Barack: "Can you hear me NOW?"

Eleanor Clift:

What he needs are some hard-nosed policies to rescue the millions of homeowners who are underwater, plus a vision to revive the nation’s manufacturing base to begin the long and painful restoration of jobs. He needs people around him who make him uncomfortable, who challenge his world view, and who have a better understanding of the workings of Capitol Hill, however dysfunctional it has become. The people around Obama caught the lightning in ’08, but they’ve been outmaneuvered by a party that two years ago was on the brink of extinction.

This is not the end of the Obama presidency, far from it, but it is time to take courageous stands on behalf of working people so these disaffected voters, whom we used to call Reagan Democrats, understand that their financial self-interest is with Obama and the Democrats and not with the Tea Party. Those voters will be a smaller portion of the electorate in 2012 as more young people and people of color come to the polls when the presidency is at stake, but their voices count, and if Obama doesn’t address their concerns, one party will benefit, and it won’t be the Democrats. MORE...