Friday, December 16, 2011

Obama ready to cave on veto threat over Keystone pipeline provision?

His own party must have realized the cave was coming, though, because Emanuel Cleaver was backing off the threat just two days after The One made it. - HotAir

The politics were poisonous: Not only did it give the GOP an opening to seize the mantle of job creation, it pitted labor against Obama and the greens — and on top of all that, a veto would have meant torpedoing a tax break for the middle class, which he was never going to do with an election less than a year away. (That’s also why he caved on the millionaire surtax, natch.) Reminds me of the GOP’s predicament in the debt-ceiling standoff: O took a hostage he simply wasn’t prepared to shoot....

Senate Republicans think there are 14 Democrats willing to vote for the Keystone provision, which would be just enough to beat the filibuster. The White House must think so too or else Carney wouldn’t suddenly be conspicuously noncommittal. To be clear, the provision wouldn’t automatically approve the pipeline, it would merely force Obama to make a decision on it within the next 60 days. But that’s no help to O: Remember, his goal here isn’t necessarily to cancel the pipeline but merely to postpone a decision until after the election so that he’s not forced yet to choose between labor and the greens.

White House silent on whether Obama would veto payroll tax cut over pipeline deal - AP/Washington Post