What The Special Election in NY Really Means for the President

There have been many commentators taking this question on for the past couple days or so, asking, “What will it mean for the President if the Democrats lose a seat they have held since 1923?” Many times in politics we can look too deep into something when it really does not mean anything at all, but in the current economic and social climate that we are facing here in this nation, I believe this election to say more than even most pundits may agree with. This election has told the President that he must work with the other side and use their ideas or he will never come close to winning another election in this nation again.

Some of you who are reading this may not take it to mean as much as that, but we have to look at the facts of this district and then make our call on how much it means. This district has been held in Democratic hands since 1923, has been held by many prominent Democrats such as Chuck Schumer and the late Geraldine Ferraro, and went strongly for Barack Obama in the last election, with the President winning 55% of the vote. In the latest polling, the people of the 9th district in NY are not so favorable to the President, with him polling at around 33% in a district that has never been a problem for the Democrats to grab up. The President needs to be worried, and he needs to get together with his people and figure out how to save his Presidency because it is imploding onto him.

These are the facts of the matter, and the President knows it. The White House and other Democrats are trying to downplay it as they downplayed the election of Scott Brown, but the fact of the matter is that the President just does not have that way with the people as he did when he was elected. He has learned the hard way one of the rules of politics: Never promise too much when you cannot deliver. To some extent that is not the fault of the President. How could he have imagined that the Congress, full of Democrats that eventually passed health care reform, would do nothing else but sit on their butts and fight with the other side about legislation they could have passed without the Republicans. In some way he was denied a first term that could have got him re-elected, but now he only has himself to blame because he has decided not to work with the other side. In fact, he has decided to tell the Republicans what they NEED to do, and that is to pass the American Jobs Act before anyone knows what is included in it. This may have worked with the Democrats in the House before the last election, but it will not work now.

In the political arena, the President has to be worried about these results even more than I am putting it into words. It is easy to play it off once or twice when an election does not go your way, but this will be the third time the Democrats have taken such a tough defeat. There are a few things the President can do, and I will help him out by laying them out in this blog for all you Democrats to see. This is very simple and will get him closer to being re-elected, if he has not ruined that chance for himself already with his ego.

1. Invite Republican leaders to the White House for a job summit- Bring the cameras and let the media see if the Republicans are ready to deal with the President. The President and the Vice-President should make it clear they are willing to add Republican ideas to the plan to get it passed as soon as possible, including the simplification of the tax code.

2. Send a NEW American Jobs Act to Congress- Include Republican ideas such as lowering taxes on small business and extending tax rates for the WEALTHIEST Americans, not at $200,000 and above but $1 Million and above. This will get some Republicans to back down a little on the attacks about raising taxes and the argument to the people about raising taxes on the “rich” will sound much better than it does right now.

3. Add a balanced budget Amendment to the bill- More Republican support would be adding to the spending plan, and it will also get the attention of those in the Tea Party and will give them less reason to shoot down the plan. With this addition and the last one that I will get to in a moment, you will have the Tea Party having to give their support for a jobs plan with what they are getting out of it.

4. Urge the House and the Senate to send to the states a repeal of the income tax, replacing it with a VAT, or flat tax option for the American people- With this coming out of the House and the Senate going on board with it, it will make the most fiscal of Conservatives happy, especially those in the Ron Paul camp. This may sound like a far fetched idea, and that it is, but the fact remains that if the President urged the end to the income tax while replacing it at the same time with another type of tax that could be debated in Congress, it shows that the President is working for the people and not his own interests. Right now he sounds like he is on the campaign trail, but what he really needs to do is get the ideas out there to the American people and judge their reactions. Without this, he has no chance of being re-elected. Listening to what the people want is key. Let’s face it, that is why he won the first election. He won because he promised everyone that he would give them what they wanted. Now is the time to put up or shut up.

While the President will never do these things I have put in this blog, as a person interested in the inter workings of the political game, I know that it would throw a monkey wrench into what the Republicans want to do. They want to make the President look bad because of his spending, but he is able to offer these plans and then asks for the money, he will look like he is moving in the right direction. While those on the right will still fight it, it would be hard to fight the fact that the President had called for the repeal of the income tax, something that you would never believe you would hear from a Democrat in the White House.

The Republicans running for the White House, however, have to also make sure they drive home the fact that our tax system is not working and we need a change. The talk of a new tax system is more prominent now than it has ever been in this nation, and the possibility that something could be done is real. There are some high profile people in this nation that do not want it touched, but at the end of the day I believe the people can have a strong enough voice to not only get rid of the income tax but also put a tax system in place where it does not costs businesses thousands, if not hundred’s of thousands, to run their business and pay their taxes.

The time to fight for the future is right now, especially with the loss of the seat for the Democrats in NY 9. It is time to mix ideas of the Republicans and all those Tea Party members to make this nation into what it can be, and that is a prosperous nation once more. It can be done and the President could have a hand in it, but seeing him all this time and knowing how he acts, we all know that he wants no part of it. He is no Bill Clinton, and because of that I believe that it will be a landslide victory for any Republican if our economic outlook stays the same.

(Shawn is an author and blogger, writing about politics and the way things COULD be with the right leadership. Check out the website for more political commentary, and thank you all for reading.)