be an albatross around the Republican Party’s neck in 2012. Why isn’t the fact that the President’s budget couldn’t get a single vote of support in the Senate—even avowed socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt.) voted against it—a sign of President Obama’s complete failure of leadership?
4 comments on “Is President Obama irrelevant?”
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Please tell me you don't get paid for this....
You do realize this budget was supplanted by the given during the George Washington speech right? You do recognize this was a symbolic move right?
This is a non story and was treated as such by the media.
The reason why the Ryan plan got more attention is because it's such a radical departure from the status quo. Even supporters of it would agree with that. If Obama put a budget out there that raised the tax rates on the rich to 70% and it got voted down 97-0 you'd see similar coverage.
No, I don't get paid for this, but it was supplanted by what exactly?
Yes, I remember the do-over speech, but point me to the document that supplanted his budget plan. Where is it?
Matthew,
Excuse BxBomber. He isn't capable of thinking for himself, so he just spouts DNC talking points, even when they don't make sense.
[...] plans that did not originate in that chamber—Ryan’s plan and Obama’s February budget. My post that day illustrated what I thought was a major indicator that Ryan should run—the media had already put [...]