Washington Post — Iran Unrest Reveals Split In U.S. on Its Role Abroad
As the president holds a midday press conference today, the main topic will be Iran’s disputed elections. As the protests and government crackdown continue, President Obama finds himself in a difficult position abroad diplomatically and at home politically.
Writer Scott Wilson devotes most of the piece to commiserating with a president he sees batting the simple-minded, opportunistic Republican view of the world in an effort to implement a better, high-minded, less nationalistic and more nuanced foreign policy.
Even so, Wilson does accidentally brush past the underlying political tension that will greet the president in the Rose Garden today. After more than a week of uproar in Iran and mounting violence, the president has been “moved,” has called on the regime to stop “unjust” actions and compared the protests to the long struggle for black civil rights in America. But Obama has not expressed solidarity with the protesters and not put much pressure on the mullahs who seem to be brushing Obama back by invoking the president’s past praise for their “vibrant” democracy and warning of interference – even as condemnation grows from other Western leaders.
Neither does Wilson mention a poll conducted for his newspaper, published today, that shows public approval for Obama’s Iran policy lags his overall foreign policy by 8 points.
Faced with an untenable political situation, Obama generally waits until his hand is forced and then responds with an eloquent expression of high-minded regret at the way of the world.
By pushing Obama to stand up straighter for the protesters Republicans have given Obama a bigger stage for today’s press conference and perhaps the potential political impact of what he will say.
If Obama equivocates, he will lose more ground even as obliging reporters discuss the need for nuance. But if he waxes eloquent about the plight of the people, writers like Wilson will be moved to say that Obama was pushed beyond the limits of his own forbearance. As usual, the press will grade Obama on a curve.
But Obma’s 2008 rival has found new vitality in the struggle against Iranian oppression.
“In his appearance on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” McCain compared Twitter, Facebook and YouTube to the printing presses that the United States provided in the early 1980s to the Solidarity leaders in Gdansk, Poland, to help them spread their anti-Soviet message. He recalled his meeting with Natan Sharansky, the former Soviet dissident, who told him that Reagan’s ‘evil empire speech’ had ‘spread like wildfire throughout the gulag.’
‘We’ve seen this movie before,’ McCain said. ‘And I don’t consider it meddling when you stand on the side of principles that made our nation the greatest nation in history.’”
Wall Street Journal — For Drug Makers, Concessions Have a Bright Side
In the latest incident of the cartelling of America, writers Laura Meckler and Alicia Mundy find that the voluntary $80 billion “contribution” of the nation’s drug makers over the next decade announced on Monday will bring big profits to the biggest operators in the industry and help cut smaller operators out of the pharmaceutical game.
Democrats looking for any good news on the health care front have been trumpeting the concessions as a way to help reduce the cost of a public health option, already at $1.6 trillion for 10 years and rising. But Meckler and Mundy observe that $30 billion of the drugmakers money will go to help prevent customers on Medicare from switching to cheaper generic drugs. The other $50 billion will be set aside for undetermined future drug subsidies, which will be negotiated on an ongoing basis.
“’The proposal won’t cost the industry much,’ said Scott Gottlieb, a former high-ranking health official in the Bush administration. ‘It will ultimately discourage [some] patients from switching to generics,’ he added, because their out-of-pocket costs for brand-name drugs will be less.”
Washington Post — Confidence in Stimulus Plan Ebbs, Poll Finds
The Washington Post/ABC poll continues to put President Obama in the most favorable light of any of the major media surveys, including those conducted for the New York Times and NBC. A 65 percent approval rating compared to the 56 percent in the Journal/NBC poll.
But writers Dan Balz and Jon Cohen point out that even within these rosier numbers, the loss in public confidence in the stimulative effect in the president’s $787 billion spending plan is fading as unemployment climbs and the long term outlook for the economy remains cloudy. Confidence has fallen seven points in two months to 52 percent, with the biggest losses in the Midwest.
“Obama has used the power and financial resources of the federal government repeatedly as he has dealt with the country’s problems this year, to the consternation of his Republican critics. The poll found little change in underlying public attitudes toward government since the inauguration, with slightly more than half saying they prefer a smaller government with fewer services to a larger government with more services. Independents, however, now split 61 to 35 percent in favor of a smaller government; they were more narrowly divided on this question a year ago (52 to 44 percent), before the financial crisis hit.”
Wall Street Journal — Independents’ Warning for Obama
Writer Gerald Seib looks at recent poll data and observes that while President Obama is keeping the faith of his fellow Democrats, the independents who won the election for him are starting to slip away – dropping from a 60 percent approval rating for the president’s job performance to 45 percent in just two months.
“[Independents] went for Mr. Obama last year by a 52% to 44% margin. Their attitudes are of great long-term importance to Democrats’ hopes that the 2008 vote was a transforming election that will usher in a durable Democratic majority.
Indeed, the broad contours of the 2008 vote were shaped by waves of previously independent voters who switched to calling themselves Democrats. They acted and voted that way last fall, which was a principal reason Mr. Obama became the first Democrat to win a majority of the popular vote in a presidential election in 32 years.
But Democrats were renting those voters last year; they don’t own them, at least not yet. As a purely political matter, they remain up for grabs in many ways. Independents who moved toward Mr. Obama last year, and away from him now, could easily swing back toward him down the line.”
New York Times — Obama Invites Gay Rights Advocates to White House
Faced with rising discontentment among gay and lesbian supporters for an incremental approach to their key issues, the White House is turning on the charm.
Many gay activists have withdrawn from a Democratic fundraiser set for Thursday even after the President pushed through an extension of limited spousal benefits to the domestic partners of unmarried federal employees.
Now writer Sheryl Gay Stolberg learns that the White House has scheduled a reception to celebrate gay rights at the White House on Monday in honor of the riot outside of a Greenwich Village gay bar that helped start the movement.
What Obama needs is to placate gay groups so as not to lose a key support group or upset the wider pool of voters by taking on something like gays in the military. It won’t be easy.
“’What’s going to change the way the community is feeling is seeing the introduction of a bill to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, repeal ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’’ said Jennifer Chrisler, executive director of the Family Equality Council, a Boston-based advocacy group, referring to two policies Mr. Obama pledged to overturn. She said gay rights advocates want to see ‘a president who is fulfilling the promises he made on the campaign trail.’’”
