Yes, it's the WSJ, and it's owned by Murdoch. Once upon a time, you could trust the Journal's news division, even though their editorial stance was staunchly conservative. Sadly, with Murdoch in charge, we have no idea if the Wall Street Journal's news division is real, or simply a wholly-own subsidiary of FOX News. Still, Jonathan Weisman, who wrote the story, is a real journalist, formerly of the Washington Post, so it's worth exploring what he says:
Sen. Tom Coburn (R., Okla.) got a call at home from Mr. Obama on a Saturday morning in late July. The two have been close since the president was a senator. "You need to take what you want to do and really spell it out," Mr. Coburn says he told the president. "You need to see if you can get some of us to come across the line, and accomplish 80% of what you want to do."It's hard to tell what's more disturbing, that Obama would ask arch-conservative Tom Coburn for advice, or that Coburn's advice was actually worthwhile, and Obama blew it off.
"I understand what you're saying," Mr. Coburn says Mr. Obama told him, "but I don't think we're there yet."
Some Democrats say the president exacerbated the message problem by being too distant from the legislative process and too vague to the public about his aims. (The White House says it was right to stay aloof from the process but is now ready to wade in.) Democrats also say that for all their preparations, they never anticipated Republicans and their allies rolling out incendiary accusations that the Obama plan would empower "death panels," help illegal immigrants and raid Medicare.I'm simply not familiar with an effective battle strategy that consists of sitting back and doing nothing for 90% of the war, while the enemy destroys you. Slow and steady does not win the race when you refuse to even defend yourself, let alone go on the attack. Also, this notion of no one anticipating that the Republicans would be so mean. With all due respect, anyone who didn't anticipate the Republicans would go all out to stop health care reform should resign their job immediately.
