There is a lot of anger directed at our president and the Senate regarding how they have both passed weak compromise bills. Namely the stimulus, healthcare reform, financial reform, and cap'n'trade. We now have to defend these bills that we essentially don't believe in and it is not fun. I don't want to defend mandates! I don't want to defend financial reform and an economic policy that won't prevent the exact same disaster from happening again. I don't want to defend a cap'n'trade system that will raise prices for consumers but won't do nearly enough for climate change.
So, before we compromise with conservatives we should make damn clear to the public what we would like optimally
This way we can say "I fucking told you so" after the bills don't do as advertised and we don't have to pull our hair out trying to defend shitty bills that we only half-heartedly support.
A perfect example of this is the stimulus package. Economists wanted 1.3 trillion, the white house wanted 1.3 trillion but when it came time Obama asked the Congress for only 800 billion. President Obama did not make it clear enough that he wanted 1.3 trillion but had to compromise to .7 or whatever it was. Now he owns the inadequate stimulus and takes a beating in the polls for it.
I understand we need to compromise to get bills passed but before we do we need to clearly state to the country what our plan entails before negotiating it.