Obama and Boehner in sync on a debt limit deal – who knew?

So I sat through the NewsHour this evening and listened to the analysis of David Brooks and Ruth Marcus with Jim Lehrer. 

Discussing the ongoing debt limit negotiations between Democratic and Republican leaders, both Brooks and Marcus visibly brightened at the prospect that Obama and Boehner were ready to make a big deal on the debt limit in which Obama would sell out Social Security and Medicare. Brooks even went so far as to happily mention that Obama is “sticking the knife in Pelosi.”

We all knew that, right?

Here’s the transcript of most of the erudite threesome’s remarks on the debt limit:

JIM LEHRER: Why is there -- are the prospects for the biggest deal better than for the medium deal or the little deal? What's happening?

RUTH MARCUS: Well, I'm not sure they're better, but the argument for the bigger deal and the reason that we might see a bigger deal is, bigger isn't just better in this circumstance. It actually might be easier, because you can trade off more different parts and more different constituencies.

And the Republicans -- Boehner, in order to get his Republicans, needs some Social Security cuts. And, so...

JIM LEHRER: And that takes -- the Democrats can get -- they can get some...

RUTH MARCUS: And then Democrats -- and the Democrats need a trillion dollars in tax revenue. And so maybe you can play around and make it look like less than a trillion. And then you whisper to your friends that it is actually a trillion.

It is going to be -- what's going on behind the scenes is absolutely fascinating. The oddest couple around is the president and the speaker. They are completely in synch in wanting to get this done.

DAVID BROOKS: Everyone else...

RUTH MARCUS: Whether they will -- everybody else, not so much.

DAVID BROOKS: Yes. Everyone else is miserable here.

JIM LEHRER: How do you explain that? What -- what has happened to make Obama and Boehner -- beyond just being golf partners?

(LAUGHTER)

DAVID BROOKS: Two things. One, I think they both seriously think the country has a problem, a deficit problem.

JIM LEHRER: OK. They agree that the debt limit, too, is a problem.

DAVID BROOKS: They agree, right.

And, third, incumbents have mutual incentives. The party of the incumbents wants to get reelected. If Obama cuts a deal, he's very likely to get reelected. If Boehner changes the trajectory of spending, he can say, we came to Washington. We did it.

And so, secretly, what's going on here is that Obama is really sticking the knife in Nancy Pelosi, making it unlikely that she's going to get -- get the speakership. And Boehner, if he cuts a deal, is hurting Mitt Romney or whoever the Republican nominee is.

And so the party of the incumbents are sticking together and hurting the party of the outs.

JIM LEHRER: Wow.

RUTH MARCUS: Do we have time?

JIM LEHRER: ... do you agree?

RUTH MARCUS: I mostly agree.

JIM LEHRER: You mostly agree?

That is as far as we can go. Sorry, Ruth. Good to see you.

(LAUGHTER)

RUTH MARCUS: Nice to see you

To read the transcript in its entirety, go here.

Obama sidesteps Hill Dems to put Medicare and Social Security on the table in deficit debate

This week Katalusis has suffered from a fickle Internet connection that has prevented me from posting since my Fourth of July message suggesting that in light of the stalled deficit debate at the federal level and the shutdown of our state government here in Minn., it’s time for our leaders to grow up.

That’s evidently too much to ask. And today we learned that yes, Obama has caved again and now both Medicare and Social Security are on the table, while our glassy-eyed pundits continue to rave about “entitlements.”

A few media reps like Dan Friedman continue to get the word out. Writing for the National Journal, Friedman reports that Hill Democrats aren’t happy about Obama’s latest sellout of his base:

Before Thursday's White House meeting on the budget, congressional Democrats said they planned to remind President Obama not to leave his party and base behind. The Democrats' testiness followed reports that the White House was proposing to alter Social Security and Medicare as part of a potential debt-ceiling deal with Republicans.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., in the meeting “expressed concern that we hadn’t been as much in the loop as we would have liked to have been," said a senior Democratic aide who asked not to be identified so he could speak candidly about the friction between the president and Democratic congressional leaders.

(RELATED: Obama Says Dems, GOP to Work All Weekend on Debt Deal)

That feeling is shared by many Democrats, irked not just by the potential cuts, but by the White House’s failure to float it to Democratic lawmakers before they learned of the proposal through media.

