US Politics Analysis: Obama Finally Talks of Jobs Fight, But Will He Last 15 Rounds?

In June, EA asked, "Will the Democrats Fight Back over Jobs?", highlighting that progressive critics of President Obama were calling for him to end his preoccupation with the national debt problem and to steer the conversation back to the unemployment crisis.

Last Thursday night, in a speech before both houses of Congress, the President finally answered those detractors with a combative and feisty performance in support of his proposed American Jobs Act. This act is designed to stimulate growth in a slumping economy through a $447 billion combination of new spending and tax cuts in the next year, a potentially larger economic impetus than the Recovery Act of 2009, which spent roughly $750 billion over two years.

But President Obama deferred an explanation of how he would pay for this programme for job creation until another speech on 19 September, one that will explain how this short-term investment in the US economy will fit into his long-term solution for reducing America's deficits. For those interested in the specific ideas, there is the handy americanjobsact.com webpage, but until the final specifics are outlined, the primary interest in this speech lies in the reaction it has provoked among disaffected progressives. It is with the support of this group, for all Obama's recent attempts to attract the backing of independents, that the President will win or lose his re-election bid next year. And this speech was, in essence, his promise to them that he will fight for the liberal values they want to see espoused.

In June 2010, EA noted the "Challenge to Democrats from the Left", with the frustration of progressives with a President who had lost his commitment to liberal causes. These disgruntled supporters argued there was a growing “enthusiasm gap” in activist groups. The bottom line then was, that if the President did not return to his core progressive policies, the activists would withdraw their commitment to campaign for his re-election. In the 16 months since then, along with a more general complaint about his lack of leadership skills, groups like MoveOn.org have continually returned to that theme.

That was the backdrop to Thursday's speech, and the question it elicits is: "How did the President do?"

Muted enthusiasm is perhaps the best answer. There were two levels of reception for the speech. First, there were the "pragmatic" progressives who, to make a timely comparison with the Republicans, are more like a Mitt Romney than a Rick Perry in their ideological camp.

Ever since the 2009 stimulus attempt, the leading academic criticism of President Obama's failure to fix the nation's unemployment problem, through not spending enough, has come from Paul Krugman at The New York Times. Though pessimistic about the act becoming law because of GOP opposition, Krugman welcomed the speech in --- compared to his recent columns --- an overwhelmingly positive tone: “I was favorably surprised by the new Obama jobs plan, which is significantly bolder and better than I expected. It’s not nearly as bold as the plan I’d want in an ideal world. But if it actually became law, it would probably make a significant dent in unemployment.”

Krugman took issue with some of the possible impact of the details in Obama's plan, but in general he agreed with the direction the President is trying to take –-- as did The Times' editorial board. This opinion is shared by two columnists at The Washington Post, but they also voiced the fundamental concern of many with this newly energised President Obama: when it comes time to fight for this act against a recalcitrant Republican majority in the House of Representatives, will he stay the course? Or will he, as he did at the end of 2010 with the extension of all the Bush tax cuts, cave before the pressure he is sure to face?

Harold Meyerson asked the question this way: “So --- a good speech; a good proposal for beginning to revive the American economy; and a good start, which he desperately needed, of the president’s 2012 election campaign. This is a president who’s had plenty of good starts, however; it’s in sustaining his momentum that he’s come up short. We’ll see if he does that better this time around.”

E.J. Dionne, in "Obama Goes Big --- and Should Stay Big", put this prevailing sentiment in a slightly different way:

This speech won’t solve Obama’s problems. Only a persistent, disciplined and focused effort to advance this proposal and the ideas behind it can begin to do that. And to put it charitably, follow-through has not always been this administration’s long suit. Still, the nature of this speech suggests Obama knows that what he had been doing wasn’t working. That’s a good sign.

This pessimism in otherwise laudatory evaluations of the speech prompted barackobama.com on Friday night to send out an e-mail reiterating the combative approach:

Last night, we saw a leader with a clear plan to get Americans back to work -- and ready to fight to make it happen. 
 
It's the kind of speech you watch and think, "I'm so proud this guy's our President." 
 
Watch the speech and let President Obama know you're ready to fight alongside him to get the job done.

At Campaign for America's Future, the most prolific website of the activist and ideological progressive left, enthusiasm for President Obama's speech was less forthcoming. CAF's Robert Borosage summed up the lukewarm reaction in "A Modest Proposal" that “the President’s American Jobs Act is bold enough to draw a stark contrast with conservatives. But it is worth noting just how modest it is, how cautious in conception and conservative in substance.”

Borosage's main criticism is that even while calling for increased spending President Obama has fallen into the conservatives' political comfort zone by linking his proposal to concerns over deficits and the debt, where the jobs message will get crowded out and forgotten in a few weeks' time. And, of course, even the mention of the possibility of reforming Medicare or Medicaid drew a rebuke.

Borasage's  primary objection to the speech was repeated by John Nichols of The Nation, who argued:

Barack Obama delivered a credible if uninspired jobs speech Thursday night.

He communicated that the United States cannot meet the challenges of an unemployment crisis with an austerity agenda that owes more to Herbert Hoover than Franklin Roosevelt. But he muddied the message with too much debt and deficit talk.

Nichols also articulated the views of the large number who disagree with the current emphasis on spending cuts, cuts, and more cuts in Congress by emphasising: 

So now Obama must fight.

MoveOn.org’s Justin Ruben got it right when he said that Americans --- at least the Americans who would ever consider voting for him --- “want to see the President stand up to Tea Party extremism, and push forward with a plan to create good jobs now, and pay for it by ending tax cuts for millionaires and corporations.

“Now that the President is turning the conversation back to jobs, he needs to keep it there,” adds Ruben. “He can’t return in a week or two with a plan that helps Tea Party extremists in their drive to slash vital programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.”

Ruben’s right.

But is Obama up to the task?

With that last question we find the overriding and compelling significance of President Obama's speech on Thursday. It was an impressive speech, but was it merely the empty rhetoric we have seen before? It has taken President Obama a long time to find common ground with his detractors from the liberal side of his own party, but does he possess the courage to be the progressive "champion" they yearn for? Will he stand up to Republicans in Congress, who made clear on Friday made known they would not roll over and submit tamely to his proposals in this letter they sent to the President, or will he water down his plan in the name of political expediency?

If he does not fight for this plan with all the means at his disposal --- and that means no more conciliatory Mr. President ---  he will be deserted by droves of progressives for his latest betrayal of the  Take Back the American Dream movement. Conversely, if this speech marks the moment President Obama switched to a more confrontational style of politics, we are in for a rollicking fourteen months in Washington before the next election.