The Next 100 Days

The first 100 days have been, in some sense, the easy part. President Obama gave stuff to people. Now he's going to have to ask people to give things up.
Domestically, he has primarily accomplished two things: He has succeeded at client politics (i.e. pleased the Democratic base), and he has gotten the federal government to perform demand-side spending (i.e. given things to people). For his efforts, the American people have rewarded him with an approval rating above 60 percent. And Congress has passed a budget resolution that starts to pay for his top priorities.
So far, Obama has been extraordinarily deferential to the legislative branch, drawing only the broadest of outlines and letting powerful liberal committee chairs in the House and centrist committee chairs in the Senate fill in the details. He's tinkered at times, but mostly he's just listened or occasionally cajoled -- acting as a president who respects the balance of power.
As press secretary Robert Gibbs explained to me in an interview, "This White House does not think in one-hundred day increments." The statement is more than a platitude. As senior officials planned Obama's presidency during the transition, they thought through the year in increments of six months, paying only perfunctory attention to the media's artificial 100 day deadline.
In the second 100 days, one administration official told me, Obama may be somewhat less deferential toward congress - at least with respect to certain issues. He may, for example, use the bully pulpit to press for a cap-and-trade emissions credit system, which Congress has so far failed to make the case for: Selling the general idea of energy reform is easy, but pushing through a specific component that would (at least temporarily) hurt Southern and Midwestern oil- and coal-producing states, is more politically contentious.
On health care, Obama expects substantive progress toward a bill in both chambers. The House's measure will likely include a significant expansion of government-run programs; the Senate will probably go in a different direction, coupling a mandate for insurance with expensive government subsidies for those who can't afford it.
"On health care, it's really simple," a senior administration official told me. "As long as they move to insurance for all and cost containment," the administration will be happy. This isn't to say that the White House won't involve itself in the debate - it will - but Obama will be content to let Congress make the sausage. Obama wants a bill by the end of the year, and he probably will have one. Officials note that there has been an internal debate about whether to press Congress to include a major, public alternative to private insurance plans as part of health care reform. But what Obama will do is an open question. link...