Dr. Robert Reich is some- what pessimistic about the vested interests and the status quo not giving up just because Obama and the Democrats have swept into office with an impressive and historical win. After all it took an unpopular war, the worst Presidency in history and on top of that the worst financial crisis in 100 years occurring a few weeks before the election and McCain still got 48% of the popular vote! As much as Obama is a consensus builder and wants to "bring us together," there should be no illusions about the forces that are aligned and arrayed against him.
The Democrats still do not have a filibuster proof Senate and that means that the Republicans can obstruct every single piece of legislation that comes down the pike. If Obama does not have a plan to confront this possibility, he better get one. Otherwise, the Republicans will sit there and turn all his necessary and potentially groundbreaking plans for the transformation of this country into so much dross left on the cutting room floor. Obama needs to shed the naivete he seems at times to be dangerously close to having.
Obama's program as summarized in his last campaign commercial, if accomplished, would in and of itself represent earthshaking change for the US. This should be his primary agenda and he should drill down and go for it right out of the box, not fool around and dither with ancillary issues like Clinton did in his first days in office (gays in the military ... remember?).
1) End the war in Iraq responsibly. Repatriate most of the $10 billion a month we're spending there.
2) Initiate a massive alternative energy, infrastructure rebuilding and job creation program. (maybe with the $10 billion from Iraq.)
3) Reform health care so that everyone is covered at a lesser cost.
4) Give corporations disincentives for offshoring jobs and incentives for creating jobs at home.
5) Tax breaks for the middle class and tax increases for corporations and the wealthy.
These five agenda items spelled out by Obama himself in his campaign commercials and in his platform, if accomplished in his first term, would be a remarkable and revolutionary achievement. But massive forces will be arrayed against him. He shouldn't make Clinton's big mistake and play patsy with the Republican establishment or think he can "triangulate" and be nice to everybody. He shouldn't let them dictate a watering down of the necessary change we need for the preservation of anything resembling a half way decent democracy and a planet worth inhabiting. In short he's going to have to take the forces of the status quo and connservatism head on. To think otherwise would be a naivete we can not afford. Clinton's "triangulation" must be avoided at all costs. Clinton essentially let the Republicans have their way with him, and to avoid a do-nothing Presidency went along with things that in hindsight seem disastrous like deregulation and various free trade agreements.
The Republicans have it in their power to do to Obama what they did to Clinton: threaten him with a Presidency of no consequence. He at least needs a back-up plan to fight and take them on if Plan A for consensus building doesn't work. Don't play nicey-nice with the Republicans. And don't think that just because the American people (at least 52% of them) want change, the status quo gives a damn about them. They still represent 48% of the population and approaching 100% of the corporate big moneyed interests. And they can still filibuster him and the Democratic majority to death!
