Obama's Lost the Middle Class

Barack Obama knows now, if he didn’t already, that he has a genuine political crisis on his hands. Blame Martha Coakley if you like, but even she could have won if Obama and his policies had been more popular in Massachusetts, contends John Judis of the New Republic. Bloggers think Obama’s losing ground because he’s disappointed liberals, but polls show that where he’s really losing ground is with the white working class.

“Obama’s political problem boils down to the difficulty he has speaking to and for middle America,” Judis concludes. He’s seemed too cozy with big business, first by helping the banks without enough preconditions, and then by allowing health care’s burdens to appear to fall on seniors and unionized workers instead of insurance companies. He “ceded too much to policy wonks” and “took his eye off of the political imperative of keeping middle America in his corner.” (More Barack Obama stories.)