“What I said was never let a good crisis go to waste when it’s an opportunity to do things you had never considered or you didn’t think were possible,” says Former White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel.
This Forbes article discusses how scandals in the Obama administration can become opportunities to do things right.
Former White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel famously, or infamously, said at a 2008 Wall Street Journal Forum, “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste.” In 2011 he helpfully explained toFox News, “First of all, what I said was never let a good crisis go to waste when it’s an opportunity to do things you had never considered or you didn’t think were possible.”
With at least three Obama administration scandals swirling inWashington, and perhaps more on the way, a number of opportunities “to do the things … you didn’t think were possible” have emerged—like moving a conservative agenda.
President Barack Obama’s agenda for the immediate future, and probably for the next three years, is dead. D-E-A-D. One reason he has survived this long is that the media have been so supportive—one might say “coddling.” No surprise, since major news executives have siblings working for the White House.
But that’s changing, probably because the media think they’ve been lied to, repeatedly. Plus now they know the Justice Department was scrutinizing the AP’s phone records.
Politico’s Jim Vandehei and Mike Allen just published a piece entitled “D.C. Turns on Obama.” That apparently includes the authors. They write, “Obama’s aloof mien and holier-than-thou rhetoric have left him with little reservoir of good will, even among Democrats.” And in the next paragraph they say, “This White House’s instinctive petulance, arrogance and defensiveness have all worked to isolate Obama at a time when he most needs a support system.”
Ouch! That’s not House Speaker John Boehner talking; that’s from journalists. “D.C. Turns” indeed.
That turning will suck almost all of the air out Washington for proceeding with Obama’s agenda—though in fairness, a number of pundits have emerged recently wondering if he even has a second term agenda.
And people who would normally back the president could begin looking for ways to oppose him. Even ethics-challenged Rep. Charlie Rangel is stepping it back.
All that scrum likely means a country without any policy direction, as the administration shifts to permanent damage control, which means conservatives have a chance to fill the policy agenda void. Here are some suggestions.
ObamaCare Repeal — The House is set to vote on repealing ObamaCare again. But this time, repeal proponents should stress that a vote for ObamaCare is a vote for the IRS tracking your health care. The IRS wants funding for nearly 2,000 full-time employees to ensure Americans are obeying ObamaCare. Just how extensive the agency’s new power and controlwill be was intentionally left vague in the legislation. (Update: Now we learnthat the IRS person in charge of ObamaCare is the one who ran the office targeting conservative nonprofits.)
Very few politicians are going to want to expand the IRS’s size and power in the midst of news headlines about the agency’s abuse of power, which is exactly what ObamaCare does. This scandal creates an opportunity for some Democrats to agree that we need to end, or at the very least postpone, the legislation until Congress gets a handle on the scope of the IRS’s crimes and does something about it.
Tax Reform — There is bipartisan support for fundamental tax reform, and now is the perfect time to simplify the tax code by lowering rates and limiting tax breaks. A less-complicated tax system means fewer opportunities for tax agents to harass Americans.
And again, reformers need to stress that a vote for the status quo tax system is a vote of confidence in the IRS agents and management who perpetrated the unethical and possibly illegal targeting.
Entitlement Reform — There is some bipartisan support for entitlement reform, but it has been mostly nipping at the edges. Conservatives need to push forward with Rep. Paul Ryan’s bipartisan Medicare reform plan that expands on the current Medicare Advantage program already popular with more than a quarter of seniors.
And conservatives need to return to their roots on Social Security reform, by implementing a system of personal retirement accounts. Accounts could be small to begin with, perhaps allowing workers to set aside that 2 percentage points that were part of the “payroll tax holiday” in 2011 and 2012, but is now going to Social Security again.
The stock market is roaring and yet millions of Americans are excluded from the climb because they don’t have enough income left over to significantly fund a personal IRA. Personal retirement accounts have long been a key component of Republican entitlement reform. There’s no better time to reenergize that effort than when the market is up and Obama is down.
While Obama officials devote all of their time and effort trying to rescue their now-demolished promise that big government can be efficient, fair and truthful, conservatives should fill the policy void with proposals that will shrink the government and grow the economy. If successful, it could turn out that the worst thing for the Obama presidency is the best thing for the country.
Evan Granowitz is a practicing lawyer with several areas of expertise. Visit this Facebook page for more information.
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