New Obama strategy: Beat up poor people [View All]

[ProSense]

New Obama strategy: Beat up poor people

To prove it is "serious" about the deficit, the White House proposes cutting a program that helps pay heating bills

By Andrew Leonard

The Obama administration, reports National Journal's Mark Ambinder, will propose big cuts to a program that provides energy assistance to poor people when it unveils its suggested 2012 budget. "The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP," writes Ambinder, "would see funding drop by about $2.5 billion from an authorized 2009 total of $5.1 billion."

The news is generating a lot of outrage from progressives, in large part because of a paragraph that suggests that the White House wants to gain political advantage from being seen as tough on the most vulnerable Americans -- people who can't afford heating oil during cold winters.

It's the biggest domestic spending cut disclosed so far, and one that will likely generate the most heat from the president's traditional political allies. That would satisfy the White House, which has a vested interest in convincing Americans that it is serious about budget discipline.

Intriguingly, an updated version of Ambinder's piece changed the wording of the beginning of second sentence from "That would satisfy the White House" to "Such complaints might satisfy the White House." Do you suppose some of the unnamed sources who leaked this story to Ambinder gave him an earful after seeing just how angry the initial reaction to his infelicitous phrasing was turning out to be?

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Outrage erupts. It's going to be interesting to see how this plays out.