Read more:

As the Obama world turns: Boehner is courted while Pelosi fights for a seat at the table

How quickly the mutual adoration has faded.

 

 

 

 

Interesting how Republican Speaker of the House John  Boehner gets to play golf with President Obama and enjoy a secret meeting with the One; whereas, House minority leader Nancy Pelosi, who fawned over Obama throughout the 08 primary and her tenure as the first woman speaker of the House,  must now make a scene in order to get a seat at the table in debt limit discussions.

Roll Call has the scoop, along with its sorry antecedents:

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will demand a seat in the table for the final talks on the national debt limit, putting a strong liberal voice in the room.

Pelosi and House Democrats were left out of the negotiations between President Obama and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) last year that extended nearly all of the Bush tax rates though 2012.

Pelosi didn’t participate in the final high-level talks over fiscal 2011 spending levels either.

But now she’s demanding her say at a time when many of her House Democratic colleagues are disappointed in Obama’s level of consultation with their caucus.

“If they don’t have the votes, House Democrats have to be at the table,” said a House Democratic leadership aide.

Pelosi stayed out of the talks on crafting a continuing resolution funding the rest of 2011 that included $38.5 billion in spending cuts because House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) expressed confidence they would pass it without Democratic help.

But, in the end of that debate, the Republican votes fell short, and GOP leaders needed help from House Democrats. Democrats went along with a deal they had almost no part in negotiating because they wanted to avert a government shutdown.

The experience left a bitter taste in their mouths, and Pelosi won’t let it happen again.

 Read more:

Geraldine Ferraro’s funeral (video)

At the Wall Street Journal, Aaron Rutkoff reports:

One-time U.S. vice-presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro’s funeral Thursday drew hundreds of mourners, including former President Bill Clinton, former Vice President Walter Mondale, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi. Dignitaries joined Ferraro’s three children in offering eulogies.

The ceremony was closed to the media, but attendees described it as a celebration of Ferraro’s life. “It was one of the most beautiful services I have ever seen,” said Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas.

In the video below, mourners remember Ferraro

 

Giffords opened her eyes

Nancy Pelosi was in the room when Giffords opened her eyes.( Pelosi's photo is in the public domain.)

President Obama’s speech in AZ this evening was very powerful and moving. In my opinion, he hit just the right note to de-escalate the finger pointing and partisan blaming. And in our hearts, we all had to cheer when, with permission of Mark Kelly, Gabrielle Giffords’ husband, Obama announced that Gabrielle had opened her eyes for the first time since she was shot.

Politico reports that friends of Giffords, including Nancy Pelosi, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, and Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz were in the room when she opened her eyes.

Veterans Services Organizations School Obama on Insurance Matters

Hope for whom? The Obama Administration considered putting at risk insurance coverage for America’s vets.

Our new president who has yet to master rendering a military hand salute correctly has recently been schooled on insurance matters by veterans service organizations.

Adam Levine at CNN reports:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Obama administration is abandoning a controversial plan to charge private insurers for treatment of veterans' service-connected ailments.

"The President listened to concerns raised by the VSOs [veterans service organizations] that this might, under certain circumstances, affect veterans and their families' ability to access health care," the White House said. "Therefore, the president has instructed that its consideration be dropped."

News of the change of heart originally came from Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, who disclosed the decision to reporters while meeting with a group of veterans on Capitol Hill.

Here’s the deal:

The administration saw the plan as a way of raising more than $500 million in revenues for the Department of Veterans Affairs. However, veterans groups saw it is a violation of what they said is the government's moral obligation to treat veterans injured during service to their country.

In addition, they believed it would lead to veterans and their families losing their private insurance or premiums rising because of the high costs of treating many service-related injuries.

Politico’s Hilarious Video of Late Night’s Take on Obama’s Speech

Ya gotta watch Politico’s summary of the late night’s take on Obama’s speech:

Stimulus Package Takes Care of the Affluent

You only need to read the screaming banner headlines on the front page of the Huffington Post to get the picture of what happened with the stimulus bill today:

PELOSI: WE HAVE AN AGREEMENT

White House Has Yet To Speak... $789 Billion Bill Preserves Obama's Signature Tax Cut... House Vote Possible Thursday... Senate Will Follow...Payback: Dems Strip Business Tax Cuts... Big Winners: The Upper-Middle Class

Got that? The big winners are the upper middle class.

