In regards to President-elect Obama’s economic stimulus proposal, I wrote that:
I think Obama is using a smart bargaining strategy here–he proposes a modest plan, lets economists criticize it for being inadequate, and then uses that criticism to expand the plan and bump up the price tag. In the end, it will look like Obama is compromising and relying on experts to craft the plan, but the final product will look a lot like what Obama wanted to propose in the first place.
Well, here’s the headline from The Huffington Post:
Obama Team Offers Concessions On Stimulus In Talks With Senate Dems
And here’s more from Politico:
President-elect Barack Obama tried Sunday to shore up support in Congress for his ambitious economic policies, with his top advisers offering concessions on his economic-stimulus proposal and preparing to detail conditions for how the incoming administration will spend the second half of the $700 billion financial rescue package.
[…]
Sens. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) both said that Obama’s team signaled that their new proposal would double the funds dedicated to energy tax credits, to at least $20 billion.
“They’re moving in our direction,” Boxer said, adding that the Obama team assured Democrats that the money given to state governments would reach cities and counties suffering from budget shortfalls.
[Emphasis added]
Like I said, I think this is some brilliant maneuvering on Obama’s part. If he started with a $1.5 trillion package, the price tag alone would cause lawmakers to balk, forcing Obama to cut the bill down.
But since Obama’s initial proposal wasn’t big enough, he can now add more progressive spending under the guise of “compromising” and “making concessions.” I mean, look at what he “conceded” to Senate Democrats–alternative energy tax credits. I doubt they had to pull teeth to get Obama to agree to that, but now it looks like he added it in as a concession.
So in the end, the final package will look like it was built through negotiation and concessions, even though it will be full of progressive policies and spending that normally would have been non-starters had they all been packed together into one huge bill.
Democrashield 