re: #220 jimbo2150

In lieu of a compromise, taxes would have effectively been increased for those earning less than $250,000 - which would also have been in contradiction to his campaign platform.

He was damned if he did and damned if he didn’t - and in the end, if taxes for those earning less than $250,000 had increased, the political future for Dems would have been worse than they are with the compromise.

A truly progressive policy would have been that all of Bush’s tax cuts should have been left to expire - but that was a political non-starter, particularly in this economy. The argument that it was a bad move politically for Obama to agree to a compromise ignores what would have happened had he not made the deal. The tax cuts for the rich are bad for the country, but failing to compromise would have been political suicide for a progressive agenda.

Besides, Obama ran as a centrist. It seems that some on the left were holding on to some belief that he would turn into a centrist after getting elected, but there was precious little evidence that would happen.

The propensity on the left to self-destruct is playing true to form, as the GOP sits back and continues to fan the flames.