The untold story of this election cycle, thanks to the apathetic media, is what happens after the elections, since neither Obama has been forthcoming on his vision for a second term nor has Romney been forthcoming on what he intends to do as President other than get Congress together and bipartisanize.
Jonathan Chait does a great job of breaking down in terms of how the chess pieces are already set in place for how each side will behave in case of victory and, in absolutely clear analysis, looks at how Obama played his hand with Congress with a longer term view. It really is the story of Paul Ryan vs Barack Obama - everybody else mere pawns in this battle for the American future - including Romney.
You have probably heard a terrifying tale of dysfunction and impending doom, with the catchphrase “the fiscal cliff” used by budget wonks to describe all the automatic changes scheduled for January 1. It’s a story of disaster that could arrive by accident and must be prevented at all costs. Every aspect of this narrative is inaccurate.
If there is one article political junkies and policy mavens must read this election cycle, this is the one. It breaks down exactly how the chess pieces have been set in play by Paul Ryan for enabling the radical, Randian wing ideas to be branded into the hide of the American psyche, and for re-instituting a morose version of Bush II, and how Obama has juxtaposed his pieces just as cleverly to deliver on his ideas. At the heart of it all is the battle for the budget and the single most important reason Paul Ryan has been thrust on the Republican ticket - it is his Ryan Budget, after all. Romney has no economic ideas of his own and he is tethered to the Ryan Budget, except for changes in the margins, that could end up devastating the American economy just as it is about to take a turn for the better.
If Romney wins the election....as part of their big-bang vote on the Ryan plan, Republicans could just cancel the tax hikes and spending cuts they don’t like without finding other ways to fill the hole in the budget, and live with the pain of being called deficit hypocrites by Rachel Maddow and Paul Krugman. But if Obama wins, starting on January 1, everything that has held true in Washington for the past two years flips upside down. Even tax reform, which the two parties have endlessly discussed but failed to agree on, will suddenly become very easy, because instead of using reform to make people pay more, any new reform will tax people less. The term that keeps popping up among Obamans is break—as in, “we have to break the Republicans on taxes.” Assuming Obama wins reelection, the moment the apple falls in Times Square, the Republican anti-tax crusade will be broken, and with it the pathology that has launched the deficit wars.
It is all the more important for Democrats to stop fussing about debate performances and polls at this critical juncture and GOTV - for House seats, Senate seats and for the President. This will truly be the most defining election of a lifetime that could set the nation on a path - of prosperity and human values should Obama win, or Plutocracy and longer term poverty of the human condition, should Romney win.
Read the long article in full. It's an eye-opener.