Thomas Edsall writes:

When President Obama outlined on January 8 the rationale for the economic stimulus bill, "The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act," he clearly identified the men and women most in trouble:

Nearly two million jobs have now been lost, and on Friday we are likely to learn that we lost more jobs last year than at any time since World War II. Just in the past year, another 2.8 million Americans who want and need full-time work have had to settle for part-time jobs.

The House-Senate compromise, however, cuts funds for extended health care coverage for the unemployed; cuts $30 billion in aid to state governments to prevent reductions in social services to the poor and out-of-work; and also cuts a special "Making Work Pay" tax holiday from $500 to $400 for an individual, and from $1,000 to $800 for a couple, for low-to-middle-income workers still hanging on to their jobs.

Amid all the cutting, however, one group emerged unscathed: the upper-middle class, the not-quite-super-rich, but certainly not on the ropes. Most of these folks, in terms of income and employment, are what could be called the un-needy, a group clearly distinct from those Obama identified as the core target of the legislation. The "compromise" legislation includes $70 billion, or just under 10 percent of the whole package, to be used expressly to take care of these affluent people.

Read more:

Maureen Dowd: Prince Charming Obama Losing his Luster

Photo courtesy of LATimes

Good heavens! I’m getting worried about myself. This post will be the second time in the past several days that I’ve linked to Maureen Dowd in appreciation of her caustic style of truth telling. She’s been diverted from trashing the Clintons by the huge whoosh from the sudden deflation of Obama euphoria - like E. J. Dionne, a chronic Obamaphile, signed off his column recently by warning that no president has ever been seen walking on water !!!

Here’s Modo on the Potomac’s Postpartisan Depression:

Once upon a time, America thought Prince Charming would glide in and kiss her, reviving her from a coma induced by a poison apple of greed, deceit, carelessness, recklessness and overreaching.

But then the prince got distracted, seeing Lincoln in the mirror, and instead gave the kiss of life to a bunch of flat-lining Republican tax-cut fetishists.

Somehow the most well-known person on the planet lost control of the economic message to someone named Eric Cantor.

(And Larry Summers ended up making Henry Paulson seem riveting.)

In his first weeks padding around a White House that still has nails on the walls waiting for new pictures, and phone and e-mail kinks, Barack Obama could not locate the bully pulpit and ended up being bullied.

Republicans, pulled out of their existential lethargy and re-energized by the president’s charm offensive, immediately mounted an offensive against him. Just as Michael Bloomberg learned the perils of cuddling a groundhog when it bit him, Mr. Obama learned the perils of coddling conservatives.

Pete Sessions, a conservative from Waco, Tex., and the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, warned that they could become an insurgency, having learned more about insurgencies “because of the Taliban.” (Yes, that’s the same Taliban that was allowed to regenerate by bumbling Republican leaders.)

Obama advisers are right to crow that the president’s civility to Republicans will be popular with the public. But the carrot-stick ratio was way out of whack. Mr. Obama should have written up a kosher (as in pork-free) bill that Americans could trust — and Republicans couldn’t as easily mock — and jammed it through.

It’s a huge, scary moment, with trillions of dollars and millions of jobs flying out the window. Vice President Joseph Biden, in another Cassandra moment, told House Democrats that even if the White House does everything right, “there’s still a 30 percent chance we’ll get it wrong.”

The president and his aides seemed a bit snow-blinded by the White House, overwhelmed and slow to understand that they were losing the high ground and the whip hand. They couldn’t even get their pick for commerce secretary, the Republican Senator Judd Gregg, to vote for their stimulus bill; he said he would abstain.

Those in the president’s circle were too caught up in more narrow concerns, like how their relationships with the president and the capital were shaking out; whether they could breathe on this new planet with the rarefied air of cool planes and helicopters; and whether W.’s mind-boggling mountain of garbage would trash Democratic candidates in 2010 and doom Mr. Obama to one term.

