I might mention here that Steve Israel is no liberal:
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chair Steve Israel warned lawmakers on Friday that he would have trouble recruiting candidates for office if the party caved on Medicare during the debt ceiling negotiations.
The comments came during a closed-door caucus meeting. Multiple sources confirmed the remarks, describing them as “impassioned.”
“He said recruits would not consider running if Democrats did not stand up for Medicare,” one attendee told The Huffington Post. “He added that national polling showed a seismic shift against House Republicans after the [Paul] Ryan budget because of Medicare.”
Maybe that’s why Obama is acting now (if not now, when?) to gut/cut/”strengthen” SocSec, Medicare and Medicaid:
It sure as hell will not help the Democrats.
Or, as Susie notes above, maybe Obama really has internalized the need to make the US a Third World economy, with the small Uberwealthy at the top, a small and insecure professional class, and a mass of poor to holding on by their fingertips.