Great Minds Think Alike: Paul Rahe Part Two

Paul Rahe and I have put forth remarkably similar analyses of the election and Barack Obama's effect on the polity.  Here is the nub of what I said  regarding what Obama has done to the Democrats:

How much pain will Barack Obama force the Democratic Party to endure and how much will it take?

I pointed out long ago that Democratic Party poobahs were going to have to start asking hard questions and potentially make some hard decisions about Barack Obama. This is now becoming conventional wisdom. As usual, I was early on this. The problem is only going to get more acute. Democrats simply have to be hearing from their mainstream donors (people who aren't George Soros or Peter Lewis) and from the business community that BO has to go and that the party has to get back to pro-business pragmatism before they'll get the old level of financial support. I think the Democrats have totally lost the mainstream business community and won't get it back until they push the progressive wing back out to the margins.

and

This will be gut-wrenching for Dems, they are likely facing an intra-party debate on the fundamental question of whether to go all in for Obama and resurrect his presidency or pull the plug entirely on Hopeandchange and, as they so famously put it, "move on."

Rahe gets it too:

Let me add that I believe something else as well – that, when it is all over, the adult wing of the Democratic Party (what is left of it) will breathe an audible sigh of relief. Barack Obama has done his party more harm than any President in the last hundred years (Jimmy Carter included); and, loyal partisans though these Democrats may be, they know it

It is this analysis that was the starting point for my theory that the Clintons were undermining the Lightworker and I think the evidence is overwhelming that they have been doing so.  Nearly every Clinton surrogate has been overtly or covertly undermining Obama's message and despite Bubba's nominal stumping he doesn't say a single thing that doesn't damn Obama with faint praise.  Smart Democrats realize that they will have more success running congressional candidates against a President Romney than on Obama 2.0's non-existent to negative coattails.

"First, if Obama wins another term it'll probably be accompanied by Republican gains in Congress and incumbency for many is a worse problem to have in the future than incumbency for one. Frankly, I think the Dems would rather run congressional candidates against a President Romney or President Perry rather than in tandem with an Obama second term"

Seeing as Rahe's analytical mindset is so close to my own, I find it hard to disagree in any great way with other elements of it, although I am less concerned about his prognosis for positive legislative wins in a Romney presidency.

To do what Romney needs to do, he has to have a cooperative Senate, and there is no way that Harry Reid, who despises Romney, will play ball. Nor is it likely that the Democrats in the Senate will buck their leadership. As the last few years have made clear, those up for re-election will be afraid of primary opposition from the left, and those with longer horizons will figure that, when they come up for re-election, Romney’s leverage will be minimal.

It is common for politicians in general and for Republican Presidential nominees in particular to operate on the basis of short-term calculations. This is nearly always a mistake, and I suspect that next year Mitt Romney will very much regret not having run a more partisan campaign.

I think Romney is a smart incrementalist.   He'll move forward in small, productive steps and when he starts getting results, he'll be able to peel away votes from Harry Reid.  I am more optimistic here than Rahe.