“I would rather do the right thing and have one term than be mediocre and have two,” Mr. Obama told House Democrats at their Williamsburg retreat Thursday night. The lawmakers had been feeling disillusioned that they were carrying Mr. Obama’s water on the bill, while Obama aides triangulated and promised that the bill would “improve” in the Senate.

But here’s the kicker – Instead of her usual all out assault on any woman daring to set foot on the national stage, Modo actually gets in a dig at Obama for throwing Nancy Pelosi under the bus:

Nancy Pelosi told her leadership team that she had told the president, “I don’t mind you driving the bus over me, but I don’t appreciate your backing it up and running over me again and again.”

Will wonders never cease?

Read more:

Obama Team Designates Pelosi to Take the Fall for Stimulus Bill

It’s hard to tell what’s happening with the stimulus bill – re-spun as the economic recovery act - this Friday afternoon, but we’re assuming it’s still possible the senate will call for a vote before midnight.

Given the recent photos of Pelosi and Obama showing her obvious infatuation with President Cool as emphasized in yesterday’s gushing assurance, “We’ve got his back,” Jane Hamsher’s declaration at Huffpo this morning is a little startling.

Hamsher writes:

The story of the morning seems to be that the Obama team is unhappy with Nancy Pelosi and the House committee chairs for delivering up such a liberal, pork-laden bill that they themselves really had nothing to do with.

"Anonymous staffers" are fanning out to fuel the fiction that "during the transition Summers, his deputy Jason Furman, and the White House's top Congressional liason, Phil Schiliro, laid out the broad principles they wanted the bill to adhere to, but when it came to actual content, they deferred to the chairmen."

Hamsher goes on to say:

Except that it's not true. The Obama transition team has been working on the substance of the bill from day one. Their first step was to go to the Association of Mayors, the National Governors' Associations and other non-congressional groups and say "give us all your shovel-ready projects." That and other provisions written by the Obama team became the spine of the bill. It went through only three committee markups, and moved through the House at lightening speed in a way that made many House chairs unhappy, with the notable exception of Dave Obey (now also under attack) who helped push it through quickly.

The House bill is notable not only for its size but also because it had no earmarks, which are the lifeblood of House members, the way they show their constituents what they're doing for them. As one person knowledgable about the writing of the bill says, "if you're in the House why would you write a bill without earmarks unless you didn't write the bill?"

Hamsher gets to the really mean part here:

But with public opinion quickly turning against the bill, and the House Republicans claiming the moral high ground as they held formation to oppose him, how could Obama be distanced from responsibility for elements of the bill under GOP attack and remain above the fray? That seemed to be the locus of White House concern, and according to those familiar with what happened, the "polarizing" Nancy Pelosi was designated to take the fall.

Read more:

Emily’s List Celebration: Hillary Releases Her Inner Feminist

(emphasis mine)

‘Tis the night before the changing of the guard in Washington, but Rebecca Traister over at Salon reports on Hillary Clinton’s appearance at the Emily’s List gala Sunday afternoon and the word is: “Hillary is back!”

Traister, who is one feisty writer, tells us:

“Yet thanks to to Ellen Malcolm (perhaps the political world's most cheerful ball-buster), a roster of 2008's biggest lady winners and a rousing speech by Hillary Clinton herself, the luncheon turned out to be a feel-good celebration. And even without much mention of the failed presidential march of the still-senator from New York, the event was yet another in a string of recent moments in which we got to see the new Hillary Rodham Clinton: Toughened, burnished and somehow fortified by her loss, she is taking on the role not only of secretary of state, but of a reanimated, reborn, rollicking feminist superhero.”

Traister continues:

‘“Introducing her very late guest, Malcolm called Clinton "an exceptional figure in American life," a "powerful role model for women for our country and for the world." And what's remarkable about that praise is that here in 2009, it is absolutely true. Hillary Clinton, who was a sore spot for so many feminists for so long, even through her presidential campaign, has made a glorious phoenix flight out of her failed presidential campaign.”

