POLITICO has got a super good read up today about President Obama's political conundrum, replete with lots of White House spin about how a President who has jacked up the debt more than any man ever living (times two) is super concerned about mounting debt.
When it comes to deficit reduction and entitlement reform, President Barack Obama has been a master of mixed signals…He set up a blue-ribbon deficit commission last year — even promised its report wouldn’t gather dust on the shelves — then promptly distanced himself from it.
As Politico points out, Obama has been talking about deficit reduction for years. Talking, not acting:
It would have been hard for the White House to dodge the issue altogether, given the steady drumbeat of criticism that Obama has failed to lead. But he also has to live down, or up to, his own previous statements.
Obama also is expected to target wasteful health care spending, redundancies and fraud, a mainstay of all reform plans for years.