Barack Obama's Panic Week has come and gone, but did his White House learn anything from the historic repudiation of his leftist agenda? Putting the question another way, has Obama made the necessary course corrections or is he still refusing to hear the message that America is sending him so loudly and clearly?
Given the Democratic Party's stunning defeat in Massachusetts, its November losses in New Jersey and Virginia and its increasingly bleak 2010 electoral prospects, one would think Obama has no choice but to follow the route Bill Clinton took to the right sixteen years ago when he stared down similar circumstances. With the exception of passing his so-called economic stimulus bill, Obama has been unable to get any major legislation through the U.S. Congress - this despite the presence of a sizeable Democratic majority in the House and (until recently) a filibuster-proof Democratic super-majority in the Senate.
Imagine how tough he'll find the sledding now.
Unfortunately, Obama remains completely tone deaf to the will of the people. In fact, the only thing that has changed in his White House as a result of these repeated electoral setbacks is the way he is pursuing his socialist agenda.
Hope and change obviously didn't work, so now it's time for some good old-fashioned smoke and mirrors.
After picking their jaws up off the floor following Sen.-elect Scott Brown's shocking victory in Massachusetts, a race in which Obama's intervention actually moved voters away from Democrat Martha Coakley, the very first thing the White House brain trust did was to elevate the role of a professional political operative. In fact, Obama's elevation of former campaign manager David Plouffe signaled right away that any attempt on the part of his administration to recalibrate its political compass would be purely cosmetic in nature.
In fact, just three days after his party's Massachusetts defeat, Obama was out looking for low hanging fruit or a convenient enemy that all Americans but particularly independent voters could join him in opposing. He quickly found that enemy in Wall Street bankers, who are the same fat cats who then-Senator Obama supported via the TARP bailout, ironically.
Now boasting that he was ready for a fight, Obama proceeded to propose a new tax on these financial institutions one that a recent Rasmussen Reports poll found was supported (conditionally, at least) by 56% of Americans.