Well, this sure seems like a big shift from yesterday's White House statement:
We have to make these middle-class tax cuts permanent. To me, it's unthinkable that we would continue the uncertainty in the job market, that we would risk letting these middle-class tax credits falter. It would have a significant economic impact. Our recovery is under way, but it's fragile, it's too slow, especially for the American middle-class, and Congress needs to act now, again, before they leave town, to make sure that taxes do not go up for middle-class Americans. They can't afford it, but the economy cannot afford it either.
So I urge the Senate to join the House -- it'll be today or tomorrow, I guess tomorrow now -- voting on the bill passed by the House to permanently extend tax cuts for the middle-class. And I urge them to do so.
There's a big difference between having Vice President Biden push for the House-passed tax cut plan and having the President himself make the case, but Biden's statement is still night-and-day compared to yesterday's defeatist statement in which the White House declared its impotence in the face of GOP obstruction. Obviously, it won't mean a damn thing if the White House doesn't follow through and ratchet up the pressure on Senate Republicans to allow a vote on extending middle-class tax cuts, but Biden's statement at least rekindles some hope that the administration might decide to fight after all.