Gibbs vs. Green Lantern-ites on Obama presidency

The Hill reports this morning that White House press secretary Robert Gibbs "blasted liberal naysayers, whom he said would never regard anything the president did as good enough." It's understandable that Gibbs and others in the White House are frustrated. While sophisticated critiques exist of Obama's failure to take the initiative at critical points on certain policy issues, most of Obama's critics tend toward a view more akin to the Green Lantern theory of the presidency. Consider the critic quoted in The Hill, Adam Green of PCCC, who argues that Obama could have achieved a public option if he had only tried harder:

Attacks from liberal political groups like the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC), which raises money for liberal candidates and causes, are also frustrating to the White House.

Adam Green, one of PCCC’s founders, repeatedly blasted Obama for a “loser mentality” during the healthcare debate, criticizing the president and Emanuel for not trying harder to include the public option in the final healthcare legislation. The group even ran ads accusing Obama of ignoring the will of the millions who voted for him by courting the support of Republican Maine Sen. Olympia Snowe...

Green said in an e-mailed statement Monday afternoon, “When Republicans opposed the stimulus and when Joe Lieberman opposed the overwhelmingly popular public option, the president could have barnstormed across their states and demanded they support policies that their constituents wanted — but instead he caved without a fight,” Green said.

In reality, presidents can rarely change public opinion on domestic policy issues. "Barnstorming" through the states of Republican senators and Joe Lieberman probably not have changed anyone's vote, particularly given the threat of a primary challenge within the GOP. And Obama needed to cultivate the votes of Snowe and others for the rest of his agenda, not alienate them. As much as liberals try to pretend otherwise, the president has relatively little leverage over senators, particularly those from the opposition party. As a result, the filibuster has proven to be an often-insurmountable barrier to much of the liberal wishlist. Gibbs's language may have been unfair, but Green and other White House critics need to get real.

Update 8/10 1:13 PM: Of course, while I'm sympathetic to the frustration, it's terrible politics to taunt your base in public -- see DeLong and Yglesias for more.

Comments

[Steve]

Bush had much smaller majorities in Congress and got everything he wanted. Bush did not precompromise everything and empower his opposition the way Obama reflexively does.

[Jinchi]

I think you're taking the Green Lantern theory a bit far here. The Hill article you're linking was written entirely from Gibbs' perspective, complete with his strawman depiction of who his liberal critics are.

But plenty of Obama's critics are attacking specific policy objectives of the administration. Maddow's attack on Obama's position on gay marriage (mentioned in the article), isn't that he's not a big enough cheerleader, it's that Obama is against gay marriage. Greenwald takes him to task for adopting many of the domestic spying and rendition policies of the Bush administration, Congressional Democrats have objected to Obama's lack of an exit strategy for Afghanistan and liberal economists fault him for filling his administration with men who fought to deregulate the banking industry. And of course liberals faulted him for taking Universal Health Care off the table at the outset, not for being unable to cajole Congress into approving it.

Simply put, it's Gibbs who has the Green Lantern view of the world. He's demanding that the "professional left" stop complaining and clap louder. And he's blaming their lack of enthusiasm for Democratic failures.

[bnyhan]

Steve - the president has far more latitude on foreign policy. Bush also had a massive approval boost after 9/11 and faced a less unified opposition caucus in the Senate. But the same principles apply, especially after things returned to normal. When Bush tried to add private accounts to Social Security and pass immigration reform during his second term, he failed.

[Rob]

Re Brendan's update:

Bogus meme alert: @mickeykaus Nyhan parrots claim that Spain trip taunting your base in public hurts Obama http://j.mp/bCDqyk In reality, unlikely to matter http://j.mp/cJPzxx

[MartyB]

Brendan -

It seems pretty clear that immigration reform was rejected by Bush's base, not his opposition, so not sure it's a good counter-example in your response to Steve.