Sun sets on Obama’s era of grand reforms
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WASHINGTON — The curtain is all but certain to drop on President Barack Obama’s era of transformative reforms, even if Republicans fall short of their dreams of a mid-term election landslide next week.
Obama, elected on a heady wave of hope and change in 2008, compiled a historic resume of domestic legislative triumphs, overhauling health care and Wall Street and pumping billions of dollars into the crisis-strangled economy.
He succeeded by uniting his Democratic Party and adding several moderate Republicans to pass bills over the objection of their leaders. But such tactics will become obsolete in the new Washington that emerges after Nov. 2 polls.
Even if Republicans do not pull off a seizure of the House of Representatives and trim the Democratic edge in the Senate, as most analysts expect, Obama is sure to see his room for maneuver curtailed.
History, and the dynamics of power in Washington, suggest Obama’s political capital will be depleted after a mid-term rebuke from voters, with a testing run-up to his 2012 reelection bid in prospect..... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20101027com3.html
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