Madtown HD Junkie
March 21st, 2009, 09:34 AM
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0309/20306.html
President Barack Obama’s ambitious early agenda has freed him from a typical obligation of presidents: Keeping the party's organized interest groups happy.
On March 10, the labor movement’s prize legislation was introduced in Congress, and President Barack Obama celebrated by chastising teachers’ unions. In February, he (again) skipped Tavis Smiley’s State of the Black Union. And when he fulfilled a key promise to the abortion rights movement, he did it with minimum ceremony, on a Friday afternoon.
“He’s not a president who checks the box and does what some people would consider the minimum to keep various constituencies happy,” said Bill Samuel, the chief lobbyist for the AFL-CIO. “He doesn’t have to, because he’s doing very big things.”
But even as he's publicly keeping them at arms length and saying little on so-called wedge-issues, he's been quietly advancing their agendas, hitching many of them to the economic crisis that, he's said, is also an opportunity American cannot afford to waste...............
President Barack Obama’s ambitious early agenda has freed him from a typical obligation of presidents: Keeping the party's organized interest groups happy.
On March 10, the labor movement’s prize legislation was introduced in Congress, and President Barack Obama celebrated by chastising teachers’ unions. In February, he (again) skipped Tavis Smiley’s State of the Black Union. And when he fulfilled a key promise to the abortion rights movement, he did it with minimum ceremony, on a Friday afternoon.
“He’s not a president who checks the box and does what some people would consider the minimum to keep various constituencies happy,” said Bill Samuel, the chief lobbyist for the AFL-CIO. “He doesn’t have to, because he’s doing very big things.”
But even as he's publicly keeping them at arms length and saying little on so-called wedge-issues, he's been quietly advancing their agendas, hitching many of them to the economic crisis that, he's said, is also an opportunity American cannot afford to waste...............