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Axelrod: Accusing GOP of trying to sabotage economy?

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Despite the president’s campaign contention to be a new kind of politician, one who would rise above ideological divisions to unite the nation, he — and his team — have a very poor understanding of why Republicans oppose his policies.  They can’t seem to understand that most conservatives just don’t believe his “stimulus” would stimulate growth or that his jobs bill would create jobs.

Instead, as Greg Sargent reports, White House political advisor David Axelrod is telling CNN’s Candy Crowley that Republicans might be sabotaging the economy on purpose:

They don’t want to cooperate. They don’t want to help. Even on measures to help the economy that they traditionally have supported before, like a payroll tax cut, like infrastructure, rebuilding our roads and bridges and surface transport. These — so you have to ask a question, are they willing to tear down the economy in order to tear down the president or are they going to cooperate?

Emphasis in original.  Axelrod was, as Sargent reports, “pushing back on . . . Crowley’s suggestion that Obama bears some of the blame for Congress’s failure to act on the economy”.

Remember, this is the White House that crafted its jobs bill in secret without input from Republicans (throwing in ideas that they contended Republicans, as Axelrod put it, “traditionally have supported before”) and then demanded that Congress “pass this bill.”

Not just that, after all the concerns expressed about our burgeoning federal debt, the White House throws out a bill that increases federal spending.  And then blames Republicans.

Why isn’t this administration — and its party — able to acknowledge the opposition’s legitimate policy concerns?  Perhaps, they should find that politician who was “trying to break is a pattern in Washington where everybody is always looking for somebody else to blame.“”

Comments

  1. The economy has dragged (or not recovered from the housing bubble’s burst) because of Obama’s policies.

    Alan Meltzer recently had a great article on why Obama’s Keynesian approach doesn’t and can’t work:

    Why is the economic response to increased government spending so different from the response predicted by Keynesian models? …

    First, big increases in spending and government deficits raise the prospect of future tax increases. Many people understand that increased spending must be paid for sooner or later. Meanwhile, President Obama makes certain that many more will reach that conclusion by continuing to demand permanent tax increases…

    Second, most of the government spending programs redistribute income from workers to the unemployed… [Keynesian] models ignore… the reduced productivity that follows a shift of resources toward redistribution and away from productive investment…

    Third, Keynesian models totally ignore the negative effects of the stream of costly new regulations that pour out of the Obama bureaucracy. Who can guess the size of the cost increases required by these programs? ObamaCare is not the only source of this uncertainty, though it makes a large contribution…

    Fourth, U.S. fiscal and monetary policies are mainly directed at getting a near-term result. The estimated cost of new jobs in President Obama’s latest jobs bill is at least $200,000 per job, based on administration estimates… Once the subsidies end, the jobs disappear—but the bonds that financed them remain and must be serviced…

    To the extent Republicans thwart Obama’s policies, Republicans are actually helping Obama.** But, once more, we see that Obama’s people don’t get it… they are too stupid to understand the only way Obama’s historical reputation can be salvaged (like the 1990s GOP ended up salvaging Clinton’s). It’s kinda funny to watch 🙂

    (**An outcome that I am fine with, since I care about outcomes, not parties.)