Little David Axelrods oversimplify tax cut politics

These days, everyone's a strategist. The tactics-obsessed media/blog ecosystem has created an army of little David Axelrods who are convinced that they have the (imaginary) solution to President Obama's problems. The second segment of the pre-election episode of This American Life, for instance, consists entirely of writer Jack Hitt blaming the party's problems on poor messaging.

The latest example of this attitude comes from liberals who have faulted President Obama for failing to hold his ground on the Bush tax cuts for families making over $250,000 despite public support for his potition. (Under the agreement reached yesterday, all of Bush's tax cuts will be temporarily extended.) Even the normally sensible Jon Chait gotten worked up about Democrats' failure on this issue.

The issue is that the President's position tends to poll well in national surveys of adults. As a result, most liberals think Obama and the Democrats should have the advantage. However, the political reality is more complicated.

First, public opinion in more conservative states is likely to be less favorable to Obama's original position than national polls. Several of these states are represented by senators whose votes Obama needed and failed to get (e.g., Ben Nelson from Nebraska, Jim Webb from Virginia, Joe Manchin from West Virginia, etc.).

Second, support for the plan may be weaker among likely voters. For instance, the 2010 electorate that senators just observed was divided on the issue between Obama and the GOP (with an additional 15% favoring full repeal):

Thirty-nine percent of voters wanted these tax cuts continued for all Americans, but about as many, 37 percent, wanted them continued only for families with incomes under $250,000 a year. The rest, 15 percent favored letting them expire for all.

Finally, as Princeton's Larry Bartels noted before the election, supporters of extending the tax cuts for all Americans have more intense preferences than opponents.

Given these factors, it's not surprising that the party couldn't get more than 53 votes for Obama's proposal, especially since so many Senate Democrats are up for re-election in 2012 (including Nelson, Webb, and Manchin).

The other commonly advocated strategy of the mini-Axelrod contingent was to let Bush's tax cuts expire and hope Republicans cave to public pressure next year, but it was never clear how this plan would succeed. The president is the political figure who is voters held accountable by voters for economic outcomes. As a result, the GOP would still have had the upper hand in any negotiations.

Liberals may find it comforting to blame the tax cut deal on the White House's tactical failures, but Obama was playing a much weaker hand than most people realize.

[Cross-posted to HuffPost Pollster]

Comments

[Andrew]

Thanks for this. I'm also surprised Chait is being so stubborn on this. Presidents have pollsters, and if an issue is truly a "win-win," they know it and they don't need mini-Axelrods to tell them. Also don't forget the role of public misunderstanding of whose taxes are going up, as Steve Kornacki wrote in Salon.

[David in Cal]

The President explained his decision in today's press conference, "It's tempting not to negotiate with hostage takers unless the hostage gets harmed....In this case, the hostage was the American people."

I had seen the "hostage taker" analogy in the Huffington Post, earlier in the day. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steven-g-brant/in-dealing-with-blackmail_b_792961.html

Actually, I think the President has a point. In a game of "chicken" over the tax cuts, he chose the mature position -- compromising, in order to prevent the entire Bush tax cut from ending. However, comparing Congressional Republicans to kidnappers or terrorists is an unfortunate way to take credit for being mature.

[Mike]

Yeah, Bush got his tax cuts through on reconciliation with 51'ish votes... I can plainly see why Democrats couldn't do anything with 53 votes - ugh. They should have just done it the same way.

[Phil Perspective]

David in Cal:
It was/is the truth. The GOP are hostage takers. They wanted the tax cuts for the rich. They don't care about the rest. So, they got what they wanted out of the deal.

[JP]

All of this will become a moot point when the Green Lantern movie comes out in June.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rs2sZgO3OMk

[Phil Perspective]

Why was Obama playing a weaker hand? Webb is a fraud and phony for whining about the poor white male and yet voting for the rich guy. Go figure. Also, Obama(and the DNC) has enabled Ben Nelson's bad behavior behavior, so why should he get in line now? Also, when Mary Landrieu says this deal is a bad deal, doesn't that tell you something?

[idyl]

We're dealing with this in the Lame Duck session ... Joe Manchin hasn't made it to Congress yet.

This was put off because Democrats thought it was not primed for the campaign ... and now they have had a change of heart? Extending unemployment benefits to the full 99 years as originally proposed is not a grand bargain, it's asking Republicans to "give the sleeves from their vest."

Sadly, this tax issue is turning out to be a pretty good "bipartisan" windfall. For every Ben Nelson sitting on the sidelines "looking for a handout," there's a Republican who cares about good governance and does not want to make his or her grand children pay for our folly. You don't need to be a David Axelrod to read the tea leaves, and recognize a good policy when it comes your way.

[bnyhan]

Because he was replacing Byrd, Joe Manchin has already been sworn in: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/15/joe-manchin-chris-coons-sworn-in-senate_n_783920.html

[bnyhan]

It's complicated. They would have needed to pass a budget with reconciliation instructions -- see http://www.themonkeycage.org/2010/12/w.html

[David in Cal]

Phil Perspective -- Regarding the President's analogy to hostage-takers, a WSJ blogger points out
The "analogy" is problematic, to say the least. Whereas a hostage-taker is a criminal, Republicans in Congress are acting in a perfectly lawful manner. Further, they gained their power through democracy, not coercion. Hostages do not elect their captors. And having just been elected, in a vote that was a clear (though not irrevocable) rebuff of Obama, at least for the moment they have a stronger claim than he does to be acting on behalf of the American people.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703493504576007472971372228.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_MIDDLETopOpinion

[David in Cal]

Keith Olbermann goes the President one better and implicitly compares Republicans in Congress to Nazis:

I don’t want to make any true comparison to the historical event to which it related; the viewer can go ahead and look it up if they wish; I will confess I won’t fight if anybody wants to draw a comparison between what you’ve done with our domestic politics of our day, to what Neville Chamberlain did with the international politics of his.

This reaction and the President's are awfully strong, considering that all the Republicans have done was to leave people's taxes unchanged. Imagine a WW2 movie where the Nazis have just conquered the country of Luvania. The evil Nazi Kommandant, perhaps played by Harry Groener, addresses the conquered citizens:

"We Nazis are in conplete control now. We are going to use our tyrannical power to leave everyone's income tax rate where it is!!!"

The Lulvanians gasp in horror. :)

[ass]

This is garbage. Bush never had more than 55 Republicans in the Senate, and he passed bills that the majority of the public OPPOSED.

How did he do it? By having the fight in public. Remember "holding our troops for ransom?" Remember "upordownvote?"

Obama has never addressed the public on the tax issue. If he came out publicly and said, "Republicans are holding up your tax cut for the sake of Paris Hilton," he could move public opinion and move votes.

Give an issue like this to the Republicans and you'd watch them make hay out of it. Don't tell me it's impossible for Democrats to do the same.

[MartyB]

An alternative view: the "hostage" metaphor could be used in a different manner in which those whose primary goal is to make sure the "rich" pay even more than they do today are holding tax relief to "middle class" taxpayers hostage.

Since the total dollars which extending the Bush Tax Cuts allows those earning less than $250K to keep dwarfs the total dollars that would benefit the "rich", this doesn't seem to be an unreasnable way to view it.

Of course this view doesn't fit the "tax cuts for the rich" meme, so some people could never see it this way.