‘He’s just a lousy negotiator — that’s all I’d say,” a loyal Democratic businessman insisted to me the other day. “He doesn’t know how to make a deal.”
He was speaking of the newly re-elected president, Barack Obama.
As a new movie, Lincoln, focuses on the greatest president’s supple, persistent, zigzagging management of congressional politics to end slavery, the limits of Obama’s bargaining skills are back in the spotlight.
He has a month to persuade House Republicans and Senate Democrats to strike a deal to avoid the huge tax rises and spending cuts that were pledged 16 months ago, when the country was about to hit its debt ceiling, as an incentive to reach an agreement on the long-term debt. If no deal is reached,