Tongues sure were a-waggin’ over the Obama/Romney kiss-and-make-up-lunch yesterday. The event was shrouded in Illuminati-like mystery, and the physical evidence that Romney even attended the meeting wouldn’t satisfy your average Bigfoot hunter.
Many in the press lamented that they weren’t “flies on the wall” at the lunch, which apparently featured white turkey chili (no doubt made from the Thanksgiving turkey Obama “pardoned”. Just a little warning to Mitt). However, not possessing six legs and a taste for dog shit, the press was left to speculate as to what the two discussed. Suggestions ranged from Obama getting pointers on how to steer the government through the current budget crisis (I’m sure) to a possible cabinet position for Mittens (pull the other one).
I noticed, however, that the least-mentioned possibility to justify the unusual White House powwow (other than good sportsmanship) might be that Obama wants the Prince of the Plutocrats to help walk the Republicans back from the fiscal cliff.
Fiscal cliff!! Fiscal cliff! Fiscal cliff! If you repeat it ten million times in front of a mirror they say that Herbert Hoover will appear!  Boy, am I ever tired of hearing that term! But despite daily protestations from both political parties that they will never honor their mutual suicide pact, it seems to be a real possibility in the minds of even sober pundits that Washington will let that axe fall. It does not help that our leaders continue to operate in Hollywood thriller mode, where no matter of consequence can be resolved before the timer reaches 00:00:01. It is also a testament to the die hard personality of the GOP’s fiscal Cold Warriors that we still don’t have a deal, when the outlines of a resolution cannot have changed much in the past year.
We should not forget that holding the line on taxes is pretty much the only thing now keeping the conservative movement together. The electorate just delivered stinging rebukes to Republicans on gay marriage, color, immigration, Obamacare, and they even broke the Carter/Bush-41 curse on electoral fortunes in down economies. Despite 2010’s Tea Party putsch, the Republicans’ reason for being has never been murkier.
And this has not been lost on Obama, who after four wishy-washy years has finally found a frozen flag pole that the Republicans are afraid to lick. The President may talk modestly about resisting second term overreach, but just listening to Jay Carney swear that The rich will pay their fair share, by Crom! tells a different story. Obama’s sexy and he knows it.
If the Republicans yield before the clock strikes midnight on the eve of the Cliffpocalypse then Obama will have done what no Democrat was thought capable of doing, that being breaking the back of Grover Norquist. But if the Republicans do allow doomsday to arrive, then their reckless disregard for America’s fiscal health (a record that includes the Bush deficits, the  Crisis of ’08 and the more recent credit downgrade), will literally be all they are known for in living memory. Meanwhile, Obama will gather fresh laurels as he stumps for reinstating those Middle Class tax cuts, and will probably go down in history as the Black Reagan.
So Obama may have offered a job to Romney after all, to deliver the following message to those Republicans still fighting the last war: It’s over. But if Romney can’t get the point across, perhaps Heisenberg can:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRoQNIz_fU8&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]