A glorious phoenix flight out of her failed presidential campaign, indeed:

Traister concludes:

“This was the woman who had long refused to take her husband's married name, who had made ungainly but honest comments about not staying home and baking cookies -- but now, all (or most) of the disjointed ugly-duckling of the past was gone. This is a woman who knew she had just made history, that she had a crowd eating out of her hands, a woman who has finally come into herself in a blaze of popular, political feminist glory. And sure, it was a perfect crowd, but a lot of this was stuff she'd said to the whole country just last week.

‘“Speaking of the criticism she received from Taliban leaders for speaking out on behalf of women in Afghanistan in the '90s, Clinton said pointedly, "I wear that, along with much of the rest of the criticism I've received, as a badge of honor." And so, with a happy crowd of cheering people, Clinton said, "I am absolutely thrilled to stand with you in the fights we have waged together. We've won some and we've lost some."

“And some of the losses are looking more like wins every day.”

No question about it. On the eve of Obama’s inauguration, Hillary Clinton is a winner big-time!

Nancy Pelosi Equivocates on Sexist Treatment of Clinton and Palin

Photo credits: Getty Images

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi became hypnotized by Barack Obama early in the Democratic primary and did her part to undermine the candidacy of Hillary Clinton. Until recently she declined to speak out against the sexism from Democratic Party leaders and their misogynistic allies in the media.

I suppose it’s progress that Pelosi is now supporting Clinton as Obama’s pick for secretary of state, but she still refuses to take an unequivocal stand against sexism, regardless of the victim. Sam Stein reports at the Huffington Post:

“Speaker Nancy Pelosi offered effusive praise for the appointment of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State on Monday, saying the New York Democrat was an ideal fit for the post, would faithfully carry out Barack Obama's policies and serve as an inspiration to woman, much like Pelosi herself.

‘“I got a call this morning from Hillary Clinton, saying the announcement will be made,’ Pelosi recalled. ‘What an exciting moment. Hillary Clinton, Secretary of State. Thomas Jefferson [and now] Hillary Clinton.’

“Speaking at a Hunter College forum on the role of gender in politics, the Speaker downplayed the suggestion -- put forth in the form of a question -- that Clinton might face misogynistic obstacles on the world stage.

‘“None at all," she replied, when asked if this would be the case. ‘I have traveled the world as Speaker of the House... and I have seen the treatment I have received in these places. And I know the respect that they will have for soon to be Secretary of State Hillary Clinton... What is important to world leaders is, ‘Does the president listen to you?’... She is a force in her own right and anybody that might have that thought that you mildly suggested does so at his peril.”’

Stein contines:

“But the most interesting topic of debate centered around whether Clinton and Sarah Palin were hindered by their sex while on the campaign trail. Both Pelosi and Rep. Carolyn Maloney were put in a tricky position, arguing that their Democratic colleague had been disadvantaged by her gender while Alaska's governor was not. But they made the case astutely, noting that the policies pursued by the McCain-Palin ticket were antithetical to women's interests, even if Palin's candidacy was a symbolic victory.”

What Pelosi, Maloney, et al overlook is that regardless of her positions on the issues, there is no justification for heaping sexist abuse on Sarah Palin or holding her to a double standard compared to male candidates, e.g., criticizing her for running for public office instead of staying home and caring for her children.

Pelosi’s waffling on these important issues is just one more reason I continue to be glad I left the Democratic Party and registered as non-affiliated in 2008.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi's Election Analysis (video)

Watch Nancy Pelosi present her analysis of the 2008 election here.

Ethical Questions Posed by a Hillary Supporter Encamped in Denver

Heidi Li Feldman, a law professor at Georgetown University, is probably one of the more knowledgeable Democrats when it comes to party rules and procedures. She’s also unafraid to call Dr. Dean and members of the DNC to account. She posted from Denver this morning to Heidi Li’s Potpourri:

“The DNC, Dr. Dean, Speaker Pelosi, et al. are learning, the hard way, that faux unity is no unity; that when you try to create your own reality, real reality tends to get in the way.

“So now here we are in Denver and Dr. Dean's and Speaker Pelosi's preferred candidate is dead even with John McCain in the polls; it is quite clear that delegates to the convention understand their rights and responsibilities and want to have to opportunity to elect Senator Clinton as the Party's nominee; the DNC seems to be in a panic over its decision to enter Senator Clinton's name in nomination; the DNC and DNCC still will not confirm that they will hold a straightforward, transparent, regular roll call vote as specified in the Call for The 2008 Democratic National Convention, the Party's own official convention governance document.

