Hey, We Tried

Austan Goolsbee says that Obama should come clean:

Goolsbee: “I think Matt’s right that we ought to come forward — and both sides — and the president should have a mea culpa, that we have gotten into a place that was very different from what the campaign wanted it to be from 2008, one in which — and, look, I think you could blame more the Republicans, but I’m sure the Republicans would say more you blame the president, but we got to — we got to back away from that. Otherwise, we’re not going to be able to confront this pretty serious challenge at the time when we — when we could do it.”

Earlier in the show ABC News political analyst Matthew Dowd suggested that President Obama should issue a mea culpa to help address the partisan divide in Washington that, Dowd argued, is a partial result of Obama pushing a partisan health care law after running on a message of unity during the 2008 campaign. Here’s what Dowd said this morning:
Dowd: “I think — I think the president — the only thing I’d say about the president — I think his message is right, but he should start with a mea culpa, because the president in 2008 ran on this exactly same message. President Bush ran on this and didn’t do it and basically made the country more polarized.”

Things have apparently come full circle...