Question for the unemployed: Do you agree with Eugene Robinson?

[apples and oranges]

Eugene's view is that President Obama needs to go really big with the jobs bill, despite the fact that the bill wouldn't be able to pass the house.

For those of you who are unemployed: how do you feel about that strategy?

Would you prefer for President Obama to:

A) come up with a bill that could pass the house, or
B) come up with a bill that would never pass the house, but could be used as a political tool to show the American people how democrats are better than repugs?

Be honest!

I think we (and President Obama) need to look deep within ourselves and figure out if politics trumps helping people who are hurting and desperately need to get back to work.

[aquart]

1. Nothing can pass this House of Idiots so go BIG.

[sudopod]

2. Yep. nt

[DURHAM D]

9. Totally agree.

GO BIG.

[Johonny]

17. I agree

what would pass the house besides tax cuts for the rich and ending social security?

[apples and oranges]

20. Good point. I guess I forgot

how unreasonable they have been.

[gkhouston]

24. +1000. The only "jobs bill" the House will pass of its own volition

will be more "incentives" to businesses that do nothing to create jobs.

Go big, and take it to the country. Make the House own its indifference to the unemployed every single day between now and November 2012.

[LongTomH]

26. +1000

I agree. If Mr. Obama wants to win in 2012, he at least needs to be seen to be trying to do something about the jobs crisis,

[Creideiki]

33. And in the meantime, we take care of one another until a progressive Congress

can take over in 2012.

[bullwinkle428]

36. +1. Thanks for saving me the trouble of posting this myself!

:D

[hifiguy]

3. I do.

Show some guts for once and if/when it stalls in the House beat the Repigs like a rented mule with their failure to accomplish anything.

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. Yes, read on Trumman and the 1948 congress

when media types go this is unprecedented, they need to pick up a history book

[DCBob]

5. I doubt anything is going to get past the terrorbaggers.

Even something they would normally agree to would now be called radical dangerous socialism. They simply want Obama to fail no matter what the cost to the nation as a whole.

[eShirl]

6. The center of gravity needs to be dragged back from the far right.

[valerief]

7. I want a big, fair jobs bill. It might not pass Congress but if the prez sells it, it might

stir the angry hordes into action (I'm one of them).

[dana_b]

8. B - although to me it would be much more than a political

tool. It would be showing support for us, it would tell the Repubs what most of the country really wants (I strongly believe that people would swamp their reps with demands for a strong jobs bill -if it were proposed) and finally IF it were a strong bill that was proposed, we would lose much less than if we started from the middle like we always seem to do now. The people who are hurting want this. Believe me - there is no one in my house who IS employed - we want a strong bill.

[Bluenorthwest]

10. You make a huge leap

when you propose a bill that is tailored for Right Wing approval and declare that it will also 'help people who are hurting need to get back to work'. I propose those two things are mutually exclusive, that which Cantor will vote for and that which will do much to help any regular person. You claim there are things the Republicans want to do that are helpful to average people, but you do not share what those are.
In short, no specifics and lots of characterizations. Both methods are politics. So either way, politics trumps all. It is pure politics to write a bill not to be the best bill, but to try to make sure your opponents will allow it to pass, that is the definition of politics trumping everything.

[MadHound]

11. It is Basic Negotiations 101

Your initial offer is over the top big. Then you negotiate down to what you can reasonably get.

If you initially offer what you can reasonably get, then you will get negotiated down to what is unreasonably small.

Sadly, Obama has yet to learn this lesson.

[dembotoz]

12. if i wanted a shit bill i could support a republican

it would be nice to see something that looked like it came from a democrat for once

[baldguy]

13. Any jobs bill that would pas the anti-American Teabagger House would be worse than worthless.

The best that can be done is to promote the strongest & biggest bill possible - then dare the Teabaggers to oppose it.

Just in time for 2012.

[DCBob]

19. "dare the Teabaggers to oppose it".. they would relish the opportunity.

and make teashirts and bumpers stickers proclaiming it.

[baldguy]

21. That's the opportunity of the Dems to strike back.

"You know the main road going through your GOP district? The one that has so many pot holes & needs to be rebuilt? And the bridge that desperately needs to be replaced? And the asbestos that needs to be removed from your kid's school?

"You GOP Congressman just voted against all those projects. Projects in your community - and others like them all across the country - that would create thousands of jobs, that would have made your community and America more competitive. Projects that would have made America stronger.

"Why doesn't the GOP want America to be stronger?"


If you just sit back and hope the GOP will play nice in an election campaign, you'll lose every time.

[DCBob]

25. "hope the GOP will play nice"?? How about just hope they will not play like psychopaths?

Is that too mcuh to ask? No need to answer that question.

[jbnow]

14. Well on his recent town halls he told people that he can't make Congress

do anything but that they can, he'll need their help.

