The PBS Newshour provides a video of Obama's speech today on immigration, Watch President Obama's Full Speech at NALEO 06/22/2012:
In this speech, Obama manages to get through the speech without doesn't pepper-spraying his own message!
He makes a straightforward case for his new pro-immigrant Executive Order, criticizes Republicans several time and uses the word "Republicans", a made a moral and patriotic case for his policy while drawing a clean line between his position and the Republicans'. He even manages to make his we-are-all-Americans point without pitching it in silly "postpartisan" terms. Instead, he pitches it as the need to act as a national community. And he even resurrects "Yes We Can!"
I'm of a mind that even mentioning the word "deficit" in his speeches is a bad idea. But listening to the video, I noticed only two mentions, one of which was demanding that the One Percent pay more taxes to reduce it.
Until last week, Obama's aggressive deportation policy was more drastic than that of any previous Administration. And we'll have to see how he actually performs on it now.
But as far as the speech goes, this is the kind of progressive talk that he needs to use to draw clear lines between himself and Romney for the November election.
We'll have a fight to save Social Security and Medicare in December no matter who wins. But we're more likely to save those programs if it's a re-elected Obama we're fighting against than a lame-duck Obama who desperately wants his Grand Bargain as part of his Presidential legacy. I actually hope he gets worried enough about his re-election prospects to start hammering the Republicans with a promise that he will veto any cuts in Social Security or Medicare benefits. That would build a consensus against the Grand Bargain he tried to get enacted last year.
Tags: 2012 election, barack obama, comprehensive immigration reform
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