Obama: Republicans and Democrats actually are “fighting inside the 40-yard lines” on key issues
Note: President Obama let the cat out of the bag when talking to CEO’s at a Wall Street Journal event last month, saying that on key issues the Republicans and Democrats agree. Some of the quotes in the article below could have come from Ralph Nader describing how the Republicans and Democrats are more alike than different on the critical issues facing the nation. Anyone capable of seeing President Obama’s policies and not be confused by the Democratic Party label or the fact that he is the first African American president would see that he is surrounded by Wall Street advisers – that he selected, that his health care law was implemented by a former health insurance company executive, that the outsourcing leader – General Electric – is his jobs czar and that his food czar is a former Monsanto executive. But, for Obama to admit it makes the truth hard to ignore.
Republicans and Democrats actually are “fighting inside the 40-yard lines” on key issues, President Obama said Tuesday, and anyone who doubts that needs to visit other countries to get a look at real political and ideological divides.
American partisans often accuse the other party of being “socialists” (a Republican charge against Democrats) or “fascists” (the reverse), and Mr. Obama mocked the former at a meeting of top CEOs hosted by the Wall Street Journal in Washington.“People call me a socialist sometimes. But, no, you’ve got to meet real socialists. You’ll have a sense of what a socialist is,” Mr. Obama said. “I’m talking about lowering the corporate tax rate. My health-care reform is based on the private marketplace. The stock market is looking pretty good last time I checked.”
Mr. Obama, pitching his White House as business-friendly and focused above all on creating jobs and increasing economic growth, responded to a question about immigration reform by saying that Republicans and Democrats actually are not that far apart. He then evaluated the overall political landscape and dismissed the seeming gulf between his administration and congressional Republicans as minor disagreements compared to what’s seen in other parts of the world.
“In my conversations with Republicans, I actually think the divide is not that wide. So what we just have to do is find a pathway where Republicans, in the House in particular, feel comfortable enough about process that they can go ahead and meet us,” he said of immigration reform, before broadening his point.
“This, by the way, is a good example of something that’s been striking me about our politics for a while. When you go to other countries, the political divisions are so much more stark and wider. Here in America, the difference between Democrats and Republicans — we’re fighting inside the 40-yard lines,” he said.
For example, every European country has a major party that calls itself some variant of “socialist” or “social democrat” and which advocates, to at least some degree, public ownership of the means of production. France’s Francois Hollande, Britain’s Tony Blair and Germany’s Gerhard Schroeder are among the recent socialist-party leaders to have governed major powers.
Ben Wolfgang covers the White House for The Washington Times. Before joining the Times in March 2011, Ben spent four years as a political reporter at the Republican-Herald in Pottsville, Pa. He can be reached at bwolfgang@washingtontimes.com.