Socialist? Worse, He May Be a 'Corporatist': Frank Rich

Republicans sometimes trot out the word "socialist" to slam President Obama, but they've got it exactly backward, writes Frank Rich in the New York Times. The bigger fear—the one causing disillusionment and justified cynicism among his supporters—"is that he might be just another corporatist, punking voters much as the Republicans do when they claim to be all for the common guy."

Look at Billy Tauzin, the former Blue Dog Democrat who jumped ship to the GOP before landing his current job as a big pharma lobbyist. As a candidate, Obama blasted him for preventing Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices. This is the same Tauzin who just struck a deal with the White House—to protect drug prices. Yes, "the making of legislative sausage is never pretty," but Obama promised us change. In ways that matter, his White House is sticking to the same old same old.
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