Michael Barone‘s latest Washington Examiner article explores the “rough and ready process, with plenty of trial and error” that transforms public opinion into policy results.
What is clear is that there already have been significant cuts in domestic discretionary spending — far more than the Democratic Congress would ever have considered in 2010 — and that there will be more to come.
Congressional Democratic leaders could have avoided this by passing a budget resolution and appropriations in 2010 and by increasing taxes on high earners by extending the Bush tax cuts for everyone else. But despite their large majorities they never got around to doing so. Instead they watched glumly as Obama agreed to extend all the tax cuts in December, and they’re now negotiating billions in cuts they would never have countenanced last year
Why? Because of public opinion, as registered in poll responses to the Democrats’ vast expansion of the size and scope of government symbolized by, but not limited to, the February 2009 stimulus package and Obamacare.
As a result, Democratic leaders dared not ask their members to vote for the policies they favored. Despite their large majorities, they just didn’t have the votes.
