Tomasky: Cut GOP off from Corporate Allies

Michael Tomasky suggests this strategy to President Obama on The Daily Beast.

But this is now the only way left to penetrate the GOP’s wall of obstruction: Drive the wedge right between the congressional GOP and its usual power centers. Corporate America wants immigration reform. It wants lower tax rates, and it (or a large majority of it) will happily accept infrastructure reform as part of a package. Obama wants those same things. The Republicans are against them. Surely at some point, some corporate leader or leaders will step forward and say enough. Even that probably won’t make congressional Republicans move; they are married to the most rabid section of their base, and they are not going to budge.

It’s a tragedy that the country has to be dragged down to this troglodytic level... But I believe and take comfort in this: They just can’t carry on this way forever. You can’t block background checks supported by 85 percent of the American people; some kind of action on climate change, which large majorities also support; comprehensive immigration reform, which the people (and the business elites and evangelical leaders) back; and corporate tax reform paired with investment and not have it all come back and bite you someday. If Obama can’t get them to the table, he can at least spent three years dangling carrots in front of them, letting them say no, and making sure the American people see.