I think he test drove that concept when he told people to call in during debt debate and maybe liked results enough to consider it for bigger plan. Remember he "threatened" Cantor towards the end that he could take it to the public. I think he might have that idea brewing
I hope he looked in his heart when fleshing out his plan on vacation and didn't just stay in his head...and that he goes back to speaking to us like adults. That is he explained why he didn't support lowering gas tax that McCain/Clinton supported in 2008. He can certainly explain why spending more to create jobs makes the most fiscal sense.

What I do agree with Robinson on what he said as panel discussed how oj my white house doesn't know what track they will take yet. Robinson smiled and said Obama knows, he just hasn't shared it yet.

[RaleighNCDUer]

15. Incorrect framing.

A) PROPOSE a huge bill, which when whittled down by the Republicans, will still do what it is intended to; or
B) Propose a bill that the Republicans MIGHT pass, but will not because they HAVE to cut somethhing from it, leaving a whittled down, ineffective bill that will pass.

YOU DON'T FUCKING START WITH WHAT YOU WANT.

[stevenleser]

22. The contents are irrelevant to passage. Start big. It will die in the House anyway.

[JoePhilly]

16. It doesn't matter ....

If Obama does something that passes, here on DU, that will be too small.

If Obama goes BIG and nothing passes, here on DU, he will have failed as a leader.

What I suspect he will do is create a strategic framework (the BIG part), and then also work to get as much as he can NOW because people's lives are at stake right now, and he's going to do what he can to help them now.

And he'll get crucified by the right and the left, regardless (albeit for totally opposite reasons).

[monmouth]

18. He needs to go HUGE. If the baggers reject it, before an election,

it will be their doom. Watch for his end game...

[Wait Wut]

23. I'm not unemployed, but know people that are.

If Pres. Obama puts forth a BIG plan and it fails, response could be "He asked for too much. Why couldn't he be more reasonable?"

If Pres. Obama puts forth a REALISTIC plan and it fails, response should be "WTF? How could the House NOT pass this? What assholes!"

So...I'll take choice A. Let them deny a basic, good plan that will create jobs. Most of the unemployed I know are Republicans. I think that would be their final straw.

[TheKentuckian]

27. What would that bill contain? I'm under the belief that absolutely nothing that

could be rationally argued as helpful can possibly pass and that whatever is proposed will be attacked as a big spending, job killing, communist proposal even if it was deep in Raygun's wheelhouse.

TeaPubliKlans are ideologically bankrupt, they have no ideas nor intention to help the people. There is nothing that will help bring decent paying jobs in their toolbox to borrow.

[RaleighNCDUer]

28. The point is, you will only get a basic, good plan by proposing a BIG plan,

then letting the republicans whittle it down in negotiation. If the whittled down plan passes - great. If it doesn't, it will be on the heads of the republicans.

[stevenleser]

37. You wont get any plan regardless. Anything you try will be killed in the House. n/t

[spanone]

29. the republicans will do NOTHING to bring down employment numbers

if they were going to, they would have done it by now

GO BIG, HUGH, GINORMOUS.......

[bluestateguy]

30. I am employed, but I agreed with him

The choice is this:

Go big and nothing passes. Give the voters the chance to sort it all out in November.

Go small and maybe something passes that makes no impact, and can then be blasted as ineffective. Or go small and nothing passes, which looks pathetic and only alienated Democratic voters.

[Overseas]

31. B -- we want the biggest broadest and best jobs plan first -- then a debate with Repubs

on each point they want to have removed.

-- Please explain, Rep. Minusheart, why you think we should remove that project from the list? -- And "we can't afford it" should be an insufficient answer. Please explain why repairing our water supply systems in each state is less critical than oil company tax exemptions.

-- Point by point.

We have already conceded so much just to get something passed.

But yes, using that strategy of giving up the store at the first negotiation has gone so far already, the misery index is still very high, and Republicans will know that once again we will be desperate for a victory.

[markpkessinger]

32. I totally agreee with Robinson (although I am lucky enough to still be employed)

At this stage of the game, half-measures are worse than merely ineffective or less than ideal. Half measures only keep the lines of the argument obscured in such a way that will leave many voters unsure about whether this President or the Democratic party is committed to protecting their interests or not (and with good reason, given recent history). It is not a matter of politics trumping helping people; it only appears that way when you look at the crisis in the immediate short-term. But when you step back and look at it from a longer-term perspective, and if you look at what has happened to Democratic priorities (which are, historically at least, about helping people) over the past 18 years (since the DLC began its Faustian bargain with the right), you quickly see that while a half measure may appear to help some in the very near term, such measures serve ultimately to enable the right's agenda of eliminating, over the longer term, millions more.

[LWolf]

34. Go Big. nt

[butterfly77]

35. Go big..

and make them defend everything they don't want for the "AMERICAN PEOPLE" and stress how the fact that they don't want us to use OUR MONEY to help us.