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Noonan: Obama Misjudged America

'Common sense' could defeat reform

By Matt Cantor, Newser Staff

Posted Jul 24, 2009 7:47 AM CDT

(Newser) – For once, President Obama’s “fine-tuned antennae” seem to have betrayed him: it looks as though he’s “misjudged the nation’s mood” on health care reform, writes Peggy Noonan in the Wall Street Journal. We’re seeing opposition to the plan, even if it’s not yet showing up in the polls. Why? “Simple American common sense”: in most minds, the economy comes first, and fixing health care won’t likely improve the economy.

“The national mood has changed since the president was elected,” Noonan notes. At that time, people were focused on a need for change. But as the financial picture grew bleaker, Americans felt “a diminished sense of their country’s margin for error.” They’re “not in a chance-taking mood,” nor one for spending. In the end, the Congressional Budget Office report saying reform would cost a trillion dollars over a decade “might have killed health care.”

[Images (2)]

[Quotes (1)]

President Barack Obama speaks during a fundraiser, Thursday, July 23, 2009, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari)

President Barack Obama speaks during a town hall on health care, Thursday, July 23, 2009, at Shaker Heights High School in Shaker Heights, Ohio. (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari)

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The president, in short, may be facing a real loss. This will be interesting in a number of ways and for a number of reasons, among them that we’ve never seen him publicly defeated before, because he hasn’t been. - Peggy Noonan

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COMMENTS

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Showing 3 of 39 comments

A1A

Jul 25, 2009 12:55 PM CDT

I'm pretty sure the Democrats could pass whatever they could pass whatever they wanted. Obama, Pelosi and Reid haven't been able to rally their own troops to vote! BO should go back to being a community organizer, where race-baiting is acceptable.

Ucantusethatname

Jul 25, 2009 8:52 AM CDT

The economy should comes first. Fixing health care would worsen the economy. American does not want socialized medicine. No health care program would be paid for by cuts in waste, an idea that is totally BS. Any program would cost hundreds of billions of dollars. What is it that our narcissist president does not understand?

DontLikeYou___

Jul 25, 2009 5:21 AM CDT

Peggy Noonan is a liberal in Conservative clothing. She makes me sick. I wish she would go into exile with McCain and other Liberals masquerading as conservatives.

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Noonan: Obama Misjudged America