Op-Ed Columnist - The Obama Slide - NYTimes.com

The administration...has joined itself at the hip to the liberal leadership in Congress... The result is the Obama slide, the most important feature of the current moment.... The public has soured on Obama’s policy proposals. Driven by this geneneral anxiety, and by specific concerns, public opposition to health care reform is now steady and stable...Amazingly, some liberals are now lashing out at Obama Some now argue that the administration should just ignore the the ignorant masses and ram health care through using reconciliation...This would be suicidal. You can’t pass the most important domestic reform in a generation when the majority of voters think you are on the wrong path...The second liberal response has been to attack the budget director, Peter Orszag. It was a mistake to put cost control at the center of the health reform sales job, many now argue. The president shouldn’t worry about the deficit. Just pass the spending parts. But fiscal restraint is now the animating issue for moderate Americans. To take the looming $9 trillion in debt and balloon it further would be to enrage a giant part of the electorate...This is a country that has always been suspicious of centralized government. This is a country that has just lived through an economic trauma caused by excessive spending and debt. Most Americans still admire Obama and want him to succeed. But if he doesn’t proceed in a manner consistent with the spirit of the nation and the times, voters will find a way to stop him.  The president’s challenge now is to halt the slide. That doesn’t mean giving up his goals. It means he has to align his proposals to the values of the political center: fiscal responsibility, individual choice and decentralized authority." via Op-Ed Columnist - The Obama Slide - NYTimes.com.