Obama's empty charm offensive

Obama said in the interview that while he is willing to do “some tough stuff,” he made it clear that “ultimately it may be that the differences are just too wide.” He would reject, he said, GOP demands in exchange for new revenues that would “gut” Medicare, Social Security or Medicaid. “If that’s the position, then we’re probably not gonna be able to get to a deal.”

So their four-star food has barely been digested, no one has held any serious meeting with numbers on the table and already Obama sounds as if negotiations have blown up once more. It’s enough to make burned-out voters even more cynical, and forget the earnest Republicans like Sens. Bob Corker, Lindsey Graham, Saxby Chambliss and others he would need to get any proposal to be taken seriously. It is stunning Obama is already so dismissive, given that Americans are souring rapidly on his second-term performance. The latest ABC News/Washington Post poll shows voters’ approval of President Obama has dropped 5 points since January and that his 18-point advantage over Republicans on who the public trusts more to manage the economy has dropped to just 4 points since December.