Moderate Dems: Obama Failing to Lead on Budget

Two moderate Democrats are taking President Obama to task for his lack of leadership in the budget battle. Freshman senator Joe Manchin, of West Virginia, asks a great question here, in a quote from a post at The Hill:

"We will likely have votes on two proposals today, and both our options are extremely partisan and unrealistic. And neither one will pass,” Manchin said. “Why are we doing all this when the most powerful person in these negotiations — our president — has failed to lead this debate or offer a serious proposal for spending and cuts that he would be willing to fight for?”

The President has earned the ire of many who are paying attention to the budget battle going on in Washington right now for sending Joe Biden in to take the lead in negotiations on budgetary issues, right before an extended trip overseas, thus leaving the talks unfinished and without any representative from the White House taking part. There is no shortage of people who are willing to pretend they know what Obama "really" isn't getting his hands dirty in this debate, but what is clear is he just isn't willing to use the power of the bully pulpit to help on this extremely important issue.

Manchin is one of at least three Democrats who have stated that they do not support their party's woefully inadequate response to the Republican plan. Perhaps the most absurd aspect of this entire debate has been how some Democrats have called their ten billion dollar cuts meeting Republicans halfway. Only in Washington D.C., and even then, only the worst of political hacks, could tell you that ten is halfway to 60 with a straight face.

Ben Nelson of Nebraska, and Claire McCaskill of Missouri, join Manchin in his splitting with their party over this. On top of the lack of leadership on the issue, President Obama has left a power vacuum by not taking more of a leadership role in his own party. Putting moderates in districts like these three are in in spots where they have to constantly fight their own party will not help the Democrats keep seats in 2012. Obama should not just be worried about looking bad themselves, but should also be worried about losing the Senate.

I don't think it is off base to say that the Republican plan is too much, too fast. President Obama could come back with a plan that cuts discretionary spending more, but spreads it out through 2013. He could take a look at the mind boggling report from the Government Accountability Office that found two hundred billion in savings that could be phased in, and start phasing in all of them over the next few years as well.

The American people would respect him for it, it would help his party's chances in 2012, would put a dent in our long term fiscal problems and hopefully build momentum towards passage of a real deficit and debt reduction plan that reforms entitlement programs and the military.

Solomon Kleinsmith is a nonprofit worker, serial social entrepreneur and strident centrist independent blogger from Omaha, Nebraska. His website, Rise of the Center, is the fastest growing blog targeting centrist independents and moderates. He is currently collaborating with other centrist independent and moderate bloggers on a news aggregation and social networking site, and is always looking for ways to help the independent groundswell as more and more people become disaffected with the two major parties.