Back in 2007 and 2008, when he was a presidential candidate, Obama expressed surprising admiration for Reagan’s game-changing, tax-cutting presidency.

Like other campaign-trail wiseguys, I thought that this mostly was a sly, Obamian way of dissing the Clinton Years (and by extension Hillary Clinton) as an intellectually and historically inconsequential saga of mere survival.

Maybe he’s just been backed — or backed himself — into a Reaganite corner, but after the sweeping tax deal the president just made with Republicans, I’m wondering if he hadn’t meant more than we thought at the time…

Even if there is no democratic challenger to Obama, he is in grave danger of Carterization.

Consider this: if the economy improves over the next two years, it will in part be “because” of the Bush tax cuts! And if it doesn’t, it will be because of the Bush tax cuts that became the Obama tax cuts!