Apparently, support of 67% of the American public doesn’t get you what it used to.
Today I watched Barack Obama’s quasi-impromptu press conference where he made a few canned remarks about his compromise in principle with Republicans on extending the Bush tax cuts for everyone for two years. Before I get into the media’s reaction, I want to highlight a CBS poll conducted a week ago. A whopping 67% of Americans say that the Bush tax cuts should either be allowed to expire for everyone, or expire just for those making more than $250,000 a year. Below is the exact breakdown. I have added the data in the bottom row which shows what percentage of Republicans, Democrats, and independents want (at the very least) the tax cuts for the $250,000-plus crowd to expire. This is done simply by adding rows three and four:
CBS Poll conducted 11/29-12/01 All REPS DEMS INDS Continue for all 26% 46 10 25 Continue for households <$250K 53 41 70 47 Expire for all 14 11 14 17 Expire for >$250K (at very least) 67 52 84 64
Most amazing of all, notice how a majority (52%) of self-identified Republicans think the tax cuts for those making over $250,000 should expire.
Watching the news, you would never know that two-thirds of Americans are in favor of not extending the tax cuts for these wealthier Americans. Meanwhile, a straight 53% say the tax cuts should be extended just for those making under $250,000. And you wouldn’t know this because every media outlet I have seen report on this tax cut compromise—whether CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and so on—has presented this as an instance of Obama defying his “liberal base” and nothing more. See for yourself:
But it’s just the newest chapter of an old fight, and despite the liberal base’s fury, it’s evidence that Obama is trying to re-center himself before the 2012 elections.
He made clear he was willing to alienate his liberal base in the interest of compromise, more interested in crafting measures that can pass to the benefit of the middle class than waging battle to the end over principle.
Even as liberals complain, White House officials believe independent voters will reward him if he’s seen as leading
By cutting the deal they have, the White House has likely concluded that it is more important to cozy up to the middle than it is to keep it’s left-leaning base happy, probably believing that it has no where else to go and will, therefore, stick with Obama through 2012.
As we just saw in the CBS poll, which merely confirmed similar results in previous polling on this issue (see here and here), two-thirds of Americans do not want tax cuts extended for anyone making over $250,000. And yet the American media would have us believe that in striking this deal, Obama dealt a cold serving of mainstream political reality to his überliberal critics. Except that unless Obama’s “liberal base” is that aforementioned two-thirds of the American population who are against extending the tax cuts for the wealthy, this analysis makes no sense whatsoever.
What this sorry episode shows is that our media is incapable of or unwilling to present serious political and economic issues in a way that goes beyond a convenient, narrow, and usually false left-right dichotomy. This narrative reminds me of the health care debate—based on the media coverage of which, you’d never know that 60% of Americans wanted a government health insurance option to compete with private coverage. Now once again, we are being told that the political realities being what they are, there’s just no possible way to extend tax cuts for the middle class while allowing them to lapse for the wealthy because only a majority of the American population favors it.
Perhaps this really does mean that a majority of Americans are in that “liberal base” the media keeps talking about.
- Max Canning
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