When is a veto threat not a veto threat?

Mother Jones:

Which brings me to the one sentence in the White House fact sheet that is in boldface: "The President will veto any bill that takes one dime from the Medicare benefits seniors rely on without asking the wealthiest Americans and biggest corporations to pay their fair share."

Before GOPers even saw the details of Obama's plan, they were blasting it (predictably) as class warfare. Is Obama ready to pound back?

This is known as a message. Obama is saying that he won't take anything away from Medicare beneficiaries—and he'll continue to point out that the Republicans are on record as supporting ending the Medicare guarantee for seniors. But there is, it seems, wiggle room here. If the GOPers relent on revenues and OK a tax hike on the wealthiest Americans and biggest corporations, might Obama consider trimming benefits for some seniors? With this statement, Obama looks as if he's both prepping to stand firm—while still being open to a grand bargain that includes more extensive entitlement cuts.

I thought the same thing the moment I saw the veto "threat." This goes back to the concern I've already noted a few times in the past several days. Yes, the President appears to be playing hard(er) ball with the GOP, and that's great. But is he capable of sustaining the effort? This veto threat was weasel-y. And it's the kind of pandering-to-both-sides kind of language that we'd expect from the old Obama, not the new and improved "fighting" Obama.  It also, justifiably, opens Democrats to attack from Republicans in the 2012 elections for being willing to cut Medicare benefits.  And when defending Medicare was one of the only things Democrats had going for them in next year's elections, that's just dumb.