Obama is now re-pushing for the Grand Bargain and is reaching out to republicans, and its obvious that this is partly being done to appease the beltway for their tsk tsk views on not being serious about cutting entitlements. Obama needs to learn from his 2012 campaign that the old "lets make a deal", triangulate playbook that the beltway media advocates is an obsession and fantasy that has no support among the american people. That was the playbook his entire 2012 campaign ultimately repudiated.
I don't think its appreciated enough how the 2012 campaign, much more than 2008, changed the psyche of many democrats regarding who owns the playing field in national politics. In substance and style, the 2012 campaign of a democratic president was a repudiation of the 1996 campaign of a democratic president.
I remember the '96 campaign vividly, and the main thrust of Cliinton's re-election was acute triangulation and playing to the beltway consensus to be the reasonable man in washington. Whether it was highlighting areas where he thought abortion should be illegal (the flip of the rape exception), DOMA, welfare reform, decrying the era of big government, he basically co-opted a lot of the republican party platform. It got to the point that republicans got so exasperated with Bob Dole venting that there is no position Bill Clinton will not switch to win re-election.
Now compare that to Obama's campaign, where women's rights, Bain Capital, and higher taxes were the clubs they used to beat Romney. They basically beat him into submission to the point that, for the first time, we saw a republican triangulate in the biggest stage of all, the presidential debates. Mitt Romney was denying he would cut taxes for the rich, something republicans used to unabashedly advocate. He was claiming he was for contraceptive access, something social conservatives view as the policies of satan.
And you know what, the whole way through the media was criticizing the Obama campaign. Too negative, too focused on social issues, to harsh on bain...all the typical beltway advice the president seems so intent on listening to now. To illustrate this point, nothing was more vivid of this 2012 vs 1996 clash than the early democratc backlash to the Bain attacks. You had Ed Rendell, Corey Booker, Third Way, Clinton, and all "serious democrats" critiquing the strategy. You had anonymous democrats talking to politico about how the campaign was botching this because americans don't resent people their success. So for about a week this story of democrats abandoning the Obama campaign was all over the news, and you had some surrogates going wishy washy on attacking Bain.
This all changed when Obama was asked, later that week at a NATO Conference in Chicago, whether he should reconsider this strategy of focusing so heavily on Bain in light of Corey Booker and company. Before the questioner even finished his question Obama started shaking his head signaling his disagreement with the entire premise and said "This is what this election will be about." From then onwards, all democrats shut up and got the message. This resulted in a democratic convention where abortion, gay rights, and Bain Capital attacks were shouted by basically every speaker.
Now, compare that today. Sure, Obama has signaled progressive pushes in his 2nd terms on immigration, gun control, early childhood education, marriage equality etc...but he still has this need to play to the washington consensus on deficits and the grand bargain. Its sad that Obama, whose brutally successful 2012 campaign was a complete repudiation of the beltway consensus, still views these people as worthy of respect, particularly on these deficit issues. It's like he thinks being serious on these issues is the price of admission. Well, the price of admission for a democrat to win the presidency was to hide his/her social views and don't talk about taxes. Well, some guy tore up that ticket and re-wrote it last year. Obama should talk to him.