Obama’s 44 percent problem

A new national poll shows more than half of Americans don’t think President Barack Obama deserves reelection in 2012. The CNN/Opinion Dynamics survey found 52 percent opposed to the president’s reelection, while 44 percent favor him — certainly not good numbers for the White House.

Former Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean thinks Obama’s problem is he’s been too soft, that he blew it by not using the Democratic majority in Congress to ram through health care and other legislation. Appearing on Joe Scarborough’s MSNBC morning show, Dean said Obama should’ve stuffed bipartisan opposition (Republicans and some moderate Democrats) to health care by using “reconciliation.”  That’s a procedure that allows passage of legislation by a simple majority in the Senate, skirting the filibuster rule used by Republicans and Democrats alike to force broad consensus. In other words, the heck with Tea Partiers and independents who’re sour on Obamacare; hold their noses and make ‘em take the medicine.

Of course, calling on Obama to “get tough” (translated: get more liberal) is pretty easy if you’re from Vermont, which these days is just a little to the right of the Castros’ Cuba. That’s not gonna fly in Arkansas, Nevada, Indiana, Ohio, Colorado, Pennsylvania and other states where there will be major Senate races this year. Just ask Democratic incumbent Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas.  It’s a center-right country, and Obama’s problems will get worse if he listens to Dean and others urging him to shoot the political rapids by leaning even more to the left than he did throughout 2009.

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