Obama Gets Tough, Republicans Get Nervous

Caught in a supposedly unguarded open-mic moment at a fundraiser last night, Obama had some choice things to say about Republicans:

"I said, 'You want to repeal health care? Go at it. We'll have that debate. You're not going to be able to do that by nickel-and-diming me in the budget. You think we're stupid?' ... Put it [planned parenthood - Editor.] in a separate bill. We'll call it up. And if you think you can overturn my veto, try it. But don't try to sneak this through."

And, of Paul Ryan, who has cobbled together a dystopian scorched-earth future of a proposed budget, he had this to say:

"When Paul Ryan says his priority is to make sure, he's just being America's accountant ... This is the same guy that voted for two wars that were unpaid for, voted for the Bush tax cuts that were unpaid for, voted for the prescription drug bill that cost as much as my health care bill — but wasn't paid for. So it's not on the level."

(Besides gutting Medicare by replacing it with insurance vouchers instead of direct payments to doctors, Ryan's budget increases the national debt to 100% of GDP by 2043. That's some way to be fiscally responsible.)

Republicans have been caught totally off guard by the Obama of the last 48 hours. First, his speech at Georgetown University two nights ago unexpectedly broadsided them:

GOP leadership followed the speech by delivering a reaction that can best be described by Ryan’s comment that the president wasn’t “building bridges but poisoning wells.” Ryan admitted that he had high expectations for Obama’s speech, saying “I was excited when I was excited when I was invited to his speech today” adding that he saw it as an “olive branch” but found it to be “excessively partisan, dramatically inaccurate and hopelessly inadequate to addressing our country’s fiscal challenges.”

An olive branch? Really? The Republicans really must have thought they had Obama rolled by now; they likely would not have attended the speech otherwise. Their initial meeting with Obama in January 2009 didn't go so well for them.) Rush Limbaugh was even gracious enough to refer to Obama's speech as a "personal bitch slap" to Republicans present. Honesty comes from surprising places.

Perhaps smarting from the speech, House republicans passed the Ryan budget plan anyway, with no Democrats at all supporting it, and shedding four of their ranks, to boot. (Interestingly, House Democrats tried to get Republicans to pass the Republican Study Committee budget proposal, which was even more conservative than Ryan's, by switching their votes from "no" to present; although Republican leadership hadn't expected the measure to pass with Democrats and Republican "no" votes, the Democrats' switch left Republican "yes" votes in the majority. The leadership yanked the bill before it could be passed.) Reid has already indicated the Ryan bill is D.O.A. in the Senate.

In short, Obama has played his advantages to the hilt in the last two days, and shown the Republicans to be out of their league. He's also shown his base--and his big-money donors--what they've been needing to see for a long time -- that he's the kind of leader that will openly stand up for Party principles and against those who would pull down the social safety system.

Now if we could just get him to rationally resolve the increasingly-unconstitutional Bradley Manning detainment, he'd be about perfect.