Over at Ace of Spades’ site, Gabriel Malor has a very insightful (and typically hysterically vulgar) analysis of just how good a deal the Republicans worked with the Obama administration on the tax cuts/unemployment deal. And by “good,” I don’t mean “good for the Republicans,” but “good for the country.” Oh, it will probably help the GOP, but that’s not the main point — it was the right thing all around. Maybe not the best, but pretty damned good.
Even more astonishing, it was done with the Lame Duck Congress, where the Democrats still hold a hefty majority in the House and Senate. It didn’t even have to wait for the Republicans to take back the House, and seriously cut into the Democrats’ majority in the Senate.
At the same time, the Obama administration has made a big shift on its policy towards the Middle East. They have dropped their demands that Israel, as a pre-condition to peace talks, stop all construction of new housing in allegedly disputed areas.
This should serve as an affirmation that the Obama administration — as well as Obama himself — are indisputably American, because this is in perfect accord with Winston Churchill’s famous observation: “Americans can always be counted on to do the right thing…after they have exhausted all other possibilities.”
Here we have the Obama administration doing the right thing in two very important areas… after they have exhausted all other possibilities. They had to be hunted down and cornered, but in the end they are on the right side of two issues.
I would be happier if they had come to the right conclusions without being beaten about the head and shoulders first, but I can live with it. As the old saying goes: it doesn’t matter if they see the light, as long as they feel the heat.
And they are really, really feeling the heat.
Good for them. And just in time for winter, too.