“Forget about making it seem like the Party is unified. At the moment, Dr. Dean and Speaker Pelosis cannot even make it seem like the Party - or at least its top officials - are honest.”

OMG! Nancy Pelosi Suddenly Realizes Clinton Supporters Count, too!

As I recall from the primary, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was among those Democratic Party leaders who refused to take a stand against the relentless sexist attacks that Hillary Clinton endured. Since then Pelosi has acknowledged that Sen. Clinton’s campaign had been hindered by sexism; however, the Speaker dismissed it by saying “it goes with the territory.”

As noted in the LA Times, Pelosi “never officially chose sides in the Hillary Clinton/Barack Obama battle for the Democratic presidential nomination. But most of those reading tea leaves assumed her heart was with the eventual winner.”

As early as January, the Times points out, Pelosi effectively encouraged superdelegates to abandon Hillary Clinton and jump on the bandwagon of the charismatic Obama with his proven ability to instantaneously convert large crowds into revival meetings starring legions of youth chanting, “Yes, we can.”

In light of all of the above, it’s a little mind numbing to read in the Hill this morning the selfsame Pelosi, in her by now familiar condescending manner, is holding women leaders in the Democratic party, along with Hillary Clinton’s supporters, responsible for the success of her guy Obama this November:

“DENVER – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi predicted Saturday that female Democratic leaders will help unify the party by getting disgruntled supporters of Hillary Rodham Clinton to back Barack Obama.

“Beginning with speeches by Sen. Clinton (N.Y.) and other women at the Democratic convention here next week, the party’s women will come out strongly for Sen. Obama (Ill.) throughout the campaign, said Pelosi (Calif.), who holds the highest position in the federal government ever occupied by a woman.

“Addressing reporters at a pre-convention luncheon sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor, Pelosi predicted that the Obama campaign would be able to win over Clinton’s supporters before the election. She stressed, though, that, if they failed to do so, it would be their own fault.

‘“I believe that women will see that they have the most to gain by the election of Barack Obama and the most to lose by the election of John McCain,’ Pelosi said. The differences between Obama and Sen. McCain (R-Ariz.) are like ‘night and day’ on issues such as healthcare, education and the war in Iraq, she said.”’

What Speaker Pelosi still fails to understand is that by their passive response to the pervasive sexism throughout the primary, she and other party leaders actually condoned and encouraged the abusive treatment suffered by the first serious female presidential candidate in the nation’s history.

Pelosi’s comments at this point are not only too little too late, they also bear an unmistakable note of condescension toward those of us who saw what was going on and have refused to sit down, shut up, and get with the Democratic Party’s program of nominating Barack Obama at all costs.

Trying to convince us that we have no choice in November other than vote for the lesser of two evils, Barack Obama or John McCain, doesn’t cut it. First of all, the Democratic Party owes Hillary Clinton a public apology, and her supporters need to know for certain the party will no longer tolerate sexism and misogyny in its own ranks or from its bigoted allies in the media.

Until then, Madam Speaker, we’ll remember to vote present in November.

While Others Slack Off, Hillary Clinton Works

Hillary Clinton campaigns for Obama in Henderson, NV. Photo credits: AP

As a member of the US Senate, representing the state of New York, Hillary Clinton has long maintained a reputation for dedication, knowledge of the issues, wisdom, compassion, an ability to work across the aisle, and a passion for hard work.

Heidi Li Feldman observes that in the midst of the general election campaign, “Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton keeps on working while those around her take vacations, lay low on bus tours, or spend time laying out the melodramas of their lives on national television.

"Meanwhile, here's where everybody else is.
Senator Obama: on vacation (Hawaii)
Speaker Pelosi: on vacation
DNC Chair Howard Dean: on a bus tour to register voters (most recent stop Pittsburgh)
John Edwards: on television (proclaiming his own narcissism)"

Feldman suggests the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee, Barack Obama, is having a problem generating enthusiasm for his election to the presidency and that Hillary Clinton is apparently the only person attempting to do anything about it.

Read more: