“It really does not matter if people agree, when you are in control you do whatever it takes to save the country. To Hell with being reelected or loved.”
Ideally, yes. In the real world, you have to think a bit further out. If you ATTEMPT the right thing now, and get DEFEATED, which will certainly be the case until 2013...why bother...since you just assured Obama’s 2013 re-election.
In other words, you have to be careful not to over-reach, or you may wind up with NOTHING (or less).
IMO, there is no downside to balancing the budget by 2012. There is enough waste, duplication of efforts and unnecessary govt expenditures to make this a no-brainer. If you do that, you will sweep to landslide victories in both the House, and Senate, then it doesn’t matter who is in the White House. How could a Democrat run against a properly run campaign to balance the Federal budget? The Republican party has hundreds of millions of dollars in their pocket right now, to overwhelm the public airways with targeted ads. Once the battle is begun, money would flow in from citizens of both parties. I would even send them money again.