I haven't posted anything in a while and today I want to address two largely unrelated points, a mash up except they will still be unrelated when I'm done. I'm talking , of course, about what has been the campaign's most critical day, June 15th, and a response to Hunter's as usual excellent post on Sunday.
I offer the notion, if I may, that Friday June 15th has so far been the critical day of the campaign. The four weekdays prior to this consisted of poor economic news with Romney trying to begin weaving the narrative that President Obama had simply failed on the economy. That Friday the president announced an executive plan to implement his own Dream Act and thus seized the initiative which he has held since. As an issue for the president, immigration is a compelling merger of good politics with good policy. The president's team has shown a masterful sense of timing in how this issue has been played politically at least. The president drove the agenda for the next week while Romney had nothing to say. This ran into a SCOTUS decision in the president's favor. This supplied a two day bump until the healthcare ruling. The president held the initiative while healthcare came to the fore and again Romney had nothing to say.
Since Romney had been finding himself with nothing to say it became easy and natural for the president to do some speaking for him. Thus came Bain, taxes, Cayman Islands etc. This should largely continue until the convention when the president can use his own rrecord and ideas as part of the ongoing effort to draw the contrast with Mr. Romney. The VP pick would give Romney a chance to reclaim the initiative but that thunder gets quickly stolen by the conventions.
I'll end this with a quick reminder of the 2010 lame duck session when President Obama made a much criticized compromise and many said he looked weak. He has had to play a long game by necessity. Obstinate resistance has been the GOP guiding principle so he has been forced to be strategic as opposed to using tactics. If the president looked weak in 2010 it was only because he was setting up a fight two years in advance. I'm just saying, everyone look around and check how they feel about where they stand on the issue of taxes now. The Democratic candidate would be happy to talk about taxes and foreign policy all the rest of the campaign. The GOP really just gave the president's team the best case senario by nominating a Latino hating one percenter such as Romney.
I enjoy reading Hunter's columns and I do so religiously.(no offense). On Sunday he wrote about the impunity with which Romney lies and the total lack of any calling to account for that. I'm sorry to overdo this word, but I would like to add what I feel is the critical point. No play-it -straight news person who is seen as representing a network newsroom can call out Romney as a liar and allow the corporate bosses to collect millions in ad revenue from him. I imagine telling GE I want to run a commercial for my skin cream on all its networks and I'll pay anything. I just want to tell people how it smoothes wrinkles, oh and it cures skin cancer. AS much as it might hurt GE, it wouldn't knowingly be a part of my fraud. With regards to politics, it gets around the knowing part by putting a lot of well paid people on the air to say dumb things while trying to look smart.